The Cabin at the End of Herrick Road. Derek Wachter
the cabin. Christina opened the door and got out of the car. Matt opened the door and swung the lower half of his body out the passenger side of the car, using his arms and hands to drag his legs out of the car. Matt sat for a moment in the passenger seat and simply admired the view of the Elwha Valley and the grass, the forest, and the mountains in the area. He listened intently for a moment and noticed that he could not hear anything—no traffic, no car horns, no neighbor’s yelling or playing music too loudly, no sounds of lawnmowers or weed whackers—just eerie silence. Matt had also noticed on the way up to this location that there were no other houses or log cabins on this dirt road. The rest of the houses kept to the paved road of Herrick, back toward the town of Elwha. They were as far away from civilization as possible, truly in a cabin at the end of civilization—the cabin at the end of Herrick Road. Matt closed his eyes and enjoyed the peace and silence of the forest as his wife talked to the movers who had come out onto the ramp after loading furniture into the home. The cool crisp breeze of the autumn air brought a sense of peace to Matt that he hadn’t felt since he was a young child. The sensation was truly overwhelming.
“Matt?” said Christina.
Matt opened his eyes to see his wife standing in front of him.
“I got your chair from the back seat, you want to come in and see the cabin?” asked Christina.
“Oh sure, that sounds great. Thank you, babe.” Matt smiled, not even realizing Christina had the wheelchair out of the car and ready for him to use.
Christina helped Matt by the arm to stand up and get into his wheelchair. Using the car door with one hand and Christina to help brace his weight, Matt swung his body toward the seat of the wheelchair and sat down all in one motion. Once in the chair, Christina helped push him up the steady incline and toward the long wooden ramp where Matt helped to propel himself up the ramp with his hands insisting to Christina that “he’s got it.” Christina stood by just in case Matt needed the extra support of a push up the ramp and into the cabin. He never did. Matt pushed himself the whole way up the ramp and onto the front deck and eventually into the cabin. Christina walked the rest of the way up the ramp and walked onto the surrounding deck of the cabin. She walked over and stood by an old rickety rocking chair and turned her back to the cabin to look out into the field. There was a gentle breeze that gracefully bent the blades of the tall brown grass stalks in the field. Christina listened carefully, and she could hear the wind whistling through the pine trees in the forest just beyond the grass field from where she was standing on the deck. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath of air, curious, not to take in the smell of cars or whatever the neighbor was cooking next door as well.
“How about that view? Hmm…hmm! And that fresh air.”
Christina heard the voice come from behind her. She had thought it was possibly one of the movers. It couldn’t have been Matt, it was too feminine to be him, but it wasn’t one of the movers at all. Christina opened her eyes and turned around to see a short, pudgy black woman sitting in the wooden rocking chair behind her rocking back and forth. She instantly recognized the woman and her eyes grew wide.
“Charolette?”
“Ha ha, yeah, it’s me suga’.”
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Oh, baby, you need me here. Right now I’m in your mind. In your thoughts. I’m here to help you.”
“Wow. Maybe I have had a little too much fresh air at once. So what you’re saying is that you’re a ghost.”
Charolette laughed and smacked her lips together. “Suga’, don’t say that. I ain’t no ghost. I’m your conscience. You still got some doubts in your mind about all this too, don’t cha?”
“Well, I would be lying if I said I didn’t.”
“This is good for you, suga’. Good for your husband. Good for your relationship.”
“No.”
“No?”
“Well. This really was a very hard decision to make. We had a pretty good life back in Olympia still. I mean I was working, and we could have stayed there. There was a Safeway store just down the road from us. Now I’m going to have to drive to Port Angeles to get to a Safeway.”
“But you still decided to come out here, huh?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I did. We did.”
“So, why’d ya do it?”
Christina thought about the question for a moment.
“I guess I did it for my husband.”
“Nah, that not all the reason why you moved out here.”
“You’re right. I did this for our marriage too.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“You lyin’ to yourself, baby. You did this for yourself too. Was it worth it?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. To me personally I would never have done this. I remember growing up in the town of Packwood. I know what it’s like to live out in the woods. Trust me, the city life is better than living the rural life. It’s easier.”
Christina turned her back to Charolette. She looked out into the field onto a beautiful and warm autumn day. The cool breeze caused the blades of grass to dance in unison with the forest just beyond the grass field. For a moment, Christina remembered her youth and what it was like back on her parents’ property in Packwood and she remembered how much she did enjoy it.
“You know what, yeah, maybe a little of this was for me too,” she said.
“Suga’, that’s what a marriage is all about, baby. When you feel comfortable and good makin’ those sacrifices, baby, then you know you doin’ it right.”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right. So what are you, locked and stuck in my imagination now? Every time I have a moment of bliss you just show up or something, is that how this works?” said Christina, turning around to look at Charolette in the wooden rocking chair. But she was gone. Christina looked around herself, but the short older black woman was nowhere to be seen. All that was left behind was a wooden rocking chair, slowly rocking back and forth in the autumn breeze, creaking while it moved.
“Wow. Maybe I should get to bed early tonight,” Christina said to herself. Christina walked toward the entrance to the cabin as she could hear her husband speaking with the movers.
The cabin had a large living room area that was set up with the couch over in the corner where the TV and TV stand were already set near a window. Matt and Christina moved out of the way while the movers continued to bring more furniture into the home from the moving truck—a nice rocking recliner followed by their bedroom set with a king-sized bed. Matt and Christina remembered moving into their last place in Olympia and were relieved that they weren’t the ones moving all their things again. It really was a great help having the movers helping to move their belongings into the cabin, not that Christina would have been able to do it all on her own. And they worked quickly too in setting things up and helping get Matt and Christina situated in their new cabin. The cabin had a spacious kitchen area that was in the northwest corner of the home. The living room, on the south east corner of the home, was quite large, and behind the living room in the southwest corner was a nice and simple dining room area, where movers were moving an old armoire set against the wall that housed some fine china and depression glass that Christina had collected over the years. On the east side of the home was a bedroom built for two, along with a bathroom and shower sitting between the bedroom and a small utility room with a back door to the cabin. In the utility room was room for a stand-up freezer (or refrigerator depending what you wanted), along with a washer and dryer unit that was already brought in by the moving crew and set up. Christina would just have to hook up the hoses and water and plug them into power, and they’d have their washer and dryer up and running. All in all, including the bedroom, bathroom, utility room, and the wide open living area, the cabin was nearly one thousand seven hundred square feet.