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  "That's great," said Rusty. Danners was eighty miles away, and even if it were only eight, not having to go there would make him extremely happy.

  "He doesn't have regular hours—just appointments. I could pull up his number and see if he's available now."

  "I'd really appreciate that."

  "What kind of pet do you have? I've never seen you buy dog or cat food."

  Rusty did not feel that this was a situation where he needed to share all of the information. "I've got a biology question." He hoped Jake wouldn't push him for more details.

  Jake took out his cell phone and tapped away at the screen for a few moments. He made a call, briefly spoke with somebody, then smiled. "You're all set," he told Rusty. He wrote an address down on a slip of paper and handed it to him.

  "Thank you," said Rusty.

  "How's everything going with you guys?" Jake asked, directing the question more at Mia than Rusty.

  "It's going great," said Mia. "Thanks so much for your help." Her tone was genuinely friendly, not dismissive, but she walked away from the register. Rusty wasn't sure if she had no interest, or if her lack of social interactions meant that she was simply clueless.

  Rusty thanked Jake again, and they left the store, hopefully to get some answers.

  * * *

  Dr. Teal's office was just a regular house with a small sign out front. After ringing the doorbell, they were greeted by a heavyset man who looked about thirty. He wore blue jeans and was buttoning a white lab coat.

  "Welcome," he said, shaking Mia's hand. Rusty didn't want to let go of the cooking pot, so he didn't offer his hand. "Right this way." The vet led them into a back room, which looked just like any veterinarian's office Rusty had ever been in. There was a scale, a metal table, lots of medical equipment, and posters of cute animals saying amusing things.

  "Thanks for seeing us on such short notice," said Rusty.

  "No problem at all. What can I do for you?"

  Rusty cleared his throat. "This is going to sound strange."

  "I'm listening."

  "There was this squirrel..."

  "Okay, hold on, let me stop you right there," said Dr. Teal. "You may be looking for somebody completely different. I handle domesticated pets. If you're looking for a wildlife expert, I'm not your guy."

  "I get that," said Rusty. "I was just hoping you'd hear me out. You might have some insight."

  "Is there a squirrel in that pot?"

  "Yes, sir."

  Dr. Teal sighed. "Go on."

  Rusty wasn't sure if he should tell the complete version of the saga, or leave out the parts that would make him sound like a madman. He decided that he might as well tell the entire story. Dr. Teal looked more and more annoyed as he went on.

  "Mia can confirm all of this," said Rusty, when he was finished.

  "Good. I'm glad to hear that the girl you came here with can back you up. I guess I might as well take a look at it."

  Dr. Teal took the pot from Rusty, set it on the table, and removed the lid. He stared into it for a few seconds, then replaced the lid.

  "Well?" asked Rusty.

  "You bashed a squirrel's brains out, then brought it here for me to inspect."

  "No."

  "It didn't do this to itself. Any fool can see that."

  "I know it doesn't seem physically possible—"

  "Because it isn't."

  "That's why I had all of those disclaimers while I was telling you what happened. I completely understand that this seems impossible."

  "You're confusing seems impossible with is impossible."

  "No, it seems impossible, because I was there when it happened."

  "I was not there," said Dr. Teal. "All I can go by is the evidence in front of me. I'm not sure if you're playing a prank or if magic mushrooms were involved, but what you're telling me happened is not what happened."

  The vet's condescending attitude was pissing Rusty off, even though he knew he deserved this attitude because his story was completely absurd.

  "Could you at least check out the lack of blood?" Mia asked.

  The vet took a penlight out of his pocket, removed the lid again, shined the light down in there, then replaced the lid. "I don't see any blood. Which leads me to believe that instead of hallucinating, you're lying."

  "Look at me," said Rusty. "Do I look like somebody who would walk in here and make this stuff up?"

  "Liars come in all shapes and sizes."

  "What would we have to gain?"

