Young Writers Society

Sky beasts stole sun, stole green, stole light and wind so all was grey and damp and chill. They shed fur in white tufts on the window sill, on the wood shed, on Scott’s plaid shoulders, on trees and earth.

Atlas sat at the window and watched. His upper lip curled in a snarl, and he dug his nails into the sill, outraged. He gave them no permission to be here with their cold and miserable white and ruin his world.

The boy inclined his head towards the door to listen as Scott came inside. He did not dare look away from the window.

Door open, door shut, creak floor boards, drop wood.

“What’s the matter, Atlas?”

Atlas looked at Scott, who was tall and whose glasses were fogged with the cold, and the white seeping into his skin.

“You have a look.”

Atlas growled, “They kill my land with they white ruin.”

“Their, darling,” Scott reminded him.

Atlas pointed out the window, anxiously. “Their white ruin is everywhere.” He didn’t need grammar lessons, not at a time like this.

Scott opened the stove, shoved in three pieces of birch, and shut the door. He wiped his glasses off on the edge of his shirt. “That’s called snow, Atlas.”

“They sky beasts, they death.”

Scott watched the boy for a moment. “Only for some things. Only for a few months, until spring.” He smiled, which meant he was happy, but Atlas could not figure out why. This was very wrong, and anger-making, not happy. “Have you really never seen snow before?”

The deep blues of his eyes made Atlas nervous. He quickly looked away, worrying at the twine bracelet around his wrist. “I hunt sky beasts. I renew land.”

“You cannot chase down clouds, Atlas.”

“Clouds,” Atlas scoffed. “They beasts of they sky.”

“They’re condensed water molecules. Clouds.”

“I kill clouds,” Atlas grumbled.

“Come to the fire. Get your workbook, and your pen. We’ll do school, and then a good run before dinner.”

Atlas hunkered down at his post. “I guard.”

“You guard?”

Scott crossed the small space of the room, threw an arm around Atlas’ middle, and swung up the giggling boy. “The snow will be here after lessons.” He deposited the boy in front of the fireplace, brought over a yellowing composition notebook and a chewed blue pen. “Stop eating your school supplies.”

“My teeth is hurt.”

“Your teeth hurt.”

“I chew,” Atlas continued, ignoring him. “My teeth is hurt no more.”

“Atlas.”

“No. I done with grammar. No more grammar. I speak English Atlas way.”

Scott looked at him.

Atlas picked at the corner of his paper. “My teeth hurt no more,” he muttered.

“Better. Remember, speaking English correctly is very important for when you’re a grownup like me.”

Atlas rolled his eyes. “I never grow up, Scott. I always so little.”

“Let’s wait a few years and see who’s right. I bet you’ll be taller than me.”

“Really?”

“Only if you eat your vegetables.”

That made the boy grin. “I love my veggies,” he confided in Scott.

“Convenient.”

They sat a while beside the fire where Atlas struggled with his letters, became frustrated, relaxed when Scott soothed him, and started again. Atlas thought he would burst.

Scott finally allowed, “That should be enough for today.”

“Can I go outside now?”

“Put away your things, first.”

Atlas leapt to his feet, tossed his school things on his shelf, and ran to the door.

“Coat, boots, hat, gloves,” Scott said, without looking at him.

“I have to be a boy?”

“For ten minutes.”

“But—”

“I am also willing to make it fifteen.”

Atlas stormed to the coat rack by the fireplace, jerking on his coat, his boots, his gloves. He held out his arms to offer himself up for inspection.

“Hat,” Scott reminded him. “What do you always cover up when it’s cold outside?”

Atlas touched his scalp; Atlas touched his feet.

“Use your words.”

“Mine head. Mine toes.” He paused, looking up at Scott. “Why?”

“I don’t want you to get cold.” Scott smiled warmly, tousled Atlas’ curly dark hair, and told him, “Right. Go on out, before the sun’s gone. Do not go past the trees.”

“I know. You tell me always.”

“And I mean it always. There’s a whole wide world out there, Atlas, and not all of it is friendly. You’ll see, when you’re older. For now, you need to stay close and safe.” Scott kissed Atlas’ forehead. “Hurry up, now, before you’re out of daylight.”

Atlas pulled on his hat and bounded out the door. He capered through the snow, kicking it, collapsing on all fours to bring it to his nose and inhale deeply. It smelled crisp, grey, wet. Atlas crumpled the snow up in his hands. Fur pressed against his gloves, and he growled skyward.

Atlas pushed himself to his feet, shook his head, and began to creep around the perimeter of their little settlement, which was quickly filling with more of these frosty burrs. He took off his glove and ran his fingers along the spines of the pines ringing their cabin, their wood shed, Atlas’ buried bike, jump rope, trampoline. When he came full circle, he looked upward, spat in the snow, and told the indifferent creatures above him, “My land, my trees, my Scott.”

Atlas took up his vigil a few yards from the front door, crouching, snapping occasionally at a snowflake that ventured too close.

In the woods, a twig snapped like bone.

Atlas froze, staring ahead. A grey shape weaved between the trees, distant and small still, but discernable and real and inexplicably there. Not badger. Not rabbit. One of the sky beasts must have descended and was coming to face him. It smelled like Atlas reasoned they smelled, like foreign fur and flesh and earth, but it moved so quickly toward him, on four paws crunch crunching snow.

He came to his feet, fur trembling down his spine, and said to the cold air around him, “They come for me.”

Behind him, the door opened. Atlas whipped around.

Scott stood in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest. “Aren’t you cold?”

