Honey-Colored Bear

Fifty days ago, Christopher left his dilapidated Subaru in a deserted parking lot deep within the entrails of Cascade Forest National Park. Forty days ago, he became an unwilling member of an infamous group he used to read about in the newspaper with cold, rolling eyes: lost hikers. 

Soon after moving to the small town in which he currently resides, nearly a decade ago, a new friend suggested going for a hike nearby. Christopher was not an avid hiker, and his less-than-ideal cardiovascular ability gave him pause at the idea. Still, the young feathers that formed the small wings of his fledgling friendship needn't be ruffled with rejection so soon, he figured, so he reluctantly agreed. He feigned excitement for the excursion, and together, he and his friend set off to the misty forest of Cascade Forest National Park. 

Upon arrival, Christopher swung his legs out of his friend’s cramped car, stretched his arms outwards, gulped down the crisp, clean forest air, gazed at the lush beauty unfolding boundlessly before him, and suddenly felt reborn. The soft, rich green embrace of the temperate Pacific rainforest wrapped around him, and he hugged back, arms as wide as his skeleton would allow.

He began habitually exploring this park, often alone. He reveled in the feeling of his footsteps sinking into the velvety, mossy forest floor. He stood with wonder as he caught glimpses of the bare chest of a jagged mountain spine that the sun would paint in the evening with streaks of pink and gold. He felt the songs he hummed reverberate amongst the antiquity of the plants surrounding him. Whenever he needed to find clarity, he could only do so when saturated by this forest, his forest. 

On the morning Christopher embarked on this ill-fated hiking expedition, a looming decision weighed him down more than the stuffed-full backpack he carried. Four mornings prior, his boss had offered him the role of Director of Something or Other, which would require him to move away to an exotic, bustling metropolis. Christopher wasn’t one to shy away from adventure, especially one with such lucid lucrativeness that he could see crystal a future complete with a home he owned, a car that wasn’t falling apart, a night out on the town that didn’t cause face-whitening anxiety when the bill came, yet the glint of this golden treasure was marred by black, sinewy cracks of opaque doubt. 

His new friends, his enjoyable yet underpaying job, the Friday nights spent poorly playing pool at a snug bar in town, the Sunday nights watching his neighbor’s spaniel, and most importantly, the forest he now found himself lost within, were all pieces of him that would be as painful to part with as a leech being extracted from his skin after a dip in a contaminated creek. 

He set up his small tent and makeshift kitchen under the ancient shadows of three large cedar trees, pondering what his future may hold. He made his camp along a stretch of sandy river shore, which he had stumbled across a few weeks back while fishing in the area.

Christopher caught a small trout, finding it hiding under the foam of a babbling backeddy a few meters up from his campsite. It was just large enough to keep, so declared the regulations of his license. He filleted it, fired up his single-burner propane stove, and prepared for the first feast of his camping trip. He slank back in his chair and fixed his eager eyes upwards. A tiny point of bright light streaked laterally across the onyx night. He made a wish. It was a good sign for his trip, he thought to himself. 

The next few days were spent largely in the same way. Christopher followed the sound of capsizing water drumming of slick slate and found a small waterfall one day; on another, he boiled a few river crayfish and savored the little lobsters with an intense appreciation not found even in Michelin star dining rooms. His mind had gone so quiet and his body so limp with peace that his impending decision, the one in which he had set out to deliberate, had jumped from his brain and sailed down the river days ago, leaving nothing for him to do but settle into the cozy bliss of existence in his small, isolated world. 

On the seventh evening of his camping trip, he felt a chill settling in his forest, which had returned after its long summer holiday. Looking upstream, he noticed large storm clouds lazily drifting towards him, surely pregnant with penetrating rain. He interpreted this as his cue to leave and resolved to head back to his car after he had his oatmeal the next morning. 

As they say, even the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry. 

—-

Christopher’s Journal

September 22nd – Day 8

I had thought the path back to the car was only about a kilometer upstream from where I had been camping. When I went to return today the path was nowhere to be found. I searched for what must have been two hours. Most of my walk to my campsite had been along the river bed, but I had noticed an orange log jammed on the shore next to where the path began which I was using for a reference point for my return. I think I saw that log float past me a few days ago, and now I can’t find where the path begins. There’s no cell service and my GPS tracker isn’t working for some reason. I’m now back to my original campsite and will search tomorrow for the path again. Weird. 

September 23rd – Day 9

Still couldn’t find the path today. I tried a few different places to climb up to where I figure the path must be, but the terrain is too steep and overgrown to get through. I’ll start downstream tomorrow. 

