Against the western sky, a beaver noses its way to the summit of a 14,000 foot peak. Follow the northern ridge down with your eyes and you’ll see the profile of a man lying down. The next peak, Twin Sisters, doesn’t actually look like twin sisters, but I always thought they named it that for Emma and me. Our mountains’ jagged tops are snow-capped until July on a good year, but we don’t get many good years anymore.
Our village sits back at the mouth of the basin, hidden from the highway and accessible only by a dirt road that makes a wide horseshoe–in one end of the village and out the other. Standing in the bend of the road, you can see almost all there is to see of this place: a post office, Max’s shop, the church, and a tumble-down building with a splintering “Inn” sign leaning up against the darkened doorway. This is one of those rare places that whispers its age, its memories told in each slant of light, in the sun beams cutting through cracks in weathered wood buildings, in the dust endlessly rising up and resettling on the rutted dirt road.
Behind the old inn, in what used to be a meadow full of sweetgrass and pops of fiery Indian paintbrush, there’s a small shack with white painted sign that says, Crystal Spring. Beneath, in smaller letters, it says: “Let those who thirst be our guest.” It sounds like a rebuke, coming from the shack standing there stout and unperturbed on the parched and blackened ground. Crystal Spring hasn’t run since sweltering heat and flames devoured the hillside a year ago. People think the fact that the shack didn’t burn is a sign of hope, that the shack acted as a sacred buffer protecting us from the flames. The meadow is still mostly black, with just a few green shoots struggling up through charred trees and ash. Looking at the fire line, you’d never believe the flames stopped where they did.
With its deck and wooden railing, steep roof to keep off heavy snow in the winter, and bulletin board on one side, the shack looks like a smaller version of the church up the road. I guess you could say it has become a kind of church, this hallowed spring. Folks say it’s a miracle that when so much burned, our little town survived, as if this spring were our savior. To me though, the blackened tree trunks and lingering smell of smoke, the end of a spring that had run from this mountain for thousands of years, all of that feels more like an ending, a warning for what might come next.
From my cabin, if I sit in the lawn chair in the corner of the balcony, I can see the spring. I used to sit there most days in the summer, a book and a sweating glass of tomato juice on the table beside me. From my perch in the trees, the folks getting water couldn’t see me, but I would study them. Before the spring dried up, everyone who lived up here knew the water was nothing special–it was the same water that comes out of your tap. But the summer people from down in the city treated the spring water like some kind of magic elixir. Young kids with sandals and shaggy hair would drive up in their Subarus as soon as the roads were cleared of snow to fill glass jugs and Nalgenes. Some of them would stop in Max’s shop if he was open that day, but most didn’t stay long when they glanced down at their phones and found they didn’t work. They’d just fill their containers and leave.
This summer, though, for the first time that I can remember, no one has come to Crystal Spring. The fire last year cast our tiny town into the national spotlight, but most people and reporters lost interest as soon as it was contained, as soon as it was assured that our town was safe. The fire kept burning for weeks, but the crowds dissipated as quick as they’d come.
We were coming up on the anniversary of the fire, so when I first saw a shabby blue car pull up to the spring from my perch on the balcony, I thought it might be a reporter. Instinctively, I moved toward the door to go inside, away from the cold stare of cameras and journalists’ emotionless questions.
A girl stepped out of the car and looked up at the summits surrounding our valley. She stared, tracing the outlines most tourists don’t see. Something about the way she stood there, reverent, made me pause. She didn’t look like a reporter. She walked over to the shack and knelt at Crystal Spring like she was offering a prayer. Then she cupped her hands underneath the spout as if she were holding a fragile bird. She raised her cupped hands toward her mouth, then took a few steps out into the meadow and opened them onto the scorched earth. After wiping her hands on her pants, she walked up the road, away from her car.
I had stopped with one foot inside the door, entranced, but now I shook my head to straighten my thoughts. I wondered if my old eyes were deceiving me. Surely the spring was still dry. I decided to go see for myself. I brought my empty glass and dog-eared book inside and traded my house shoes for some sturdier loafers. I inched down the creaking stairs, gripping the railing. By the time I tottered to the end of my long dirt driveway, the girl’s car was gone. I felt sweat blooming on my chest and was grateful for the shade of the spring’s shack. For a second, I let myself imagine cool water running through my fingers. But when I turned the spout, nothing came out.
*
The next day, the same tired-looking blue sedan crunched to a stop on the dirt road below my balcony. The same girl got out. I watched her move through the same motions: kneeling, filling her hands, drinking, pouring the last drops over a tiny new sprout growing at the edge of the path. I felt my forehead tightening in a web of wrinkles. Was she imagining things? Was I? Her movements were certain, convincing. I could have sworn I saw real drops fall from her fingertips back to the earth.