  "Amusement. Winning a bet. Attention that you desperately crave but aren't getting elsewhere."

  Rusty wanted to tell Dr. Teal to go fuck himself, but he'd been kind enough to see them in the first place and that would be going too far. "Okay, I agree with what you said before, you're not the right guy for this. Can you recommend somebody else?"

  "You're asking me to contact one of my professional colleagues and send you over there with a pot of mashed squirrel?"

  "They could run some tests. Prove that I'm lying."

  "I'm sure you can find somebody who will run some tests on your pet if you pay them. The recommendation won't come from me."

  Rusty almost hoped that the squirrel would spring back to life and attack him. Almost. Not quite.

  "All right," said Rusty. "I won't try to change your mind."

  "If you leave now I won't charge you for this office visit."

  Rusty picked up the pot. Dr. Teal escorted them to the front door, waved them out, then shut the door without another word.

  "Asshole," said Rusty as they walked toward the truck. "That's why I don't like people. He didn't have to act like that. Why not be respectful? Would that have been so difficult?"

  "Should we let Jake know that his vet might be mad at him?" Mia asked.

  CHAPTER SIX

  One rude small-town veterinarian who worked out of his home was far from their only possible source of information, but to be completely honest, Rusty no longer cared about the squirrel. He just wanted to go back to the cabin. If somebody else treated him this way—and they probably would—he might do something he regretted. At least, something he regretted doing in front of Mia when he was supposed to be setting a good example.

  "Where next?" asked Mia, as they drove away.

  "Home."

  "That's it? We're quitting already?"

  "If you want to come back tomorrow and wave the dead squirrel in people's faces, you're more than welcome, but I'm done. We shouldn't have come out here in the first place. What were they ever going to tell us?"

  "All right," said Mia. "If you're done, I'm done. Do you want to go back and shove the squirrel guts in the vet's mailbox?"

  "Yes. But we're not going to."

  After about ten miles on the paved road, it began to pour. Rusty cursed and muttered under his breath.

  "What did you say?" Mia asked.

  "Nothing."

  "Did you say that this is why you hate going into town?"

  "Yeah."

  "You do know that it rains up at the cabin, right? Rain isn't limited to the civilized world."

  "I meant that I hate driving in the rain."

  "I'm pretty sure that's not what you meant."

  "Fine," said Rusty. "I was being irrational. Completely irrational. Are you happy now?"

  "I'm happy that you admitted it, yes."

  Rusty clenched the steering wheel more tightly. He knew that he was being completely irrational and didn't care. It would've been insane for Dr. Teal to hear his story and not think he was being conned. He should've known before they even scooped the squirrel into a pot that it would take several attempts to find somebody who would spend their valuable time poking around in its remains to determine how it could continue to splatter itself after its brain was exposed. His behavior wasn't logical. He'd never try to convince anybody—including himself—otherwise.

  By the time they reached the road that went through the forest, he was feeling less pissy about the whole thing. Thou
gh he wasn't ready to laugh about it quite yet, he was no longer seething with rage. The rain hadn't ceased so the road was going to be a bitch to navigate, but the truck was designed for this kind of thing and he wasn't in the mood to wait it out.

  After going around the first curve, Rusty put the truck into park.

  "What's wrong?" Mia asked.

  "Not a thing." He picked up the pot, opened the door, and got out of the truck. He removed the lid, then swung the pot, flinging the squirrel off into some brush. He held up the pot, gathering some rain, then swished it around to clean up the remnants, which he poured onto the road. He replaced the lid, set the pot in the back of the truck, and got back inside.

  "You could have waited until it wasn't raining," Mia noted.

  "I know."

  "Whatever makes you happy, I guess."

  "I can't lie. That made me happy." He put the truck back into drive and they continued on their way. The mystery of the psycho squirrel would never be resolved, but Rusty didn't think that his life would be poorer for it.

