The Long Dark by Billy Farmer (best book club books for discussion .txt) 📗

“Fuck you. I know what I fucking saw, okay.”

“You’re an asshole, you know that,” Tish yelled over her shoulder.

“Just shut up you two. I’ll take the gun.” And use it on myself, I thought.

“It’s a bad idea,” she continued.

I heard Tom telling Tish everything was going to be alright as I closed the door. If anyone could make her feel better, it would be Tom. They had become almost inseparable since she came to the Patch. Of course, working around the kind of people who worked at the Patch, there were rumors flying about them being more than just friends. I never asked. If Tom had wanted me to know, he would’ve told me. I do know they took leave together on at least two occasions. I heard they were going hunting together. Like I said, I didn’t ask. I approved their leaves.

I walked around to the rear of the Shining. I opened the rear hatch and grabbed the rifle we kept to protect ourselves from polar bears wondering onto the Patch looking for scraps. I had no clue what kind of rifle it was. I just know it had a scope that didn’t work. The glass had a nasty crack running down the center, and you could barely see through it. “Just aim down the side of the barrel,” Sam told me. “You ain’t goin ta hit nothin, anyways.” I rotated my injured shoulder. That wasn’t going to make things any easier if I had to fire the rifle. Thanks, Avery.

I walked back to the front of the Shining and told Tom to throw the truck in reverse and follow close behind me just in case shit went down. He yelled out a string of expletives I barely heard over the grinding gears. He apparently couldn’t get it to go in reverse. He wanted to turn around and follow me, but I told him not to. “Keep the piece of crap pointed towards Barrow… and be ready to roll if something happens.”

“Yeah, we’ll book it out of here,” Tom said.

Smartass.

I adjusted my headlamp and began walking towards the way we came. I didn’t see anything, but I swore to God I heard something. The farther I got away from the Shining, the less I could hear the rumble of the diesel and the more attuned I became with my surroundings. There was a flurry of what sounded like snorts very close to where I was standing. I had taken the polar bear educational experience given by one of our safety trainers; I didn’t remember polar bears making sounds like the ones I was hearing. The sniffing noise sounded like the sound some children make when they’ve cried too much. There was a convulsion and then a grasp for air. If it was a polar bear, the bastard was sick.

I have no remnant of pride to lie and say I wasn't scared, because I was. There was a large part of my copious self who wanted to take off and run towards the Shining. The faint knocking of the diesel engine and the comfort knowing it was still within running distance, kept me sane enough to keep walking away from it, as weird as that sounds. It wasn’t, however, enough to make me yell out to whoever (or whatever) might be out there, which is what I should’ve done but couldn’t. I was well past the outer limits of my gallantry. It was time for me to go. If it were someone who was supposed to check on us, the bastard should’ve followed us, or yelled or something, instead of doing nothing. I wasn’t about to try to track him down, and I didn’t think it was my job to do so. I honored what I considered my duty to check on him. I didn’t see him. I was finished.

I backed away slowly at first. My senses were in overload. I heard everything but probably nothing. Still, I had an ominous feeling that someone or something was near, maybe even stalking me. Humans have goosebumps for a reason. The vestiges of our primal past were in full effect all up and down my arms, nape of my neck, and legs. Adrenaline coursed through my body and I was in unadulterated fight or flight mode. Since I didn’t have anything obvious to fight, and because it wouldn’t have mattered at that point even if I had, I chose flight – big time. I was running back to the Shining before I even realized it.

I tried to jump on the tracks, but I missed and knocked the holy hell out of my shin as a result. I dropped my rifle in the snow, and my headlamp was now covering my eyes. “Fuck,” I screamed out in both pain and fear. I was overcome. I felt a hand pulling at my parka, but I didn’t scream… outwardly, anyway. Inside, my neurotransmitters were all up in a tizzy, slinging dopamine like a meth dealer in a trailer park. I turned my head to see who or what had a grip on me. My head turned, but my hood didn’t. All I ended up seeing was its furry lining, and the plastic backing of my lamp. I was trapped in the moment; in a prison created by my own fear.  I was flailing my arms like I imagined Titouan did when he didn’t get his thirty presents for Arbor Day.

“William, what in the hell is a matter with you? Get a grip, son,” Sam said, firmly but not angrily.

I flipped away my hood, turning my head and hoping I wasn’t imagining the comforting twang of Sam’s voice. It was him. If I hadn’t been so overcome, I would’ve been embarrassed. Tom, now out of the cab with the rifle in his hands, stood watch for my self-imagined foe. Seeing him with the gun helped me regain some of my senses. I got up, dusted