I swung the axe for the last time of the day. It smashed into a thick stump and I stood up and looked around. The land was flat and beat up from all the tire treads of the equipment. I was the last guy standing for the day. Three guys called out with the Irish flu as we all jokingly called it. Some guys just couldn't handle a night of drinking and know the importance of waking up the next morning and getting your ass to work.

I turned and sat down on the stump and took my hard hat off. I preferred to work without anything on my head, but there were rules and insurance bullshit things to worry about, so Jerry rode everyone’s ass hard about keeping safe.

Speaking of which, Jerry came out of the office, which was a small trailer right against the edge of the woods. He was carrying a black folder and looking somewhere between confused and pissed off.

When he saw me, he stopped and opened his arms.

There was nobody else around the site. And why would there be? The other guys had left over an hour ago. They saw the value of the five o’clock whistle and left on the dot. Me? I had a different outlook on things. Blame that on my former life.

“Go home,” Jerry said to me.

“You go home,” I said.

“What are you doing here?”

“Enjoying the scenery.”

“I’m not paying you for the OT.”

“I never asked you to pay me for it.”

“You’re just sitting.”

I nodded to a pile of logs.

“You did that?”

“Yeah.”

“Solo?”

“Nobody else is here.”

“Christ, Syi, are you human?”

I put a hand to my chest. “Heart’s beating. So, I’m at least a living thing.”

“Not human though. Move over, I need to sit.”

“You look like you need a beer,” I said.

Jerry started to sit but stopped. He then tossed the folder to the wide tree stump and waved a finger at me. “Don’t move, Syi.”

“I wouldn’t dare,” I said.

Truth be told, what else did I have to do in life? I mean, I could give up why I was up on the mountain. I could answer all the texts and calls from those who showed care. I could maybe find a fucking nice shirt to wear. Shave my beard. Give up the whole lumberjack look.

But up here, it was quiet. It was actually easy to survive up here, as long as you didn’t do anything stupid and get yourself killed.

I lowered my head and felt anger course through me.

Then I grabbed the folder that I probably wasn’t supposed to be looking into. But I needed distraction.

Inside was a picture of a machine called a fell-buncher. It was a machine used to help fall trees in a controlled direction. It had this giant mouth where it would put the trees into piles. This model worked well on steep slopes. Which made sense because there were several rides all around us and a lot of those trees were a pain in the ass to get to, let alone try and cut them down and pull them up to the mountain.

So, Jerry was looking at equipment.

“Six figures.”

I looked up. Jerry had a beer in his hand for me. In his other hand was a beer for him.

“What?”

“That’s what I’m looking at.”

“Well, yeah,” I said. “It’s a big machine, Jerry.”

“I need to finance it, if I decide to get it.”

“Right.”

“You did this…I mean…before, right?”

“Not heavy machinery.”

“But you did all this shit.”

I glanced at Jerry. Sometimes I wondered how much he dug into my life without telling me.

“What do you think? Company offered me a really good deal. This one is used. Which is fine. I’ll get a warranty on it. The financing end though…these payments are low.”

I flipped a few pages and looked at the financing options.

I couldn’t believe I was getting sucked back into this world for a second.

“Well, the payments are low because they want a balloon at the end.”

“A what?” Jerry asked.

“Christ, Jerry. You need to take a business class. Look. The payments are low now. Then at the end, the balance is paid. One big payment. A balloon payment. Usually, what they do is make you a deal on that balloon payment to get you another machine and another loan, lease, whatever. So, you basically pay for the rest of your life and never own anything.”

“Is that bad?”

“Depends on what you want to get done. They offer warranty and service. See, they’re going to take your machine and then do something with it with someone else. That’s how they make money.”

“Wow,” Jerry said. “You’re smart, Syi. Too smart to be swinging an axe and carrying logs.”

I ignored Jerry. “Now, if you go with a more traditional kind of loan, payments are higher, but it’s yours at the end. So, it depends on what you want. Unless you’ve got cash to pay for it straight up.”

“Six figures? Where the fuck do you think I’m hiding six figures?”

I laughed and shut the folder. “Thanks for the beer, Jerry.”

Jerry tossed the folder to the ground. “Life.”

“Life,” I said.

“Hey, I heard someone went missing up here the other day.”

“Nah,” I said. “Some camper got herself twisted in the woods. I found her. Jimmy came to get her.”

“Oh, you found her? Well shit, you’re a hero then.”

“No,” I said. “Not even close. Just some dumb woman who got lucky.”

“Right,” Jerry said. Then he leaned forward and grabbed the folder. He stood up. “Don’t stay up here too long. Storms are coming through.”

“Have a good night,” I said.

Jerry took a few steps and stopped. “Syi…the door goes both way on this. With you helping me, I mean. I can help you. With anything.”

I stood up and finished the beer. I then tossed the bottle at Jerry. He scrambled to catch it.

I turned and walked away.

I had nothing to say to him. I didn’t want his fucking pity. And what I needed help with…he couldn’t fucking do.

* * *

I sat on the porch of the cabin with my feet up. My huge gray socks had a red pattern across the toes. They were getting worn down pretty fast, but that came with the territory of actually working hard. Not that I gave a shit about socks with holes in the toes.

