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Sometimes The Mountain Buries You is a queer novella about the monster that threatens your attempt at a much-needed quiet life. Check out the about page here.
It's the next time you hike to Sheppard that Murre comes with, so you don't get to have a long conversation about It and being in the woods with Murre and what, if anything, to tell Murre. He gives you an 'ok' sign as you walk up the transition from packed dirt road to service road.
You know this from when you said you have an answer, but Murre has the same sort of familiarity with traversing the woods as you and Sheppard do. They step even lighter now, with their backpack empty of their entire life but their medkit, to fill with berries. They're younger than you and the juxtaposition with the woods makes you think of houses on fire. Sheppard doesn't say anything and avoids your gaze, retreating from a passive unintentional intrusion on trauma. If it were just the two of you, you might consider telling him. It's been a long time since you've had the chance to tell someone, regardless of whether or not you wanted to.
Sheppard shows you and Murre where the huckleberry patches are, regardless of the lack of berries. He's one part guide, one part checking on each plant and stream. He's packed his thermos but when you nod at him to swap with your water bottle, he holds the thermos away and takes the offered water. Over the past months you've grown more confident in Sheppard maybe knowing how not to poison a human, that meter ticks up again. "Really?" "It's a treat, just for me." You wonder which of the plants of spring that might kill you that he's not dying from right now.
At the third—and final, Sheppard promises—salmonberry patch, you forgo picking and sit on the soft ground of moss and decomposing leaf and pine needle against a tree with yet another pocket-size paperback. It's almost sweet, Sheppard and Murre quietly picking only a couple berries from the most prolific plants, commenting on how the soil here works, what grows and what doesn't and how well. It would be sweet if you weren't still all too and perhaps unnecessarily keeping aware for Sheppard's safety.
Especially as Sheppard, in turn, is necessarily doing the same for you.
You look up from the page in your hands to see him pause. Murre takes much longer than you to catch on to something being wrong but not long enough for Sheppard to shush them. They study him for a moment before looking at you. You keep your eyes on Sheppard, on what to do next.
You can still hear birds. You can still hear a breeze. You can still hope it's not It.
When Sheppard resumes breathing—long enough that Murre in the corner of your eye has not only fully primed themself for running or fighting but is shaking from not acting yet—he doesn't turn to either you or Murre to say, "Alright, but we're leaving."
You quietly put away your book, take Sheppard's pack so he's without burden, and wave at Murre to move—certain they'd react poorly to a touch.
Sheppard goes through several phases of alert as you hike down to trails and trails to the service road and service road to packed dirt road and packed dirt road to winding paved road, a slow and steady deescalation to a notch about the usual out-and-about Sheppard that you've learned in the past few months is much more ready for peril than you had originally presumed. At some point Murre too unclenches their hands which shake with unspent adrenaline.
"I'll, uh, stay tonight," Sheppard says. You don't want to think about how big what had passed by was, Sheppard grimaces and sucks in a breath. He points out salmonberry patches closer to town that he's pretty sure folks in town don't know about as consolation for today's truncated ordeal.
When the three of you are settled in the cabin waiting for the next tankful of water to heat up enough for Murre's shower after you and Sheppard shared the first tankful, you heat up leftovers and make the largest pot of tea you've made in a long, long time. It hurts your heart in a way not entirely dissimilar to houses on fire. While Murre showers with an abandoned half cup on the kitchen table, Sheppard wraps his arms around you and breathes warmth against the crook of your neck.
The tea cozy for the tea pot that came with the cabin looks to have been made by someone in town. Sometimes the mountain of history that doesn't belong to you, that's etched into every facet of this cabin you live in, buries you until you're sobbing wherever you stand. Murre has been very conscious and courteous about not intruding on these moments while they've been here.
The pot sits on the coffee table. You sit on the couch, curled up and curled against Sheppard while Murre piled every possible spare pillow with them on your reading chair. It's a trial of effort sitting up to refill a mug of tea, and so each of you tops up the rest of your mugs whenever your own.
Sheppard admits they don't typically go after people, just him. But just him includes his vicinity. "Really fucked up some hunter's truck once." But also he's not all-knowing, and he's pretty sure any person fell to an attack wouldn't have much left of them to indicate there had been a person so—outside of knowing the rarity of disappearances in the area—he's not placing his whole confidence in his numbers.
"Wait, can you—" you gesture at your head, "—them?"
Murre seems to follow this just fine.
"Yeah," he says, eyes a kind of dull placid they've been since the last time he filled everyone's cups.
"Can it you?"
"Oh, yeah, of course." He refocuses his eyes, looking up to see Murre with questions they aren't voicing.
You hope your questions are in line with theirs. "How do you even... not stalemate all the time?"
"Well, it's not like... hrm." He puts his mug down on the side table—careful not to disturb you—presumably to add his hands to the explanation but he just stares at them instead. "You have to be paying attention to that, enough to react to it, which is maybe too much to react to what's happening. So it's really about which you focus more on and when."
"That's a fucked up game of chess," Murre says.
"Yeah." You can feel Sheppard withhold 'I'm not dead yet'. When he settles back into the couch with his mug again, you curl against him closer still.
