A Bad Memory (long-form test)

I've never told this story before. Partly because it sounds ridiculous, and partly because even now, years later, it still feels more like a memory than a story.

I was fifteen years old when it happened. My parents had divorced a few years earlier, and every summer and fall my dad would send me to spend a few weeks with my cousin Jensen in Northern Ontario.

He was twelve years older than me. Wherever he went, I went. He was the closest thing to a brother, even a father figure, that I ever knew. Looking back, I think those trips meant more to me than they ever did to him. I didn't have many friends. I didn't have any siblings. Those hunting trips were the only thing I looked forward to.

The day this happened was late November. Most of the leaves were already down. The woods were gray and brown and open in a way forests only seem to be after autumn has stripped everything away. We parked Jensen's truck near an old logging road before daylight and spent most of the morning tracking a buck he'd hit earlier.

We weren't supposed to be where we were; technically it was private land, nothing heavily guarded, but definitely somewhere we didn't have permission to hunt. We'd brought a deer sled with us originally, but the buck wasn't hit badly and Jensen figured we'd recover it quickly. The sled was just slowing us down. So we stashed it near a landmark he knew and kept tracking.

Eventually we found the deer. It had stumbled down into what I always recall as a dried creek bed, although that isn't really the best description. It was more like a shallow trench carved into the forest floor over hundreds of years, just deep enough that you couldn't see very far around the bends. The buck was still alive. Barely. Its breathing came in strange little spasms. Every so often its body would twitch.

Jensen stared at it for a few seconds. Then he sighed. 'No matter how many times you see it, this part always gets to you.' I asked him what he meant. He shrugged. 'Just makes you feel vulnerable.' Then he looked around. 'The sled. We'd both forgotten about it. He swore under his breath. Stay here. I'll come with you. No. I know exactly where we left it. I'll be faster by myself.' Then his expression changed slightly. 'If anybody comes through here, hide.' 'Why?' 'Because we're not supposed to be here.'

He jogged away and disappeared. Then I was alone. I've thought about that moment a lot over the years. The silence. I don't know if the woods actually got quieter after he left, or if I just noticed how alone I was. The buck kept making those awful sounds. Not cries. Not breathing. Something in between. At the time I didn't really understand what Jensen meant about vulnerability. But sitting there alone, watching that animal struggle between life and death, I started to understand.

I hated looking at it. The sounds made my stomach twist. But I couldn't stop. I was completely fixated. Watching its chest rise and fall. Watching the occasional twitch. At fifteen years old, I don't think I'd ever really thought about death before. Not like that. Not up close. While I was staring at it, I started hearing something. At first I couldn't place it. The buck was still making those strange sounds. Every now and then a breeze moved through the trees and stirred the leaves. Everything blended together. But there was something else.

After a minute or two I realized I was hearing voices. Two voices. They sounded far away. Not shouting. Not talking. Bickering. Like an old married couple having the same conversation they'd had a thousand times before. I froze. My first thought was that it was the landowners. Maybe other hunters. I remember staring toward the bend in the trench and trying to figure out what I was supposed to do. The voices got closer. Panic took over.

I spotted a tree with low branches maybe ten feet away and climbed it as fast as I could. I don't know how high I got. Fifteen feet maybe. Not high enough to feel safe. Just high enough that if somebody wasn't looking for me, they might miss me. I wedged myself against the trunk and tried not to move. The footsteps got closer. And that's when I noticed something that still bothers me. I could hear two voices. But I could only hear one set of footsteps. Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.

I remember trying to convince myself there had to be two people. Maybe one was walking softer. But even at fifteen years old, something about it felt wrong. Then I saw movement through the trees. At first all I could see was skin. Pale skin. Almost gray. Moving between the trunks. The footsteps got closer. Then the figure stepped into view. It resembled a woman. Looking back, she probably wasn't as tall as I remember. But at fifteen years old she seemed impossibly tall.

She was completely naked and barefoot. Thin, but not unhealthy. One shoulder sat noticeably lower than the other. She walked with a strange limp. Not the limp of somebody injured. The kind that looked permanent. Necessary. As strange as it sounds, she moved efficiently. With purpose. Whatever was wrong with her posture didn't slow her down at all. Her head was shaved. Not cleanly. It looked like she'd done it with a dull razor. Small scabs covered parts of her scalp.

And the entire time she was talking. Or arguing. I still don't know. It was two voices coming from one mouth. One voice was deeper. Not impossibly deep. It sounded like a woman trying to imitate a man. The other voice sounded more feminine, but flat. Emotionless. Obedient. The deeper voice said: 'You've been walking for days.' The other replied immediately. 'I enjoy walking.' 'You always say that.' 'I enjoy walking.' A pause. 'I enjoy walking.' Another pause. 'I enjoy walking.'

She walked directly toward the deer. As though she'd known exactly where it was before she'd ever rounded the bend. The deeper voice spoke again. 'What is this doing here?' The other voice answered. 'An oasis.' She dropped to her knees beside the buck. Then lowered her head toward it.

I won't describe everything that happened after that. Partly because I don't remember all of it. And partly because I don't want to. I remember the buck jerking once. Then becoming still. I remember her biting into its throat. I remember pressing both hands over my mouth. My legs shook so badly I thought the tree would move. Most of all, I remember feeling like I was going to pass out. Not from disgust. From fear. The kind of fear that makes your body stop feeling like your own.

