Juggling Fire Read Online Free Page B

that it sets me vibrating again at the thought of the night air. I climb out on my stomach and unpack my wool hat, my flashlight, my bear spray and a pen-shaped device called a bear banger. I screw one orange cap of gunpowder into its end and carry three more into my tent. Lying down again, I put my hat on my head and use my sweater for a pillow. I need to arrange my defenses where I can find them by feel in the dark. I prop up my empty boot and drop everything into it. I could find it by smell as well. My boots smell like moss. All I have to do with the bear banger is pull back one end, and the gunpowder will explode into the sky like a firecracker.
    Brooks crawls up and lies on me, legs spread like a roasting chicken. Claustrophobic, I kick him off and he curls against the wall, making it shake. I shove him back to my feet and, feeling guilty, sit up to scratch his warm belly for a moment, my sleeping bag bunched about my waist. He moans, content. Eyes closing, I curl up again, relaxed and warm.
    My pack is still too close if a hungry bear wanders past.
    I crawl out yet again.
    I drop my pack close enough that I’ll see a bear coming to investigate, but not so close he feels compelled to investigate me too. Unfortunately, there are no trees here so I can’t sling it over a high branch.
    Back in the tent, I’m wide awake. My stomach rumbles and then twists. I didn’t eat enough, I know. I mound my sweater-pillow underneath me and stare at the roof sagging above my head. I unzip the outer door so I can see a crack into the night. I want to be able to run out if I need to, not fumble with the zippers of the screen and the nylon doors. I fall asleep with one fist curved around the toe of my boot. Brooks lies with his head on my stomach and snores.
    My stomach growls like a bear in the night.

3

So What Is a Bear?
    Grizzly, grizzle us,
    Ursus horribilis,
    Moonlight dribble us,
    You can’t get me!
    Not bad, I think. When I’m half awake, poems sometimes pop into my head. I’m a better sleeping poet than an awake one. I think of my mind as a long corridor with rooms opening off it. The poem-making room is sunny, with bright yellow walls and tall skinny windows letting in mountain views. Unfortunately, I can knock on the door in the day, but only in the early morning does it swing open.
    I lie in my bag with the low morning sun on my tent walls and floor, bathing me in warmth. Ursus horribilis used to be the Latin name for grizzly bear. Brooks yawns and stretches and the tent shakes. I stick my head out without getting out of my bag. The moon is sinking below a plug of rock at the top of some no-name peak. The upper mountain faces are rosy and fresh from the rising sun. Brooks licks my face at the same moment I open my mouth to speak. Gross!
    I’m happy. It isn’t dark anymore, and I don’t have to say good-bye to anyone today. As well, it’s completely up to me what I do with my day.
    An hour later the sunshine has moved down from the peaks and is shining on the willows. White-crowned sparrows flash above me from bush to bush. My first choice, which is to stay in bed, won’t work. To do that, I’d need someone to build the fire for me and cook my breakfast.
    I fling open the tent door and hop out, still in my sleeping bag, collecting dry twigs in the clumps of bushes. I don’t step out of my bag until the little fire is blazing and spitting sparks into the sunshine. I like the sound the sparks make as they pop and fly away.
    Brooks is sniffing down the trail, nose to ground. Brooks always has his nose on the ground unless a large mammal like a bear, wolf, moose or caribou is close. In that case, it’s up in the air and he’s talking away—kind of a cross between a yip and a drawn-out moan.
    “What could have happened to him, Mom?” I asked her once when he’d been gone a few years.
    Mom only talked about Dad’s good side to me. She figured if I only remembered the happy times, then I wouldn’t be traumatized.