Can We Go Home Now?

The Smell of Fear Was Everywhere

The wind was strong, almost fierce, and it carried many scents as he tried to avoid the one he knew would follow him wherever he turned. Several times in his life, he had smelled the fear of an animal that suddenly submitted to a more dominant power rather than continue the struggle. The odor seems to scream to everyone who will listen, “Enough! No more!” It had always come from his dog, Pooch, in the past as the poor thing found himself at the mercy of some larger dog, just waiting for Ian to come to his rescue or struggling to free his head from the fence and the gate that once joined, refused to yield to his attempts at freedom. But now, the smell of fear also came from Ian himself.

“Don’t panic! Whatever you do, do not panic,” he kept telling himself. In his mind’s eye, he remembered a brass plaque with this text that he kept on the wall in his office. 

“When you’re up to your ass in alligators, it is difficult to remind yourself that your initial objective was to drain the swamp.”

Right now, he was definitely up to his ass in alligators. 

Mary clung to him with all the strength her little arms could manage. He remembered when she was so light as he scanned the wall of flame and smoke bearing down on them from the south. “How heavy can a five-year-old be?” The answer came back from somewhere: “How long have you been running with her?” 

Fair question. But there was no time to answer because a doe, followed by a spotted fawn and nearly crushed by a large buck at the end of an otherwise impressive leap, changed course right in front of them at the last second and immediately narrowed their already minimal options. The buck bounded away to the north, the fawn found his legs, and the doe danced wildly after the buck, stopping now and again for the fawn to catch up. And Mary continued to cry as Ian wondered, “Where to? Where to now?” But mostly, he thought, “Don’t let my baby die; please don’t let my baby die!”

The smoke blinded his tear-filled eyes and choked their every breath. His only landmark was the hazy image of the sun through the smoke, which he tried to keep behind him and to his left. The sun was in the southern hemisphere, as it rose from the East, meaning he and Mary were going West. 

Why was he here, he thought? Of all the days to hike in the woods, he had to choose this one. (Damn, the deer are coming back from the north, so we can’t go that way. What had they seen that spooked them?) He had come from the east, where he had left the truck, and he was headed back there when the fire cut them off. He had tried to get around it by going south when the wind changed and forced them north. Now, the animals were returning to his burning ark in the middle of the inferno, and they all seemed to scream, “Go west, young man.”

“How are you doing, Mary? You still Daddy’s sweet little girl?”

“Uh-huh.”

“That’s my baby. Hey, look there. That possum’s carrying her babies, too. Everybody’s getting a free ride today.”

“Daddy, when are we going to be back at the truck? I’m scared.”

Her voice was muffled because he had used his T-shirt as a mask over her nose and mouth, but he still got the gist of what she was saying. 

Ian’s voice tried to be a steady anchor in the storm of fear. “I know, honey. Just as soon as we can. Okay? Hang in there, sweetie. We’re getting there.” 

Getting there. “There” was someplace Ian desperately wanted to be today. The smell returned even stronger than before as he thought of “there.” “There” was to the west, about a mile through the thickest part of the woods, where all the large and small animals would end up just before stopping to peer over the edge and gauge the rocks a hundred feet below. 

He had climbed that cliff wall as a teenager just for the thrill of feeling control over his life, but now he was 39 and carrying the most precious 46 pounds he could think of. Would he end up as just another panicky animal desperately deciding between the flames or the fall, or could he summon whatever was needed to save their lives?

“I love you, Daddy.”

Hell, yeah, he could do it.

“Love ya, Sweetie. Let’s do this!”

* * * (To Be Continued) * * *