September 24th – Day 10

Heading downstream. Fighting against the thick bush is taking more energy than I thought, but I’m making progress. Thought about returning to my original campsite back upstream as I told Rob roughly where I had planned to camp, but the energy of returning through this thick forest when I’m surely only a few kilometres from a service road seems unnecessary. Managed to catch a fish this afternoon that will sustain me well enough and have some dry food left. Fine for now, hoping this will just be a stupid story in a few days. 

September 30th – Day 16 

Today I reached the end of the river where it meets a lake. I thought I’d be able to figure out which lake this is from my map book, but there’s about a dozen that all look similar. I could figure roughly where I started, but since then I’ve been hacking a wild path and randomly choosing which fork of the river to follow. I could realistically be at six or seven of these lakes. Hoping I’ll be able to find the outflow of the lake and continue to follow that downstream tomorrow. Making camp here tonight, saw a fish jump. 

October 12th – Day 28 

I’m stuck at the lake. The lake is so large and hard to traverse that I can’t find where the outflow is. There are no signs of people anywhere. Feel like I may be the only person who has seen this lake. I haven’t been able to catch a fish since the first night I arrived and my dry food is running low. I think I can ration enough for about 20 or so more days. I sleep under a leaning rock that covers about half of me. I found some cedar branches to cover the other half. My clothes are soaked with my sweat and the relentless rain. I’m starting to get scared of what’s to come, but I’m sure someone will find me soon. Think it makes the most sense to stay put, conserve energy, and wait for someone to find me. 

October 22nd – Day 38 

Found a patch of blueberries this morning near my “camp” and have been eating some. Getting hungry. Have seen a large bear eating the blueberries too. I like to watch her while keeping my distance. It’s a good distraction from my situation. Every time I hear the woods rustle I think it’s someone who has come to save me, which is getting old. The cold is inescapable. 

October 25th – Day 41

I saw the bear again today. She is beautiful. Honey-coloured. She sits down and uses her paws to eat. I know she has seen me, or at least smelled me, but she leaves me alone. I can feel eyes on me almost at all times. I heard a cougar’s cry a few nights ago… not sure if it is stalking me. Tired, hungry, so cold.

October 28th – Day 44

Abandoning hope of rescue but don’t have the energy or bearings to get back upstream to my original campsite. I’ve been floating logs into the lake in hopes that someone will notice them. Can’t find a clearing large enough to make myself seen to the helicopter that has flown over several times. Not sure what else to do. 

October 31st – Day 47

Halloween– I don’t know what can be scarier than this. Feeling so weak. Don’t know how much longer I can survive this cold. Basically out of food. So cold. Walking a hundred meters exhausts me. Getting more scared. 

November 2nd – Day 49

I am too cold and too hungry. I won’t survive another day like this. If I wake up tomorrow, I’m going to leave the lake and the stream and wander deeper into the woods until I find somewhere that looks comfortable to die. If anyone finds this journal my name is Christopher Gerber, please tell John & Nancy Gerber I love them and I’m sorry. 

—-

Fifty mornings after he confidently strode away from his car into the woods, Christopher rolled slowly off his damp mattress of moss and trembled as he begged his legs to support his weight. His swollen, dirty eyes began cracking open, and he was greeted with the first sun he had seen in weeks. The rays illuminated the steam emanating from the soaked forest floor as it welcomed the sun's heat. 

In his extended time as its unwilling captor, Christopher now saw the forest in a way few humans ever would. He watched ferns stretch themselves to lap up the morning’s dew. He noticed leaves unfurling and adjusting to face the glowing orb in the sky, slurping in nourishing light from the generous sun.  

Christopher gazed up at the blue sky above him. Dying in the sun seemed better than the rain, so he was grateful to the universe for the gift it provided. Blinking his goodbyes towards the lake, Christopher began stumbling into the hill behind his campsite, past his blueberry patch, and through the bush, finally collapsing into an open clearing. He rolled onto his back, stretched out, and let the sun baptize him before his imminent meeting with his maker.

He noticed that the pain, stomach-burning hunger, and unforgiving cold that had consumed him for weeks were no longer present. He felt free in his impending severance from life. He watched as the forest revealed itself to him.

Exposed roots intertwined and communicated. Fungi delicately connected and multiplied between tree bases. The forest subtly contracted and expanded as it took deep breaths. A black tail deer rushed through some plants, creating a nearly imperceptible change of color in the foliage. He had always felt the presence of something larger when in these woods, but this was the first time he was acutely aware that there was an intelligence and cooperation larger than any individual organism.

Why can’t humans be like this? he half-joked to himself. Christopher had always believed in climate change and did his small part, but he also always thought those who dedicated themselves to climate advocacy were too intense for his taste. He realized, sitting up in the clearing and gazing at the virginal gleam of the world around him, that the activists must see the forest as he now does.

