Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/554642
S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S 1 6 9 moved on. I followed her sucking footsteps away from the glimmer of dusk and into a place fully dark. When I dropped her off at her room, there wasn't anything to say, and she knew it and stepped onto the sill. I followed her to the door and reached for her and pulled her back and hugged her hard, hoping to find something in our immediacy, some understanding, but there was just the cool presence of her body and her hair against my lips as I awkwardly kissed her ear and wanted to cry and couldn't. She pushed back and walked inside. In bed that night, I watched the moon creep across the window. Mice skittered in the attic crawlspace, and Tobey's feet paddled in woodcock dreams while I waited for the alarm. I rose as soon as it chimed, punching the plunger and swinging my legs out of bed. It was dark and chilly, and my bare feet were dry on the plank floor. I walked out of my room and groped for the light switch. Missing my mark, I felt the painting at the head of the stairs list. With my heart beating hard and a near sick feeling, I found the light, flipped it on, and straightened the painting, noticing it for the first time. Abstract, and ugly in its abstraction, it was the image of a fisherman adrift in his canoe. His face was a smudge of color, all reds and blues and threw it back, undulating with the goings-on of shallow water. Panfish smacked the lilies. The bullfrog shut up. A good bass swirled hard by the deadheads, setting me free from my thoughts. That reflexive excitement filled the frame enough to make my heart beat hard but receded with the ripples, till the fear and distance were centered again, and a wet dog slipped past my leg. I looked over at Jackie. She too was looking out over the water. "We should get Tobey home before we lose him. You can stay with me at Ann and Dave's if you like." I hoped she'd look at me, but she didn't. Her eyes hovered somewhere over Wolcott Pond. "I have too much packing. I'll need to leave on Thursday, if you can still give me a ride to the train in Montpelier. My gig with the forest service starts soon, and I need to see my mom in Keene before I go." We'd been over the plan so many times. Its finality hung in the air, and we didn't speak about what lay beyond it, the plausibility of our fracture spanning a thousand miles and a half-year apart. "I should get some sleep anyway." She turned back toward the car. Lifting a bleached beaver chew from the mud, I chucked it into the water. Tobey turned to chase but thought better of it. I opened my mouth to speak, but Jackie had already