As suddenly as it had started, the new snow had stopped falling, which stopped muting everything. I slowed, conscious of the crunching sound I made, blundering through snow and leaves. At the edge of the tree line, I froze. Before me, the hill sloped down to the ditch, and then to the road.

I saw my truck, my truck that had crashed against the tree. A little smoke rose from it. Otherwise, it seemed frozen in time. Nothing moved, even the snow on the hood. It looked etched there. The glittering and broken glass had been on the ground forever, part of the road. I didn’t hear the engine anymore. Had it been turned off? Or died? The truck looked as still as the dead. It waited, a part of the woods now.

Down the road, I heard the men’s voices again. They were arguing.

The man with the rifle had put down his gun. He was examining things they had pulled from my truck and laid out on the road. Our stuff. The man and Jake were debating what was useful, who should get what. I felt a hot surge of shame, seeing our belongings splayed out—my long underwear, Jamey’s fuzzy boots—and I felt anger. We needed those supplies, the warm clothes, the food. We had paid for them, been gifted them. And we had nothing now.

“I don’t see any ammo,” the man with the rifle said. “Or weed. And this knife is shit.”

“Whatever,” Jake said. “It’s a blade. The grower is gonna come back for this stuff. She’s gonna come back for this house. She can’t survive out here. We just gotta wait her out.” He clapped the man’s shoulder. “I gotta piss.”

In the trees, I drew the heaviness from my pocket.

My hand trembled, but maybe it was from the weight of the gun. I stilled my hand against my side, keeping the gun pressed close to me. I crept right behind the trees, parallel to Jake’s path, his dragging, shuffling walk. Snake walk. He headed alongside the ditch, farther down the road.

I shadowed him. When he stopped, I stopped. I put my head down, my heart knocking in my chest. I hardly dared to breathe in case he heard me, turned his face to see me. And I listened.

The woods were still. No birds sang. Had they fled or had we killed them? No deer pulled the bark off trees. Had the deer escaped or been hunted to death? Or wasted away? No other cars came. I listened.