Matt shined the flashlight to the eastern tree line, illuminating the sweeping branches of spruce and occasional spiderweb. The deer was gone. Probably alright, he thought. He’d had close encounters before and even smacked into a deer near Big Timber, Montana. The area was known as “deer alley,” home to outlandish numbers of mule deer under the shadow of the Crazy Mountains. The deer in that accident had also disappeared, but he’d assumed it wasn’t going to make it when he’d seen the smashed front end of the truck. But that was another land, far away from the Ottawa National Forest and the Huron Mountains—a land that wasn’t cut up. He walked back to the truck and got in. Despite having close to two hundred thousand miles, the vehicle started just fine. He admired it as much as you could admire any material item. The old Toyota 4x4 had seen him through high school, numerous girlfriends, construction work, and innumerable camping trips. That wasn’t even counting the trips his father had made up north with it. The truck was beginning to rust and the muffler never sounded right no matter the amount of repair work. Acceleration wasn’t so hot, either. He guessed his truck was dying. Maybe this was the last trip.

The little four-cylinder engine purred, accompanied by cacophonous swamp frogs out of sight behind tree line. He smiled, at last back in the Northwoods with his trusty steed. He rubbed the gray plastic dashboard a few times as if to say “good girl,” the way you would to a horse. He felt a little crazy doing it, but whatever.

The pickup rolled into the night along the empty highway, still an hour from the shack. It’d get there. It always got there.

The fresh Northwoods air always made him ravenous. Matt grabbed the chocolate-covered wafer cookies he’d taken from his mother’s place. Sometimes he stopped over to grab food before trips. He liked the way her food tasted, liked the smell of the kitchen. Even if he went out and bought the exact cookies, they wouldn’t taste the same. It was some sort of voodoo mother magic.

His mother had moved to a condo in the suburbs after his father died. For the time being, he’d been allowed to stay in the family house as it was prepped for sale. There were ways of delaying the realtors though . . .