Only as he sat there, about to be shackled to the forest for eternity, did he understand why they would chain themselves to tree trunks in the face of chainsaws. Killing these forests meant killing a world more substantial than most anyone understood. The forest is the engine of life. A momentous design that, whether from creator or evolution, should have been impossible to conjure. 

He drew in air sharply, gasping at the importance of what he was soon to irreversibly and eternally become part of. He lay his head back slowly on the moss, ready to drift off into a sleep so complete that his spirit would escape his body. He tried to center himself by breathing deeply, inhaling the rich smell of the deeply organic musk. His breathing was interrupted by a branch cracking and a bush rustling to his left. He looked over. The honey-colored bear stood there, watching him with intense curiosity. 

“Hello, Honey-Coloured Bear,” he said without realizing. 

The bear took a step towards him. Christopher felt no fear. Two more steps. Still, no fear. The bear continued walking, slowly but intently, towards him. Christopher got to his feet and lumbered his stiff, dying body towards Honey-Coloured Bear until only two feet separated them.

Christopher could feel the breath of his bear friend stick to him. He could smell the bear’s must and the pieces of fish that still clung to the bear’s collar. He looked into Honey-Coloured Bear’s eyes and saw his hollow face reflected to himself. He felt the hot warmth of tears flood his eyes. If this was it, his end, he was a willing sacrifice in the name of his friend’s nourishment. 

Honey-Colored Bear observed Christopher, pressing her long nose to sniff at the layer of mud stuck to his head. Christopher stiffened and braced himself. The bear sat down, gingerly lifting a paw. She prodded at Christopher’s arm with the same gentle precision that Christopher had watched her pick blueberries with. Christopher fought against his evolutionary impulses. He wouldn’t fight; he wouldn’t run. He loosened his muscles while the bear continued sniffing and prodding him. Steadily, the bear backed away and stood over Christopher’s dilapidated stature, surely planning to issue a fatal strike. Christopher bowed his head. Nothing happened. 

Christopher gingerly raised his head. Honey-Colored Bear had vanished. He scanned the bushes and spotted her tail sauntering around a sapling at the end of the clearing. Unconsciously, Christopher began following the bear’s footprints. A primal store of energy flooded him instantaneously. Through thick brush, open meadows, and turbulent, twisting streams, Christopher and Honey-Coloured Bear waltzed through all the flora and fauna they encountered. Christopher, entranced, was unaware of the day slipping into night. 

The sun had begun to slip behind the cover of the moon when Honey-Colored Bear suddenly stopped. The air hung still. She turned to face Christopher, her breath illuminated by the dappled moonlight. She slowly nodded to the right, turned, and resumed her trundle. Christopher’s eyes followed where the snout of his friend pointed. He noticed the tree line thinning just past a gently sloped embankment of sprawling sword ferns. The clearing seemed to be in a strange location, given the thickness of the bush surrounding it. Christopher began to climb.

The fronds of sword ferns fought against him with all their might, feeling like thousands of papercuts to Christopher’s raw, injured arms as he climbed. He broke their grasp and burst into the clearing, which only extended roughly six feet before him. When he looked to his right, however, his breath disappeared. The clearing extended, winding and unfolding itself until it snaked out of sight. It was a service road. 

Christopher wavered in place momentarily, trying to formulate a plan while fighting back feelings of elation. He debated himself on which direction of the road to venture down. As he pondered, he felt the bitter bite of complete depletion sink its teeth into his body with a smooth clench of the jaw. He had no defense, no energy, nothing left to call upon to wrestle him from the last gasp of adrenaline abandoning his body. He crumpled to the ground. 

Floating in and out of consciousness, he almost laughed at the irony of his fate. He came to these woods to decide if he should move away from them and would now be entombed in them forever. Although he didn’t believe in a god, he prayed for the safety and peace of his loved ones. 

He gazed upon the same pretty, small points of light in the sky as he did fifty nights ago. As he watched and waited for one to dash across the sky, his eyes unfocused, transforming the stars into a golden blur that flowed like champagne poured by the moon. A toast to a life well lived. 

He felt himself slipping into a final, complete slumber. A white light materialized within the blackness as he began to disappear from this world; I guess there is a god, he thought. 

The light persisted, and he stretched his eyelids open, letting them fill with the white light. It wasn’t God, it was headlights. He heard a truck engine shut off and four footsteps run out. 

“Jesus, it’s the Gerber guy from the posters,” Christopher heard one of them say. A soft smile spread across his blistered lips. His eyes adjusted to the light, and as he was rolled onto his back by one of the truckmen, he saw Honey-Coloured Bear hiding amongst the ferns. 

“Thank you.”