Atlas shook his head. He looked back towards the wood, but the wanton sky beast was gone. He resolved to find it again, later. When Scott was asleep and would not notice him creep past the trees, Atlas would hunt it, kill it, rescue his land.

Scott regarded the growing twilight. He stamped his feet. “Do you need a break?”

The boy nodded.

Nodding over his shoulder, “Come inside to change, then. You can go run about until it gets dark.”

Atlas hurried inside, stripping as he went. He crouched by the stove to set out and let dry his hat and gloves and coat. He took off his shirts, his boots, his pants, his woolen tights, his underwear, his skin and his hair, his fingernails, the very lashes of his eyes. He collapsed onto dirty paws, into fur, and stood there, prancing, watching Scott with wild yellow eyes.

“Go on. You have only thirty minutes or so out there.”

Atlas the wolf bounded out the door.

----

While Atlas ran, Scott began making dinner. He went out to fire up the barbecue and stood under the alcove there, watching the trees, watching the grey wolf pup dart between branches, attacking snowflakes, rolling through snow piles, snuffling after field mice. He smiled to think that Atlas had really never paid attention to clouds before this day, that he was still so young to have never seen snow. That boy.

He set the venison steaks to grill, gave a last glance to the trees, and went inside to peel potatoes and to wait.

When genuine twilight pressed against the windows, there came a scratching and a whining at the door. Scott grabbed a blanket and left the stove and the half-finished mashed potatoes to let Atlas, wet and panting and manic, inside. He hunkered down before the wolf pup and ruffled his scruff. “Atlas, where are my eyes?”

Atlas’ stare stilled, settled on Scott.

“It’s time to be a boy again.”

The wolf shook his coat out, and then there was the boy, naked and shivering, his hair soaked and skin glistening. He stank of wet dog.

Scott smiled, relieved despite himself. He feared the day Atlas would not turn back again. He collected him up in the blanket and hugged him to his chest. “God, you’re freezing.”

Atlas’ hands moved against Scott’s collar bone.

“Use your words.”

“I want pants.”

Scott laughed and put Atlas down in front of the fireplace. “Here, sit here, warm up. I’ll get you new clothes.”

Atlas huddled in his blanket and watched the fire flicker with animal eyes. He muttered, “I frighten rabbit.”

“Frightened, my friend.” Back with clothing, Scott offered Atlas a pair of underwear. “They’re pretty jumpy.

Atlas blinked away the primal solemnity from his eyes. He began to dress himself. “Dinner?” Scott stared at him. Atlas sighed. “Is dinner ready?”

“Almost.”

Atlas curled back up in his blanket, pulling down his sleeves to his wrists. Anxiety clouded his eyes.

Scott hoped there wasn’t anything wrong, but, knowing Atlas would not react well to being asked directly, decided to wait until he was ready to talk. He returned to the stove, saying, “You’re already outgrowing those clothes. Would you like me to get you some new ones?”

“We go to town?” Atlas’ smile bloomed.

“We’ve only about two weeks of food left. I think we’d better endeavor—”

“‘Endeavor’?”

“It means to go toward or to pursue something. Anyway, we should head down tomorrow, if the snow lets up. Before the roads get too bad.”

“I can drive?”

Scott laughed. “No, big man. No, you can’t.”

“I never go to town before.”

“You did, when you were a baby. When I brought you home for the first time. I think you were too little to remember.” Scott stirred the mashed potatoes, smiling fondly at the memory. Atlas had been so small then, stifled by the wolf in him, and just sat in his lap whining and whimpering, even when Scott hushed him and scratched his back reassuringly.

He waved off the memory, shut off the stove, moved the pot off the burner. “I’m going to go grab the steaks. Set the table, please.”

Atlas pushed himself up off the floor, padded across to the small, rickety card table with two opposing chairs. He opened up the cabinets above it.

Scott jerked on his coat, picked up a pair of tongs, a roll of aluminum foil, and a plate, then went outside. The dark had spread, and with it the cold. He looked out at the expanse of woods beyond the safe halo of light that was their cabin. They kept silent and still.

The man shook his head to get the dark thoughts out from behind his eyes, the involuntary worry of something out there, and collected the meat off the grill. He swept back inside with a covered plate. Snow swirled in and vanished on the wood floor. He muttered, “Freezing out there.”

Atlas stood by the table, admiring his handiwork, the carefully set plates and cups and forks and knives. He had, as he always did, set them up with painstaking symmetry.

“Dinner’s ready. Would you sit down? Atlas?”

Atlas didn’t seem to be listening to him, bent over the table, moving his fork millimeter by millimeter, trying to line it up with the one opposite him.

Scott moved one of the cups as he walked by.

“Scott! Is not funny! You ruined it!”

“You weren’t listening to me, big man.”

Atlas rocked back on his heels and folded his arms over his chest, pouting. He wondered where Atlas got that pose from. “What?”

“I said dinner’s ready, and it’s time to sit down.” Scott reached over him to set the plate down on the middle of the table.

Atlas put the cup back. He sat. He rocked a little in his chair, watching Scott dish mashed potatoes into a serving bowl. “I can have milk?”

“May I.”

“May I have milk?”

“Sure, get a can out of the fridge. I’ll pop it open for you.”

After dinner, after Atlas was asleep, Scott banked the fire. He dead bolted the door, shut and locked the window shutters, checked that his hunting rifle was loaded, and climbed into bed. He lay there in his and Atlas’ shared room, which was only separated from their eating and living space by a curtain, and listened to the murmur of the wood until he at last slept.