Alone

He'd been alone a long time now. What was it now? Ten years since she had passed? He'd stopped counting the days a long time ago. Now he spent most of his time in the woods, alone. 

He sipped his coffee, eyeing the winter chill that had just made its way onto the window panes during the night. 

"I don't feel lonely," he thought as he watched the snow fall silently to the ground outside.

But he was lonely. He knew that much at least. he wasn't sad, not really. He was sad of course, just not a moaning, wailing kind of sadness like he used to feel. She was just a memory now, he was starting to feel like she always had been that way, just an idea, a memory living in his dreams. 

He sipped again.

He felt perfectly normal just like everybody else. At least he thought that was how everybody else felt. He wasn't sure exactly, he hadn't spoken to anyone in years, save the young employee at the market where he bought food once a month. The young man was always kind and smiling. He was quiet and deliberate; he always paid for his food, gave the boy a nod, and went about his business.

He sipped slowly. Coughed once. Twice. He turned his attention back to the woods and the new fallen snow.

It looked soft today, the snow. She had always liked the snow. She used to tell him about the softness of it, how it kept the trees warm, like a downy coat to keep them warm. She was always so kind to everything, even the trees, which don't need coats and don't feel the cold. 

It did look soft though, much softer than his tough wool blanket and decades old mattress in the sturdy cabin he had built himself, many years ago. He looked down at his rough hands. The same hands that had built the cabin around him, the same hands that had held her close, all those years ago. 

He tilted his mug and peered inside, his coffee was cold, quite cold. He had been sitting watching the snow for most of the day, and the days were quite short. He needed to get some work done before dark. He set down his mug.  

He took a deep breath and coughed several times, the sound of gravel and mucous filling his tiny cabin. He took another deep breath, and pulled himself to his feet. He had to stifle another fit of coughing as he walked over to the door. 

He pulled on his boots and his coat, bracing himself for the cold and the snow. The same snow that looked so soft and comforting from inside drove him into a fit of coughing that nearly drove him to his knees. But he needed to go outside, he needed wood for the fire or he would freeze tonight. 

The cold always made his coughing worse, he thought to himself as he made his way toward the wood pile. He did not think about the pain in his chest, or the sound of his own labored breathing as he walked slowly toward the wood pile. Instead, he thought about the necessity of the task before him. He had to eat, he had to stay warm. 

He tugged on his old, yellow gloves. 

"Maybe selling the house and moving here wasn't my best idea," he muttered to himself as he pulled the tarp away from the wood. Of course, he knew it wasn't a good idea when he sold that house, but he couldn't bear to stay in the place where she had died, where he held her small delicate hands in his own as the life left them. But he didn't think about that, he never did. 

Instead he chose one of the smaller logs, lifted it with a small effort, and lined it up on the nearby stump. He coughed a few times, leaning on the axe handle for support. The he lifted it over his head and swung. 

He had buried the axe head only an inch or two into the log. As a young man, he'd have split the log in one swing, he always had. But splitting wood had become slow, laborious, and difficult. He always blamed it on his age, sixty-seven wasn't a good age to be swinging an axe all day. But could split enough wood for the night in less than an hour most of his life. 

"My age is catching up to me," he thought to himself with a cough, which he ignored. He ignored how he had stopped smoking when his coughing started a little over a year ago. He ignored the fact that he had not seen a doctor since then. He didn't need to; he knew what was happening to him. The pain in his chest told him enough. 

He pulled the axe from the log. He swung again. The log split a little further. He pulled the axe free again, this time struggling a bit. He swung again. The log split completely. 

"Three swings. Not bad," he said to himself, picking up one of the halves and lining it up to be split. He held the axe up over one shoulder, lining up his swing. Standing there, with one gloved hand near his grizzled chin, gripping the hickory handle, the other by his ear, ready to hoist the axe over his head and bring it swiftly down, he was a shadow of the strong man he had once been. 

He brought the axe down. This time the wood split easily. Some of his strength was still there after all, never mind that the wood was already weakened by the previous blows. He split the other half easily as well.

"Four pieces." he thought, knowing that was not nearly enough for a whole night. Looking toward the pile, he saw that none of the remaining logs were as small as the one he had struggled so much to split. He went for the smallest remaining log, which was significantly larger than the previous one. 

He got one hand under the log, then the other. He hoisted it in front of him, his arms struggling with the weight of it. It wasn't very heavy, but sickness weighed on him, heavier than a coat of solid steel. He couldn't hold it any longer, and the log fell from his tired hands.

He coughed. He coughed so much he could hardly breathe, darkness closed around his eyes until he couldn't see. One knee hit the ground, the soft snow covering his knee like an icy blanket, then the other, then, silence. 

He drew a shaky breath. Then another. He opened his eyes to a patch of bright red snow between his gloved fists. He loosened his grip, he had been holding on tightly, fighting against the sickness that weighed on him so heavily. He drew another shaky breath and rose to his feet, setting his foot down deliberately on the red stain beneath him. It wasn't the first time he ignored a bright red message written on the whiteness of the snow. 

He gathered up his pile of wood, knowing it was much too little to keep him warm through the night, and brought it inside. He decided on a dinner of cold beans and bread, he needed to make the little pile of wood last as long as he could. 

It was quite dark now, and he was tired. He lit a small fire in the stove and went to his bed. pulling off his boots, he thought about how long it had been since he had spoken to another person. He thought about how his wife had been gone for too long. How he was sick, and there was nothing to be done about that. He thought about the bright red of his blood against the pure white of the snow. He thought about all the things he had been ignoring for too long. He thought about how he was alone.

He wiped a tear from his face, the first in a long time and he thought about her. He laid in his bed and went to sleep, thinking about her until he fell asleep.

He did not wake up.

Years would pass, and there he would stay, dreaming of her. It would be many years before anyone came upon his tiny cabin. Maybe it was some teenagers, exploring in the woods, maybe it was an old man like him, looking for peace and quiet. Whoever is was, they did not dare open the door, for fear of disturbing what was inside. That door would stay closed because behind it someone was dreaming of love, and it was best to let him dream, for he was really quite alone.