Between them, the hearth— their humanity long forsaken. A quiescent bed of ash and cinder, no more than a heap now, having last fostered fire in another time. And yet, here had sparked a small orange flamelet, one so delicate and feeble to burn. It popped and crackled in its fragility, flickering peril and setting a-drift wisps of white smoke in declaration of its resurrection. It begged a hand to stoke, and to oblige meant to venture.

He knelt down, picked up the rifle, and walked past her to holster the weapon in the gun cabinet. Walking to the nightstand, he looked over at her and asked: Are you really alone?

She looked back at him, arms still at her sides: Yes.

No ones gonna come looking for you?

No. She lowered her eyes and folded her arms in front of her, tightening her forearms against her chest— perhaps a motion of self-comfort. As he approached the nightstand he could feel her carriage, one of genuine angst. No one was coming for her.

He reached down and picked up the silver handgun from the nightstand. Gripped in his right hand, he pointed the gun upward and pulled the slide back between his thumb and forefinger to see the brass round in the chamber. Well…He let the slide snap forward…who’re you looking for? He tucked the gun, barrel first, into the back of his jeans.

She nodded at him as if to acknowledge the question, but she didn’t answer. She just looked around the room and asked: How long’ve you been here?

He sighed and said simply: Six years. He walked around the bed and past the gun cabinet to the open wardrobe where he pulled from the closet rod a green and black checkered flannel shirt. He removed the shirt from the hanger shoulder by shoulder and hung again the empty wire. He carefully slid the left sleeve up his arm, minding the wound at his shoulder, and hastily worked his other arm into the right. He then buttoned up the shirt.

She continued to take appraisal of the space. The gun cabinet, the bed, the nightstand. She walked to the full length mirror leaned up against the north wall and stared blankly, almost hypnotized, and she put a hand out to run across her own reflection. She looked over at the small round table and chair, and she turned to face the door, all the while scanning. Where are we?

Gray Canyon.

She stopped her survey to face him, expecting more.

He rolled his eyes, Utah.

She then said, in slight satisfaction: Made it to Utah. With a half-smile she turned and swiped the bag of sugar off of the table, walking over to place it on the wooden countertop, then placing her hands down on the countertop before her to lean. She let her neck stretch forward, and then lifted her head and turned around to face him. She asked: Is this where you’re from?

He laughed, audibly. God, no. Stepping forward, he pulled the chair out from the table to sit down and crossed his arms over one another against his chest. He kept his eyes fixed to her’s, waiting for another question.

So you came here. On purpose?

He slowly nodded. He moved his gaze to lay on the open doorway, and for a few moments he stared straight ahead. His awareness trailed away to some far off place, and she did not interrupt the wander. Very suddenly, he shook his head, and she understood the motion as a quick diffusion of thought. Once again, they were silent.

He cleaned the cabin, clearing the floor of all she had thrown about and placing each object where he had known it to live. He then sat down again in the chair— relaxed with his legs stretched long, right ankle crossed over his left, one heel to the ground and the other hovering. She paced the floor, crossing the cabin back and forth, eyes to the wooden boards below. There were no words to speak between them. They were both tired, but neither would rest. As surely as each had found some comfort with the presence of the other, they would pass the hours in vigilance.

Eventually, he stood out of the chair and reached back with his right hand to pull the gun out of his jeans.

She turned to face him. What is it?

He pinched the top of the barrel, pulling back fast the slide to eject the round from the chamber. He caught the brass in his left hand and said simply: Its a gun. He brought his right thumb up from the grip and pressed the button just behind the trigger guard, the magazine slid out of the magwell and he took it in his left hand. He placed it down on the small round table alongside the lone round and held tightly the empty weapon.

She kept looking at him, standing in futile wait for further detail. He quietly walked forward to the counter, reached up to one of the hanging cabinets, and pulled down a small grey snap-closure case. He turned, walked back to the table, and placed the case down flat along with the weapon. With his thumbs he flicked open both snaps and pulled the top of the case back to reveal a cleaning kit.

