When Ashley felt good, she nested. She lined up the cans on the shelves, or stacked the kindling again, or else she’d sit and watch birds through the glass window. She found chaga on an old birch tree not far away, and ground it up between rocks to make a dark tea. She’d mix in a little sugar and hand the cups to Bullfrog and Mara and sit there watching while they drank. If either of them put a cup down unfinished, Ashley stared until they picked it up again. “It’s good for you,” she said. “It’s good for inflammation,” which made Mara think of Kyle, and maybe it did for Ashley, too, because then she’d be quiet for a while.

Ashley didn’t like the trapline. She felt bad for the animals. But she tended other things, washing laundry in a bucket of lake water by the stove, pausing to warm her hands. The evenings came earlier now, and they didn’t like to use the lights, the batteries, more than they had to. But sometimes Ashley would light a candle and read to them from one of the books on the shelves. They were mostly trapping manuals, but she found a cowboy paperback, full of shoot-outs and lost love, and she read the dialogue in a terrible Texas accent, like she was starting once more, in her small way, to perform.

When it got too dark to read, or when their eyes were tired, they sang—old folk songs, pop songs, whatever they could recall. Mara had never been able to sing on key, but that didn’t seem like a thing that mattered anymore, or even existed. Voices were just voices, except for Ashley’s, which was more than that. She harmonized on the chorus. Mara built up the fire before going to sleep beside her. Days like that, it felt something like a life.

Other times were different. Ashley thrashed in the night, and Mara calmed her until her panic slowed. Or else Ashley would lie in bed late, and when Mara checked on her, she was not sleeping but staring blankly at the log wall.

Sometimes Ashley woke sobbing and didn’t stop the whole day. Silent now, the way she cried. Eyes dull as tears rolled through them. When Mara touched her, she jolted. As if she’d been struck. But Mara could keep touching her, stroking her forehead, her back, until finally Ashley’s muscles relaxed, and it felt like a war had been won or at least stalled. Sometimes Mara petted her for hours. She pulled the knots from Ashley’s hair with her fingers, as gently as she could. There were always more knots, and they grew quickly, the way she tossed at night. Mara tried to untangle them, and Ashley let her, or maybe in times like that she just didn’t care.

On those days, Mara knew better than to ask questions. Ashley wouldn’t answer, and it seemed to stress her out to try. In her worst times, it was like she couldn’t make sentences at all. She’d start talking and gasp, or choke on one word again and again. She worked herself into a frenzy. “I can’t,” she said. “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t—”