Just like before, she walked away from her car toward the center of our village. Most tourists used to mill around outside the spring as if looking for something else to do, or wondering how people actually lived up here. Some of them would visit Max’s shop, but very few actually bought anything. This girl didn’t look like most summer people. She looked like she knew this place, knew exactly where she was going. Even from a distance, she reminded me of someone, I thought.
I told myself I was just going to stop in and see Max at his shop, like I often do, but for a reason I couldn’t explain, I was really hoping I’d bump into the girl, get a better look at her. The door to Max’s store jingled when I walked in, and his gravelly voice greeted me before I saw him.
“Dora!” he said. “How you doing this fine morning?” Max is the only one I allow to call me Dora, short for Dorothy.
I see Max every day, but he always sounds excited to see me, like it has been months. He is my oldest friend, the only one who’s been in this town longer than me. Before I could answer him, Max set a box he had carried from the back of the store down on the counter and leaned toward me. “You looking for someone?”
I narrowed my eyes at him, wondering how he knew.
“What, I can’t just come in and say hi anymore?” I asked. I was trying to joke, but my words came out edgy and hard. I knew Max could hear the uncertainty in my voice.
“Quiet as usual,” he said. “Nobody’s been in today.” This time his voice was tinged with sadness, and I suddenly felt guilty and foolish.
“Well, good thing you have me then.” I smiled, letting myself fall into our easy conversation and willing my brain to forget about the memories the girl had unsettled in me. It was probably my old mind playing tricks on me.
*
Living here as long as I have, you get to know the smells of the place, the sounds, so that all that knowledge stays with you even when your eyes start to go bad, like mine have. The rain used to come every afternoon in the summer, and you could smell it in the air before the first drops fell. When they did, any summer people who had driven up from town for a day trip would scatter. They’d huddle under Max’s awning with slumped shoulders before running back to their cars. Once safely inside, they would look out through blurred windows at the heavy clouds rumbling over the mountains. They had all heard the stories of inexperienced hikers who reached the summit too late in the day and fell rushing down, or got struck by lightning. They would point their cars back down the mountain, in a hurry to return to the comfort and safety of the city.
What they don’t know is that summer thunderstorms here are severe, but short lived. The clouds will clear and the rain will dry up in an hour or less, leaving the air fresher and the grass less thirsty and the long summer evening bright and warm. We’re glad to see them go–that way, the prettiest part of the day is ours to savor.
That was before we started having a fifth season: the one the news reporters called fire season. Now, the summer air is so dry it crackles, and the smell of coming rain is like a song you’ve heard a million times but can’t remember the lyrics to. Now when it rains, the scorched soil can’t absorb the water. The brittle, burned trees and other forest debris pile up on steep slopes and slide along the earth’s surface like matchsticks on a slick table–perfect conditions for landslides.
That’s why, when the smell of rain filtered through the air one day as I came out of the post office, I stopped short, on alert. I looked up at the mountain, where the ridge was covered in thin, burned trunks from the last fire. There were no clouds in sight. I closed my eyes, concentrating, to see if I could smell it again, half hoping for much-needed moisture, half hoping I’d imagined it, being careful what I wished for.
I opened my eyes when I heard someone striding past me on the dirt road. These were footsteps I didn’t recognize. The girl I had seen at the spring breezed by, jogging up the steps of the church. I watched her pull open the heavy wooden doors and disappear into the dark sanctuary. It was Wednesday so there was no service, but she had walked in like she knew the doors were always open, like she was familiar with this place.
Following her into the empty sanctuary seemed like sacrilege, but I couldn’t help myself. I walked toward the church’s side door. I knew the pastor would be working in his office and figured I could make up an excuse to talk to him as a way to bump into the girl and figure out who she was, why she looked so familiar to me. I raised my hand to knock on the office door, and suddenly, I knew. I let my arm drop to my side and turned down the hallway. I had to see her.
There are only ten rows of pews in our small church, and she was sitting in the back, head bowed. At first I thought she was praying, but her hand was moving, like she was writing in a notebook. Her auburn hair fell over one cheek and she raised a hand to tuck it behind her ear. A wide ring circled her pointer finger. Even from here I could see its pattern of braided copper and silver. I’d know that ring anywhere–Max made jewelry to sell in his shop, and I knew he’d only made two rings like that one. I kept one, and I’d given the matching one away.
I stood for a moment, holding my breath, afraid that she would see me and afraid of what I’d see in her face. I had almost decided to walk away when she looked up. She gazed first at the stained glass window–a bunch of purple columbines–before looking around the room. Her eyes fell on me like an afterthought, and she jumped a little, startled to see me.