  The road was crap but it was nothing Rusty hadn't handled before. He found having to maintain close focus on what he was doing very soothing—which, yes, also made no sense. The paved road should've been the soothing one. He didn't care.

  The deer that leapt out in front of him did it at the worst possible spot. For Rusty, not for the deer itself, which survived unharmed. Deer had a tendency to bound across the path with no notice, but usually it was a "slam the brakes" solution instead of a "swerve" one. But this particular deer appeared when they were on a downward slope, and so Rusty swerved instead of braked. Missed the deer completely. The truck went off the path.

  They stopped quickly, without smashing into anything or damaging the vehicle.

  "Are you okay?" Rusty asked.

  Mia nodded. "Frickin' deer."

  Rusty put the truck into reverse and applied the gas. The wheels shot muddy water high up into the air behind it but it didn't move. "Wonderful. Great."

  "We've got it out before."

  "Yeah." Rusty sighed.

  "The squirrel planned this."

  "Shut up."

  "I can't tell if that was an annoyed 'shut up' or an amused 'shut up.'"

  "Both. Do you want to get out now, or wait out the rain?"

  "Wait it out. It'll clear up soon."

  It did not clear up soon. They sat in the truck for two hours, alternating between silence and word games, until the rain finally thinned to a mist.

  Rusty started the engine again and pressed the gas pedal. Same result as before.

  "Slide on over," he told Mia, as he opened the door.

  "Should we even bother?" Mia asked. "Why not just walk home, wait for the mud to firm up, and come back with boards?"

  She was probably right. Rusty might be able to push the truck out of the mess, but most likely he'd just get himself drenched in mud and be in an even fouler mood during the three-mile walk home. Best to save this until tomorrow morning.

  They dug the umbrellas out from under the seat, got out of the truck, and walked down the muddy path.

  "What a waste of a day," said Rusty. "So much stuff we could've gotten done. That cabinet was almost finished, but no, I had to humiliate myself. Watch, we'll probably drag those boards all the way back here and still not be able to get the truck free."

  "We'll be able to get the truck free," said Mia.

  "Yeah, yeah, we will, I know. It'll be fine. I should've left that rodent to die in the outhouse."

  "That would've been heartless."

  "Heartless but smarter."

  "You're not a cruel person."

  "Just let me question my choices, okay?"

  At least the weather was kind to them on the walk back, never raining quite enough for them to need to open the umbrellas. Rusty wanted to angrily stomp through some of the mud puddles, but didn't want to behave like a bratty little kid.

  They saw plenty of squirrels, which all seemed normal, and plenty of birds, which also all seemed normal, and another deer, about fifty feet back into the woods. It sprinted away as they walked past.

  "What's your plan for the rest of the day?" asked Mia as they arrived back at the cabin.

  Rusty wanted to sit on the front porch and sulk, but that was not a good answer. "I was going to get back to work. Make up for the lost time today."

  "Sounds good to me."

  Mia went back to the shed, while Rusty returned to his woodworking on the porch. He was particularly proud of this cabinet, which was almost done except for the varnish and paint, and he found himself getting closer and closer to being amused by what had happened. He didn't think he'd ever quite reach the tipping point, but he conceded that he might reach a state where Mia's amusement didn't irritate him.

  When it was time to quit for the day, they went inside and had a lackluster dinner. Then it started raining again, followed by lightning and thunder. The cabin hadn't leaked since the second year he'd lived there (during the first year, it leaked in a different spot with each storm), so they just relaxed and read for a short while. Then, because he'd gotten so little sleep the previous night, Rusty went to bed early.

  He fell asleep immediately.

  Then he woke up. It was still raining, though the thunderstorm seemed to have passed.

  He heard scraping noises again.

  Not over by the outhouse. Something was scraping against the outside wall of the cabin.

  And from the sound of it, the source was something much bigger than a squirrel.

  Rusty got out of bed. The scraping stopped as he walked over to his window. He peered through the glass and saw nothing in the darkness outside.

