Page 30 of The Otherworld

I roll up the sleeves of my flannel shirt and grab the ax leaning against the barn.

That makes two of us.

Half a cord of wood is still piled at the side of our driveway under a gray tarp. Dad had chopped some of it, and Adam promised he would do the rest. I should have offered to help, but I hate chopping wood. Now the idea of slamming an ax into something over and over again sounds kind of satisfying.

I get to work, forgoing gloves (Adam never wears them) and wrapping my bruised knuckles around the ax handle. I steady a log on the chopping block.

SLAM.

Mom’s been crying all day. Dad took the day off work to be with her. She’s been cleaning things that don’t need to be cleaned, cooking food none of us wants to eat. Just trying to keep herself busy.

I grab another piece of wood, lift the ax over my shoulder, and swing it down.

SLAM.

The first neighbor came this morning. Mrs. Dubois from down the road. The silver-haired lady who used to yell at Adam and me for stealing cherries from her tree back when she didn’t have silver hair. This morning she brought my mother a casserole and her “condolences.” She saw me for two seconds when I walked through the room. Hey, Mrs. Dubois. She smiled, sad eyes. Hello, Jack. I’m so sorry about your brother. I didn’t reply. I just walked out.

The ax goes up, down—

SLAM.

Orca hasn’t called me yet. She’s searching the island again today, the woods this time. But no word yet. If this damn fog would lift, I could fly out there and look with her. Now there’s a storm coming, and I’m worried that Orca might not know about it. Her dad must have a weather radio, right? Or maybe she can sense when a storm is coming. ESP.

I bend down to scoop up the armload of chopped wood, stacking it beside the barn. That’s when I hear the screen door whine open, slam shut. I turn around and see Dad walking down the steps. He locks eyes with me, and I know right away I’m his target.

Shit.

I keep working like I never saw him—grabbing the next log, steadying it. I hoist the ax up over my shoulder.

“Jack.”

SLAM.

“What?”

“I need to talk to you.”

“I’m busy.”

“Jack.”

It’s a warning this time.

I clench my jaw, grab another hunk of wood.

Dad takes a big breath and lets it all out again like the grief is suffocating him too. All that time in the house with Mom crying.

“Jack, do you want to talk about it?”

It.

“About what?” I bite out, not because I don’t know what “it” is, but because I want to hear someone say his name. I can’t believe nobody has the guts to say his name.

Not even Dad. He shrugs his shoulders and goes, “How you feel.”

“How I feel?” My fingers go white around the handle of the ax. “This is how I feel—” I slam it clean through—the log splits with a shredding CRACK. “And since when did you become a therapist?”

Dad stares at me, unflinching. “I know you’re going through a lot right now, Jack.”

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