No Way Around

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window.

Alice's snowshoes thumped against her boots as she walked home. The snow crunched, and her snowshoes sank in the snow as she hauled the three trout slung over her shoulder. She knew her father would be hungry by now.

When Alice spotted the lit candle in the window of the abandoned cabin that she had passed so many times to and from the lake, she stood still. She'd never seen it being used, and her father had always told her that the Old Man that owned it had died long before she was born.

She was curious, but she went on her way home through the woods so that she could get supper ready for her father. They had heard on the radio the night before that a squall would be passing through their area sometime after nightfall, and she didn't want to get trapped out in the dark in a storm.

When she got home to their single room cabin, her father was still lied up in bed, dozing, his bottle of whiskey now half drained. Alice stoked the dying fire, grabbed some fresh firewood and placed it by the hearth.

She crept back out as softly as she could and placed two of the trout she had caught in the ice chest outside. After she crept back in and made sure her father was still asleep, she quietly took off her boots and socks.

She put on her apron and started to make dinner: trout and potatoes.

She chopped into a hard potato and the knife clunk against the chopping board.

Her father stirred and muttered, "Alice, is that you?"

"Yes, dad. I'm here," she replied softly.

"How's the catch?" Her father grumbled, his speech still slurred.

"Got enough for the next few days, but it took a while," she replied, glancing over at the bottle of whiskey and then at his face in the firelight, his eyes still closed. He grunted and turned on his side away from the light.

"I saw something weird, though, on my way back," Alice said as she chopped potatoes.

"Yeah?" Her father grunted. "What's that?"

"I think someone might be squatting in the Old Man's cabin. I saw a candle lit in the window, on my way back."

Her father shot up in his bed, which startled Alice and made her stop her cooking.

She looked across the room and saw his eyes wide with fear, and even in the orange light of the fire, she could see his face was pale.

The light flickered over his long, creased face. His eyes were wide, but the lines and bones of his face in the firelight made it seem like a crinkled jack-O-lantern was staring back at her. His normally grey eyes shone bright orange.

They were quiet, the two of them. Alice was peering across the room, her hands mid-chop through a potato, and her father staring back at her.

Finally, he said with an almost whisper, "What do you mean you saw a candle in the window? Was it lit?"

Alice rolled her eyes and said, "That's what I said, dad. It was a lit candle in one of the windows,” and she started back to her cooking.

Before she knew what was happening she heard a swift woosh and her father was on her. He spun her towards him and she dropped her knife with a clang to the wooden floor.

He was grasping both of her shoulders with his large boney hands. His face was even whiter than before, and the firelight danced in his eyes. His eyes were wide and orange but the sockets around them were sunken and dark, like a skull.

"You're sure. You're sure the candle was lit," he said sternly. She squirmed in his tight grip and nodded.

"Yes, dad, I'm sure!" He let go of her and walked towards the fireplace and stared into the light. He stood that way for a long time. She watched his ribcage heave a little through his nightshirt. He was resting his hand on the mantlepiece, and she watched his face shrink further and further into itself, as if he really was becoming a skeleton. He sighed deeply and said nothing.

The fire crackled, and soon the wind outside began to pick up. It did not seem like he would speak again, so Alice picked up her knife and continued to chop up the potatoes.

"I'm sure it's just a squatter or something; we've had campers and hikers around here before. I can check it out in the morning," Alice said as she worked.

Once again, she felt her father's large boney hands grab her shoulders.

"You are never to go near that cabin, Alice. Never," he said.

"But-" she started, but he shook her, and she was afraid.

"Never," he said again; the smell of whiskey from his breath came with a rage and fear that made Alice shrink. She nodded emphatically and her father released her. He stumbled back to his bed and took a long swig of whiskey.

"Wake me when supper is ready."

She did as she was told.

They didn't speak as they ate; the only sounds were the winds now beginning to howl and the crackling of the fire. Her father ate his dinner, went out to the outhouse, then shuffled back in and to his bed. He took a gulp of whiskey and turned over away from the light.

The only thing he muttered to Alice before he drifted off was, "Storm's coming. Stay away from that cabin."

Alice cleared the table and washed the dishes as quietly as she could in the basin, and then sat down by the window and rubbed her pink hands to watch the coming storm.

She peered through the flurry and the trees towards the Old Man's cabin. She got lost deep in thought until she noticed that she was looking right at something she mistook for moonlight reflected off the rushed, dancing snow. But the lights were fixed.

She thought they were the eyes of an animal, reflecting the firelight, and so she watched and wondered at what animal it could be.

The eyes stared at her from the dark in the woods beyond the moonlight. She stared back. Her father shifted in his bed. She looked at him quickly; he was dead asleep.

When she looked back outside the eyes were gone; she only saw the shapes of trees in the moonlight. Her mind must be playing tricks on her, she told herself.

She looked out of the window again into the woods, and she only saw streaks of moonlight with blowing snow and the dark, gnarled shapes of trees. Her eyes began to droop.

She tucked herself into bed, but she wasn't able to fall asleep right away. She watched her father breathe deeply. She watched him to make sure that he was asleep. She saw that the bottle of whiskey was almost done, and she thought she was safe.

As the snow storm began to build, she got up to stoke the fire and added another log so that she would not have to warm the cabin in the middle of the night; she never got to sleep through the night if it got too cold.

She was drifting into sleep, but the thought of those orange eyes in the dark of the woods came back to her, and she could not help herself; she had to know about the Old Man's cabin. She forced herself up and stood at the window and looked through the trees.

There she found those eyes again, but now she could she the shadow of a man attached to them.

Alice looked back at her father dead asleep, and wondered if she should wake him. It could just be a deer. It could be her mind playing tricks on her again, and then she would be in trouble.

She looked back out the window and saw those orange eyes staring right at her, and then they went dark.

The strange figure they belonged to were cast in white moonlight and falling snow, and it moved slowly away through the woods. Alice could see the shadow, hunched over with lanky arms and large hands. She blinked, and it was gone in the dark. She sat by the window for a time.

Alice could not help but watch for the eyes or the strange figure deep into the night. Eventually, she was taken by sleep, huddled under a blanket by the window.

*

When Alice woke, her father was gone. She looked out of the window to see a clear, cloudless day. At least a foot of snow had fallen the night before.

She saw that he'd had taken his boots and snowshoes. When she opened the door, she could see his tracks in the snowpack making their way towards the lake and the Old Man's cabin.

She decided to stay inside inside and tidy things; she brought up a bottle of whiskey from the cellar and placed it by her father's bed. When he hadn't returned in sometime, she grew hungry. She was so hungry that she scaled, cooked, and ate the other two trout.

Alice knew her father would be angry, and she knew she would have to go out fishing again the next day. But she looked out the window peering at her father's tracks.

She waited until nightfall. She had stoked a fire and brought in extra wood for when her father would return. She waited, looking out of the window of their cabin until it was clear that she had to go looking for him.

*