  He hoped he'd imagined it. He probably hadn't.

  He left his bedroom and went into the living room. He turned on the outside light. Rusty went from room to room, looking through all of the windows except Mia's, and didn't see anything.

  Best to just ignore it, then.

  He heard the scraping again. He hurried back into his bedroom. Looked through the window. Nothing in front of it. Nothing to the right. When he looked to the left, he thought he caught a glimpse of something, but it moved around the corner.

  He was not in the mood for this right now. He needed one peaceful night before he had to deal with this kind of crap again.

  Should he wake up Mia?

  No. If he decided that he actually needed to go outside to investigate, he'd wake her up, but for now he'd let her sleep.

  His palms were sweating. He couldn't deny it: he was legitimately scared.

  More scraping. This time it came from the living room. Or at least he thought it did. He went back in there, looked through the window, and saw nothing.

  Did he just hear a growl?

  He may very well have heard a growl.

  He stayed completely still and listened carefully. There wasn't another growl, at least not one he could hear over the rain.

  Okay, he needed to stay calm. This was nothing he couldn't handle. He had several guns and plenty of ammunition. If whatever was out there tried to get inside—which it wouldn't—a shotgun blast to the face would take care of that problem.

  He did another check of the windows. Nothing.

  Then he sat down on the couch, listening for anything unusual.

  It was quiet except for the rain.

  "Uncle Rusty?"

  Rusty flinched at the sound of Mia's voice. She was right in front of him. How had she gotten there without him noticing?

  "Why are you sleeping on the couch?" she asked.

  He'd fallen asleep. Of course. Made sense.

  "I heard something outside," he said. It was still dark. It had either stopped raining or was raining very lightly—he couldn't tell.

  "What?"

  "Scraping against the sides of the cabin. Maybe a growl."

  Mia frowned. "Did you see what it was?"

  Rusty shook his head. "I couldn't see anything through the windows. I'm going to look now." />
  "Be careful."

  Rusty got up off the couch and went over to the cabinet where they kept the guns. He'd stopped locking it on Mia's thirteenth birthday. He wanted one hand free, so he selected the pistol. It was already loaded.

  Mia grabbed her rifle. Rusty didn't stop her.

  He did another window check, including the one in Mia's room, and saw nothing. Whatever was out there was probably long gone, but maybe it had left clues to what it was, like footprints or a great big pile of scat. Rusty picked up the flashlight, turned it on, walked over to the front door, opened it, and stepped out onto the front porch.

  If there'd been muddy footprints, the rain had washed them away. He waved the flashlight beam past where the outside lights would carry, and saw nothing.

  "Oh my God," said Mia.

  Rusty turned around to see what she was looking at. There was a long scrape across the front wall of the cabin, as if something had raked its claws across the wood for several feet.

  "A bear?" Mia asked.

  "Looks like it."

  "We didn't leave any food out, did we?"

  "No." One mistake Rusty had never made in his entire time living out in the woods was leaving out food that might attract animals. If a bear ran its claws along the cabin wall, it wasn't going to be because of something stupid like that. "I'm going to circle the cabin, see what else I can find. You wait here."

  "What if you need help?"

  "If you hear me scream, come rescue me. Otherwise, wait here. I'm just going to do a quick circle; I'm not going to wander off into the forest."

  Rusty stepped off the porch and walked across their front yard. He stayed about ten feet from the cabin so that if there was a nasty surprise waiting around the corner, he wouldn't be face-to-face with it before he saw what he was dealing with.

  There might have been footprints. If so, they were filled with water and impossible to identify as such. But there was another very distinct scrape across the wall.

  He went around to the back. Another long scrape—this one went from edge to edge—and more imprints in the mud that may or may not have been footprints. There was no question that an animal had done this, and, yes, he was leaning very strongly in a "bear" direction.

  No scrapes on the final side of the house. Rusty returned to the front porch.