It's the next time you hike to Sheppard that Murre comes with, so you don't get to have a long conversation about It and being in the woods with Murre and what, if anything, to tell Murre. He gives you an 'ok' sign as you walk up the transition from packed dirt road to service road.
You know this from when you said you have an answer, but Murre has the same sort of familiarity with traversing the woods as you and Sheppard do. They step even lighter now, with their backpack empty of their entire life but their medkit, to fill with berries. They're younger than you and the juxtaposition with the woods makes you think of houses on fire. Sheppard doesn't say anything and avoids your gaze, retreating from a passive unintentional intrusion on trauma. If it were just the two of you, you might consider telling him. It's been a long time since you've had the chance to tell someone, regardless of whether or not you wanted to.
Sheppard shows you and Murre where the huckleberry patches are, regardless of the lack of berries. He's one part guide, one part checking on each plant and stream. He's packed his thermos but when you nod at him to swap with your water bottle, he holds the thermos away and takes the offered water. Over the past months you've grown more confident in Sheppard maybe knowing how not to poison a human, that meter ticks up again. "Really?" "It's a treat, just for me." You wonder which of the plants of spring that might kill you that he's not dying from right now.
At the third—and final, Sheppard promises—salmonberry patch, you forgo picking and sit on the soft ground of moss and decomposing leaf and pine needle against a tree with yet another pocket-size paperback. It's almost sweet, Sheppard and Murre quietly picking only a couple berries from the most prolific plants, commenting on how the soil here works, what grows and what doesn't and how well. It would be sweet if you weren't still all too and perhaps unnecessarily keeping aware for Sheppard's safety.
Especially as Sheppard, in turn, is necessarily doing the same for you.
You look up from the page in your hands to see him pause. Murre takes much longer than you to catch on to something being wrong but not long enough for Sheppard to shush them. They study him for a moment before looking at you. You keep your eyes on Sheppard, on what to do next.
You can still hear birds. You can still hear a breeze. You can still hope it's not It.
When Sheppard resumes breathing—long enough that Murre in the corner of your eye has not only fully primed themself for running or fighting but is shaking from not acting yet—he doesn't turn to either you or Murre to say, "Alright, but we're leaving."
You quietly put away your book, take Sheppard's pack so he's without burden, and wave at Murre to move—certain they'd react poorly to a touch.
Sheppard goes through several phases of alert as you hike down to trails and trails to the service road and service road to packed dirt road and packed dirt road to winding paved road, a slow and steady deescalation to a notch about the usual out-and-about Sheppard that you've learned in the past few months is much more ready for peril than you had originally presumed. At some point Murre too unclenches their hands which shake with unspent adrenaline.
"I'll, uh, stay tonight," Sheppard says. You don't want to think about how big what had passed by was, Sheppard grimaces and sucks in a breath. He points out salmonberry patches closer to town that he's pretty sure folks in town don't know about as consolation for today's truncated ordeal.
When the three of you are settled in the cabin waiting for the next tankful of water to heat up enough for Murre's shower after you and Sheppard shared the first tankful, you heat up leftovers and make the largest pot of tea you've made in a long, long time. It hurts your heart in a way not entirely dissimilar to houses on fire. While Murre showers with an abandoned half cup on the kitchen table, Sheppard wraps his arms around you and breathes warmth against the crook of your neck.
The tea cozy for the tea pot that came with the cabin looks to have been made by someone in town. Sometimes the mountain of history that doesn't belong to you, that's etched into every facet of this cabin you live in, buries you until you're sobbing wherever you stand. Murre has been very conscious and courteous about not intruding on these moments while they've been here.
The pot sits on the coffee table. You sit on the couch, curled up and curled against Sheppard while Murre piled every possible spare pillow with them on your reading chair. It's a trial of effort sitting up to refill a mug of tea, and so each of you tops up the rest of your mugs whenever your own.
Sheppard admits they don't typically go after people, just him. But just him includes his vicinity. "Really fucked up some hunter's truck once." But also he's not all-knowing, and he's pretty sure any person fell to an attack wouldn't have much left of them to indicate there had been a person so—outside of knowing the rarity of disappearances in the area—he's not placing his whole confidence in his numbers.
"Wait, can you—" you gesture at your head, "—them?"
Murre seems to follow this just fine.
"Yeah," he says, eyes a kind of dull placid they've been since the last time he filled everyone's cups.
"Can it you?"
"Oh, yeah, of course." He refocuses his eyes, looking up to see Murre with questions they aren't voicing.
You hope your questions are in line with theirs. "How do you even... not stalemate all the time?"
"Well, it's not like... hrm." He puts his mug down on the side table—careful not to disturb you—presumably to add his hands to the explanation but he just stares at them instead. "You have to be paying attention to that, enough to react to it, which is maybe too much to react to what's happening. So it's really about which you focus more on and when."
"That's a fucked up game of chess," Murre says.
"Yeah." You can feel Sheppard withhold 'I'm not dead yet'. When he settles back into the couch with his mug again, you curl against him closer still.