If she were here, she’d rip the fucker off my foot and throw it out. Smiling the whole damn time.

I reached for the bottle of whiskey instead of the beer.

The clouds that had rolled in were dark. The winds were starting to pick up. Branches bending. Leaves rustling together. I was right where I wanted to be. Sitting on the porch and watching the storm pass by. Sometimes, it was dangerous to be up on the mountain if a good one went by because you never knew what was going to happen. Lightning. Winds. Trees falling over. Trees catching on fire.

I smiled and threw the whiskey bottle back.

It got darker out, and I had to take a piss. I thought about pissing right off the porch but went inside instead. When I entered the bathroom, I paused and looked at myself in the mirror.

I didn’t know who was looking back at me. And that was a fucked up feeling to have.

I gave the guy in the mirror the middle finger and then took my piss.

I washed my hands and out in the living room I looked at my cellphone. Shit, that thing used to be glued to my fucking face. It couldn’t beep or vibrate without my jumping at it like I was waiting for a call about winning millions of dollars.

There were a few calls. A couple texts. Plenty of emails. I marked everything as read. Nothing but the usual junk in life. Questions I didn’t want to answer. Personal stuff that was left in a town that I used to call home.

I then caught myself going online. Opening a search box. My fingers wondering what to type. Wondering if what happened with Lara had turned into actual news or something. I had to walk away when Jimmy came to get her. Because if someone like me had been up on the mountain before…

I shut my eyes.

I wanted to type her name so badly.

I dropped the phone and growled in my throat.

The first rumble of thunder sounded way off in the distance. It was a long, drawn out warning of what was to come.

That was followed by a knocking sound.

I turned and realized the knocking wasn’t from a storm. It was at my door.

I opened the door and couldn’t believe my eyes.

It was Lara, the woman I saved…and believe me, she was a whole different kind of storm…

* * *

“I wanted to thank you,” she said without hesitation. “And then I wanted to say I’m sorry. So, I brought you this.”

She was holding a brown paper bag with the top folded over. There were grease stains on the bottom of the bag. And she had a six pack of beer. Her hair was pulled back in a sloppy ponytail. No makeup on her face. The smallest of blemishes showing, but with that came a greater sense of honesty. When she half-smiled, she had dimples on one side of her mouth. Her eyes had a sense of desperation and hurt that I only ever saw when I looked in the mirror.

“You drove all the way up here for that?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“You realize it’s going to storm?”

“Oh. Well, no,” she said. “I mean, I see the clouds. But I didn’t check. I don’t really care.”

“You’re going to care if you try driving back down. These roads flood, and it doesn’t take much to get stuck.”

“Then I’ll wait until it passes,” she said so boldly. “Or I’ll just leave right now. I couldn’t just go without saying something. You sort of disappeared…”

“I did that on purpose, sugar,” I said. I still hadn’t invited her in. And why the fuck would I?

“Right. Because I got in your way. I thought you were going to hurt me.”

I slowly nodded and raised an eyebrow. “That’s what you thought?”

“Well, sort of. I mean, I woke up on your couch. No clue who you were. You were telling me to take pills. You’re sort of…scary-looking.”

I laughed. “Thanks for that.”

“No. I don’t mean it mean, Osiris.”

I raised an eyebrow. Hearing my actual name like that. The way it ran off her tongue. Then the way she puckered her lips because she was nervous. The right side of her mouth pulling to the left for a second before she bit at her lip.

“Call me Syi,” I said. “It’s only Osiris when I’m in trouble.”

“Your name is really awesome, by the way. And I didn’t mean to offend you. And I didn’t mean to wander away and…”

“Yes you did,” I cut her off. “Don’t bullshit me, sugar. It’s not my business anyway. I saw you on the bench. You started throwing up. That’s why I brought you back here. I figured the firewood was enough but I guess not.”

“The firewood?” she asked.

I shook my head. “Where do you think your friends got that firewood? Who the hell goes camping without firewood?”

“That was you?”

“I brought some over for you,” he said. “Whoever you were with looked like they belonged in a hotel in the city. And your boyfriend letting you slip away like that…”

“I don’t have a boyfriend,” she blurted out in a hurry.

“Right. Well, whatever.”

“These are the best burgers around,” she said. “So, take the bag, take the beer, and I’ll be going. I just wanted to say thank you and that I’m sorry.”

“Now you’ve said it twice,” I said. “If you keep apologizing then you’re feeling guilty for something else.”

Her face turned a shade of red. “Okay. I won’t say it again then. But you saved me. I appreciate that. I hope it didn’t cause you any trouble.”

“I’m still alive,” I said. “Anything else?”

“I guess not.”

Lara gave a weak wave and turned. I watched her to the end of the porch. The winds were still battling with the trees. It hadn’t started raining just yet. But when it did, the sky was going to just open up and pour.

I put the beer down on the same table near the door where I had charged her cellphone. I opened the bag and saw there was plenty of food. Burgers. Fries.

I curled my lip and watched her take a step off the porch.

“Lara,” I said.

She looked back at me. “Yeah?”

“If you come back in here for a bite to eat you might not be able to leave for a while.”

That’s when a small smile flickered on her face.

That was exactly what she wanted…

… and maybe that was exactly what I needed.