She watched with interest as he disassembled the weapon until it was no more than several inert pieces of steel organized on the tabletop before him. He then proceeded to pick each component up one by one, examining and meticulously cleaning them. His hands moved fluidly, with intention, and he could feel her watching and he wondered if she had ever broken down a firearm before.

She couldn’t help but let herself become immersed in his flow, how naturally he moved to reassemble the weapon. She was fascinated. He slid the magazine into the open bottom of the grip, pulled back the slide to chamber a round, and let it go forward with a loud click. He stood, reaching back to tuck the loaded weapon again into the waist of his pants.

He closed the case on the table and snapped it shut. As he was placing it back in the hanging cabinet, she asked: How’d you get here?

He shut the cabinet and laid both hands out on the counter in front of him. Leaning forward he let his chin fall to his chest and sighed in exasperation: I walked.

Without pause, she asked: From where?

His eyes narrowed, and he paused for a moment before faintly speaking her question as a statement: From where. The words danced off of his lips, drifting away into the cool and stagnant air around him, and he felt his mind begin to roam. Head still down, he shut his eyes tight and felt an abrupt cessation of everything around him. Sudden, incredibly visceral, a revolt within him. His breathing became shallow, his palms pressing harder against the wood of the countertop. He knew he couldn’t let her see him falling apart at a simple question, and he snapped back with an austere tone: Don’t you gotta get water?

She looked to the open doorway and then back at him. He opened his eyes and looked at her with a focused ferocity, one of his own fabrication. And in concealing his own vulnerability, he raised his voice: Go!

She stood quietly, frozen in place, and after a few seconds she turned to walk out of the cabin and into the clearing. He was looking towards the doorway as she left, and after a few seconds he turned his head to look back down at his hands. He was barely breathing when he shut tight his eyes down tight once again and clenched his jaw to bare his teeth. She had asked only, from where? One question, so simple. But in him was a tide, one made to churn by such a question, and he felt so violently the growing and indefinable inner-turbulence. It was something he could not grasp to control, and after a minute he understood its nature— it was memory.

From where? The words echoed, a signal drifting through him with the volume and clarity of its original source. From where? The cabin was his only home, all he had known for so long, but suddenly he feared it foreign. He could feel the room breathe, the same way as he had felt it when he first stumbled in six years ago. From where? He kept his eyes shut and he felt the wood of the counter, the hard grain against his open hands. So deeply in his soul he knew of somewhere before, and he could see that place now as it rose out of obscurity. And he felt a whole life, one once beaten inanimate, coming back to sentience in seconds.

And then, he heard it:

…will you say one for me.

And, for the first time in years, he could see the dying face behind those living words. And he forced open his eyes to escape the vision.

It was dusk, there was little sun left and the room had grown dim around him. He reached his left hand over to the edge of the counter and frantically felt around for the matchbox, locating and trapping it beneath his open hand. He took a moment to catch his breath before dragging the matches towards him. He closed his hand around the box and picked it up off of the countertop, holding delicately the small cardboard rectangle, and he wrapped his index finger to push the inner box out of its sleeve. His right hand quivered as he brought it up to carefully pick a single matchstick out of the bunch and he slid the inner box back into its sleeve. He turned the matchbox in his hand to face out the phosphorous strip and he struck the stick to light. Once, twice, and the third strike yielded a small spark that grew to a flickering flame. He put the box down and reached over to find the tin candlestick and he lifted it off the counter, bringing it in to let the flame meet the top of the half-melted pillar candle. The wick ignited, bringing a low and lambent light to the space around him.

He laid softly the rusted metal of the candlestick down on the countertop and laid both hands flat on either side. He looked ahead and breathed deeply. The small flame fluttered before him, and he could feel its heat so meek against his chin. He noticed something in his eye and he blinked it away, and he looked down to see by the burning candle a small drop of liquid just barely reflecting the wavering light. He realized it was a tear, one fallen and slowly drying into a small and dark watermark. Overcome, he lowered his head. And in his quiet weeping he found relief, however broken and ephemeral.