To this day I don't know how long I sat there. Ten minutes. Thirty. An hour. I have no idea. Parts of it feel missing. Like my memory skips. Like my brain stopped recording and then started again. As though some part of it shut down to protect itself from what it was witnessing. I remember hearing the deeper voice say: 'You're getting good at this.' The other replied: 'Like a mountain lion.' Then later: 'Like a mountain lion.' And again: 'Like a mountain lion.' Over and over. As though she was reminding herself. Or practicing.

At some point she unfolded a burlap sack she'd been carrying. I hadn't noticed it at first. Inside was what looked like random junk. Sticks. Rocks. Garbage. A few things I couldn't identify. I remember seeing a feather. And something that looked like roadkill. Then she pulled out a sharp stone. Not a knife. A stone. Using it, she opened the deer's abdomen with surprising precision. She removed the stomach and intestines and set them aside. Then she lowered her head into the opening she'd made.

I remember looking away. When I looked back, there was blood on her face. A little while later she picked up the organs and carried them off into the trees. I heard rustling. Then silence. When she returned she folded the burlap sack under one arm. Grabbed the deer by a hoof with the other hand. And that's the part that still haunts me. The part I can't explain away. As she started dragging the deer away, the deeper voice said: 'She doesn't like being watched while she eats.' A pause. Then the other voice answered: 'I don't like being watched while I eat.'

She kept dragging. The deeper voice said: 'It's rude to watch someone eat.' And the other replied: 'I don't like being watched while I eat.' Back and forth. Again. And again. And again. The voices slowly faded as she disappeared around the bend. I never saw her again. But I could hear them long afterward. I stayed in that tree. I don't know how long.

Realistically Jensen couldn't have been gone more than half an hour. The sled wasn't far away. And he knew those woods better than the animals that lived in them. I remember sweating through my clothes. I remember my legs cramping. I remember being absolutely certain that if I climbed down, she'd be waiting for me. Eventually I heard footsteps again. And something being dragged. For a second I thought she'd come back. The panic hit me so hard I almost blacked out again. Then I saw Jensen. Dragging the sled behind him.

I don't think I've ever felt relief like that before. He immediately knew something was wrong. The deer was gone. The blood was there. Some fur was there. And a drag trail disappeared down the trench. I called his name. My voice cracked so badly I barely recognized it. The relief on his face lasted maybe half a second. I practically fell out of the tree trying to get down. When my feet hit the ground, my legs gave out completely. I was shaking so badly I could barely stand.

Jensen dropped the sled. I heard the safety on his rifle click off as he became aware of the situation and started scanning the woods around us. It's a sound I'd heard countless times. But something about hearing it then was different. For the first time all day, whatever had happened felt real. Dangerously real. He grabbed my shoulders. 'What happened?' I couldn't answer. He looked around. Then noticed disturbed leaves nearby. Still scanning the woods, he walked over and kicked through them. A second later he froze. Underneath were the deer's organs.

He looked back at me. 'What was it?' I couldn't answer. 'A mountain lion?' Nothing. 'Was it a mountain lion? A bear? Coyotes?' I opened my mouth. Finally managed: 'I don't know.' Something changed in his expression. Not just fear. But understanding. He nodded once. Picked up the sled. And said: 'We need to leave. Right now.' The drive home was almost completely silent. A few times he tried asking what I'd seen. Every time I tried to answer, the words died in my throat. It sounded ridiculous. Even to me. Eventually he stopped asking.

That night I barely slept. Every time I closed my eyes I heard the voices. The leaves crunching. The endless repetition. Like a mountain lion. Like a mountain lion. Like a mountain lion. The next morning I came downstairs and found Jensen sitting with his father and two men I'd never seen before. The conversation stopped the second they noticed me. The two men nodded their goodbyes and left. My uncle came over and sat beside me. He put a hand on my shoulder. I still remember how cold his hand felt. Something that would normally have comforted me only made my stomach drop.

He glanced toward Jensen. Then back at me. 'We love having you here, Kennedy. I think this should probably be your last summer up here.' I asked why. Nobody answered. After a few seconds he squeezed my shoulder and said: 'Some places aren't meant for everybody.' That was the last summer I ever spent with my cousin. Jensen still lives somewhere out there. We don't talk much anymore. Life happened. Years passed.

A few years ago we ended up on the phone together. Just catching up. Talking about work. Family. Normal things. Then there was a long pause. And out of nowhere he said: 'Can I ask you something?' I knew immediately what he was talking about. 'It wasn't really a mountain lion, was it?' 'No.' Silence. Then: 'It wasn't an animal at all, was it?' I stared at the wall for a long time. Finally I said: 'No.' Another silence. Longer this time. Then he quietly said: 'I thought so.' And that was the end of the conversation.

There's one detail that still bothers me more than anything else. More than the voices. More than the deer. More than the fact that I still don't know what I saw. When she first entered the creek bed, before she noticed the deer, before the conversation started, the deeper voice said something. At the time it didn't mean anything to me. I forgot about it for years. But recently I've remembered it. The voice called her by a name. Not a nickname. Not a person's name. At least not any name I've ever heard before. I can't explain it. It just sounded old. Like a word that had existed for a very long time. Like a word that had presence. A word that was aware of itself, that was listening when it was spoken. I won't write it here. Because I still remember exactly how it sounded. And for some reason, even now, I don't like saying it out loud.