Page 2 of The Mountain Man's Virgin
The ring glimmered and shone in the candlelight from the table, and my vision blurred as I felt tears brim up in my eyes. The restaurant was silent, everyone staring with bated breath, waiting for my response. A bystander would’ve mistaken them as tears of joy. And they might have been. Lawrence was everything I had been looking for.
I looked into Lawrence’s brown eyes. He cleared his throat again. I had to say something.
Chapter 2 – Mick
“Chopper!” I yelled from the porch and scanned the nearby treeline for any sign of my dog. “Chopper!” I shouted even louder, but there was no sign of the graying black lab.
I sighed and went back into the cabin to find my thick plaid jacket and grab my snowshoes. If Chopper was a typical dog, I wouldn’t be worried, but since he lost one of his back legs, trekking through the deep snow had been tough on the old guy.
I sat down on the steps to put on my snowshoes. They were massive and cumbersome but were able to float my two hundred pounds on the fluffy snowpack much better than modern snowshoes. The light aluminum ones were fine for walking on harder snow, or for city slickers to use on well-worn paths, but this year was proving to be a banner snow year, and only the big traditional snowshoes would cut it.
I stood to go look for Chops, then heard some rustling under the porch. I bent down to look between the boards of the stairs and sure enough, there was the old pooch, yawning and stretching lazily.
I smiled. I couldn’t be mad at Chopper. He had been with me through thick and thin. I dreaded the day the old guy would leave me for doggie heaven, and I worried that day was looming near. There were many times that I thought he might be losing his hearing, but his ability to hear a squirrel chatter from over a mile away always gave away his ruse.
“Come here, boy.” I smiled and clapped my suede work gloves together. “Let’s get some wood for the fire.”
He followed in my oval shaped tracks to the large wood shed. I had cords and cords of split firewood, but always left a few cords untouched so I could split them by hand. The act of chopping wood, raising the heavy splitting maul over my head, and then using technique, rather than brawn, to crack the wood apart, had proven to be the best way to take out my anger and frustration.
I looked at the mountainous horizon and saw that I had about an hour before I lost the sun. I didn’t really need to check my watch, I knew that it was nearing 4 p.m., and a quick double-check of my high-tech wrist altimeter confirmed it, 3:47. The days were getting longer.
At the top of my shed, the red and white striped wind sock lay limp against the pole. Thankfully the wind had dropped off and so had its accompanying chill. I spent two hours splitting wood, the latter hour chopping in the dusty light from my headlamp. I shivered. I had worked up a sweat and once the sun dipped behind the jagged peaks, a chill quickly started to set into my bones.
I packed the wood onto a sled and quickly fashioned a triple bowline. I slid the makeshift harness around my legs and waist. My thighs were thick, to begin with, but this cabin life had turned them into veritable tree trunks. Yeah, it would’ve been easier to use the slick trailer and tow it behind my mountain snowmobile, but some part of me really enjoyed roughing it. Was I punishing myself for my shortcomings? Maybe. All I know is that it felt good to be physically exhausted from exertion at the end of the day. “Come on, boy.” I tossed a raggedy wool blanket on top of the wood and Chopper hopped on top. Dogs truly are remarkable and adaptable creatures. After the initial healing process, it had only taken Chopper a week to get used to having three legs.
I heard the windsock flutter to life just as I felt the first flakes of snow in the air. I smiled to myself. If we got more snow overnight, I would have to clear off the helipad by hand. More hard labor. Could it be done with the tractor? Yep. Would I spend hours hand shoveling it? Hell, yeah.
I had been at the cabin since October. The first month was tough, I had felt like an addict going through withdrawal. Well, technically, I am an addict, so, I suppose it truly was withdrawal. With each month that passed, it seemed to get easier and easier to be away from society.
My life might sound rough, even like punishment to some. A life lived by a hermit with nothing to his name, but I couldn’t be further from that.Could I have a multi-million-dollar log home in Aspen? I could have five. Could I have a staff of fifty to run my household? Yes, and I have had all that. I sold my Aspen home two years ago and I don’t miss it one bit. I don’t miss Marcus, the chef, or the cheerful cleaning staff, or even my driver, Anthony. None of it. I’m here alone. I’m getting what I deserve. The harder my life is the better.
I mean, there is one luxury item that I allowed myself to keep. I smiled as I looked out the back window of the cabin at my favorite material thing in the world. My helo was basking in the white light of the generator powered floodlight, and she was beautiful. Keeping a helicopter was a justifiable luxury. I still needed to make trips to the office and I mean, one of the companies I own manufactures them, so what kind of a CEO would I be if I didn’t endorse my own product?
I flicked off the generator and felt my heart rate slow as the serenity of silence took over. The only sound in my cabin was the crackling of the fire, the hiss off the kettle on the woodstove, and Chopper’s loud snoring.
Was my new life a self-inflicted purgatory? Sometimes it felt like it, but then sometimes it felt like heaven - I couldn’t decide. I had put myself in the woods to protect society. I was a menace. But the longer I spent here, the more it feels like I’m where I was meant to be - away from temptation.My last relapse had been a bad one. I couldn’t be trusted to be out in society. The cure for my addiction was isolation. Solitude was both my jailor and savior.
Chapter 3 – Lucy
I still remember the day that I met Lawrence.
We were running interval drills on the track. I was the anchor in the 4x800, the most grueling of all the races, in my opinion. It doesn’t have the same strategic game playing as the longer races, and yet isn’t an all-out sprint.
I try my hardest at everything that I do. I’ve been told that I have a natural ability both on the track and in school, but people have no idea how many grueling hours I’ve put into both. I never want to feel like I haven’t put my ‘all’ on the table, that I haven’t tried my absolute best at something.
I jumped up and down on the orange track, opening and closing my hands until I saw Sasha round the corner. Every muscle in my body was tense, like a stalking tiger ready to pounce, waiting for her to shout ‘stick’ and pass the baton to me.
“Stick!” Sasha screamed, and I heard her track spikes punching into the rubberized surface as she bore down on me. I took off, my arm outstretched behind me. As soon as I felt the metal of the baton hit my palm, I clenched my fingers around it and took off at ninety percent of my capacity.
I loved the way running made me feel. It was the only time in my life when my mind wasn’t racing, that I wasn’t thinking about a million things: School, grades, money, cancer. Running gave me freedom from myself.
On my second lap, my skin started to tingle, that feeling you only get when you know that someone is watching you. As I rounded the corner, I stole a glance at the infield and saw two of the rugby players staring at me. I averted my gaze and focused on the finish line. I lengthened my stride and my tanned runner’s legs whisked me to the finish line.
“Lucy! Great time,” Coach Reid yelled to me and smiled.
My legs were wobbly, and I bent over, placing my hands on my knees, and actively tried to slow down my breathing.
“That was your fastest split this year,” Coach Reid said and clapped me on the back. “Do I need to get the rugby team to come to our next meet?” she smiled and winked at me.