“I’m sorry,” I said. I didn’t mean to scare you. I was…” I didn’t have an answer for what I was doing and let my words hang in the air with the dust.
“It’s okay. I just come here to think sometimes. Pastor Jeff doesn’t mind.” She smiled, then added, “He says the church wasn’t built to be empty.”
I nodded. My father, one of the founders of this church, always said that same thing. I still couldn’t find any words that didn’t sound unhinged, and the girl seemed to sense my discomfort.
“I’m Jane,” she said, eyeing my walking stick. “You can sit, if you’d like.”
I walked to the pew across the aisle from hers. “I’m Dora,” I offered, surprising myself. I hadn’t introduced myself as anything other than Dorothy in decades. Jane looked taken aback for a moment, then quickly rearranged her face into a sweet smile.
“That’s my mom’s name,” she said. I was right. I had known the moment I saw her, even if I couldn’t quite put the pieces together. I felt tears burning behind my eyes. I thought I was managing to keep it together, but Jane was perceptive. That made sense really, since Emma was the same way.
“Do you know my mom?” she asked.
“Not exactly,” I said. My voice came out hoarse and I cleared my throat. “But I think I knew your grandmother, Emma. We grew up here together.”
Now Jane had tears in her eyes, and I leaned toward her instinctively. “You’re that Dora,” she said, and I nodded.
Then she laughed, bright as the sun cutting through a thundercloud. “My grandma always said Crystal Spring brought clarity, and I guess she was right.”
“Maybe so,” I say, Jane’s smile rubbing off on me. “Is that why you come to the Spring?” I asked. “To find clarity?”
We were both quiet for a moment, our unspoken questions filling the space around us, muddling our words. Jane looked at me sideways and I added, “My house is right above the spring, so I saw you the other day.”
She looked down without answering, and spun the ring on her finger. Then she laid her hand on the notebook she had set beside her. “I guess so. When my grandma passed away–” She paused and looked up at me, realizing I might not have known and measuring how much those words might hurt me. “And then after the fire, I tried to remember as much as I could. I wanted to write down some of the stories she told me, and coming up here seemed like a good way to help myself remember.”
*
My parents and Jane’s grandmother’s parents, the Landrys, were among the first settlers of this little village. There had been miners and ranchers before, but by the time our parents got here, gold fever had pretty much fizzled out. My mother and father had actually come on their honeymoon, some of the original summer people. They fell as much in love with the mountains as with each other, and they never left. Something about this place made folks stay put. My family became fast friends with the Landrys, who had moved up for Mr. Landry to take the job of pastor at the new church. Emma Landry and I were born in the same month. Everyone else saw that as a simple coincidence, but we had come into the world together and to me it had always felt like the universe was telling us that was how it was meant to be.
Emma and I grew up closer than siblings. We went to school in the larger town 30 miles west so we saw other kids, but as soon as we got home each afternoon and for the long summers, our little village became our world. We were all that each other needed. It shocked me then, when Emma first said she was thinking about moving away after high school. I had always thought she felt the same way I did, about everything. As soon as she told me, I saw the same surprise in her eyes: she had expected me to want to move away too, but saw that we had suddenly, inexplicably, moved to two opposite sides of a chasm. We had never disagreed about anything before. The small separation it wedged between us scared us so much that we didn’t talk about it. Instead, it grew, becoming something nebulous and undefinable and frightening, something we couldn’t find the words to talk about even if we had wanted to.
Somehow, sitting in the silent sanctuary with Jane, I felt her presence drawing out those lost words, making them bubble up from somewhere long ago, just as she had seemed to draw water from the dried up spring. I felt I had to tell her, but as the story formed on my lips I stopped. The story was Emma’s and mine, and I wanted to keep it that way.
Jane looked at me like she could read my thoughts. Maybe she had already heard the story from Emma. And Emma had named her daughter, Jane’s mother, after me. That must mean something.
Jane stood up, jolting me out of my memories. “I better get going,” she said.
I stood too and followed her out the chapel door and down the dirt road. Suddenly I felt cold, even though we had stepped out into the hot summer air. Our silence was tense, uncertain. She could have outpaced me easily, but she matched my slow, careful steps all the way down the road. When we reached her car, she looked toward the Crystal Spring shack, then turned her back on it, away from the blackened earth and gray ash toward the village, toward the mountains.
I’m not sure how long the two of us stood there, our shadows lengthening in the late afternoon. Maybe the spring was magic, I thought. Or maybe Jane brought magic with her. Maybe the real magic was in being here now, with her. The peaks of the Twin Sisters towered in front of us, and the stories between us lifted, rising and settling like the rain clouds building over the burned mountains, looking for somewhere to land and begin again, reborn into something new.
