Dad laughed once, then went silent. His eyes widened when he realized they weren’t joking.

“That’s my choice, actually,” Mr. Walker said. “Large Marge has a different plan.”

“Ernt, you’re going to pack your shit up and go to the slope,” Large Marge said. “The pipeline is hiring men like you—it’s a Sodom and Gomorrah up there—and they need mechanics. You’ll make a pile of money, which you need, and you’ll be gone until spring.”

“I can’t leave my family alone until spring,” Dad said.

“How thoughtful you are,” Mr. Walker muttered.

“You think I’ll just leave her to you?” Dad said.

“Enough, boys,” Large Marge said. “You can clank antlers later. For now, Ernt is leaving and I’m moving in. I’ll stay with your girls for the winter, Ernt. I’ll keep them safe from everything and everyone. You can come back in the spring. By then, maybe you’ll know what you’ve got and treat your wife as she deserves.”

“You can’t make me go,” Dad said.

“That’s not the A answer,” Large Marge said. “Look, Ernt. Alaska brings out the best and the worst in a man. Maybe if you’d stayed Outside you never would have become who you are now. I know about ’Nam, and it breaks my heart what you boys went through. But you can’t handle the dark, can you? It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Most folks can’t. Accept it and do what’s best for your family. You love Cora and Leni, don’t you?”

Dad’s expression changed as he looked at Mama. Everything about him softened; for an instant, Leni saw her dad, the real him, the man he would have been if the war hadn’t ruined him. The man from Before. “I do,” he said.

“Perfect. You love them enough to leave and provide for them,” she said. “Go pack your shit and hit the road. We’ll see you again at breakup.”

1978

1978

Chapter Twelve

TWELVE

Seventeen-year-old Leni drove the snow machine with confidence in the falling snow. She was all alone in the vastness of winter. Following the glow of her headlights in the predawn dark, she turned onto the old mine road. Within a mile or so the road became a trail that twisted and turned and rose and fell. The plastic sled behind her thumped on the snow, empty now, but she hoped that soon it would hold her latest kill. If there was one thing her dad had been right about, it was this: Leni had learned to hunt.

She hurtled over embankments and around trees and across frozen rivers, airborne on the snow machine sometimes, skidding out of control, sometimes shrieking in joy or fear or a combination of the two. She was completely in her element out here.