“I didn’t mean to alarm you,” the man told the soldier. “Forgive me. I left my ID in the apartment just now and had to go back for it.”

Peter’s legs gave way beneath him. “Dad.”

Cooper pulled him closer to muffle his cry and Dad drew back the hood of his parka. The soldier took the documents, wiping snow from the plastic slip, and the bus revved. The soldier took a moment, checking first the ID then Peter’s dad to be sure they were one and the same. But the bus revved a second time and backed on to the street. It was time to go. The red lights flashed across the snow and the back doors swung open. The soldier glanced down the length of Mainstreet one last time. But he was done here. He rapped the side of the bus with his fist for the driver to go on and bundled Peter’s dad into the back. The doors pulled shut behind him and Dad took his seat. It was only then, just as the bus pulled away, that he finally turned round to look back.

And he stayed there watching for as long as was possible. The bus tumbled over the roughened snow and the rear lights swerved, catching in their red glare first a mailbox and then an elk, which stood looking on with nostrils flared, its white breath rumbling across the darkness. Peter’s dad smiled sadly, as if taking sudden solace that his departure should occur at the same time as the animal’s arrival. Then his eyes finally found Peter. Peter pulled free of Cooper’s arms, then squeezing between two cars, dashed out into the middle of the road.

“Dad!”

His dad pressed both hands to the glass. I love you, his eyes told him. I love you so very much. But then they said, No. His dad shook his head and Peter knew he was asking him not to give up his and Cooper’s whereabouts. Go, his dad told him. Go be happy and never look back. He blinked once deeply as if to hold Peter in his arms one last time. Then his dad’s eyes told him no more. The bus turned a corner. The rear lights faded across the elk’s hooves. Then both they and his dad were gone.

5 Years Later

Drooping pines, too parched this late in the summer to hold up their boughs, ringed the perimeter of the lake. A family of deer made their way down to the water’s edge to drink. Bull elks, too. Further up towards the boathouse, a pair of giant antlers breached the water, cutting through a haze of flies and gossamer, travelling on towards land. The antlers hit shingle, rising up sharply from the lake, and a moose hoisted its weary limbs off into the woods.