Monday, May 12

The RV’s okay, I guess. It’s got a shower, but since the pump burned down with the cabin we have to haul water up from the creek. I never want a shower that bad, but Kate’s awful picky that way. Man.

The RV isn’t level, either. I’m sleeping in the bunk over the steering wheel and this morning I woke up mashed against the far wall. All you have to do is inhale and the whole thing shakes.

But it’s got a roof. Plus it’s free.

I don’t know if Kate has enough money to build a new cabin. I know Dad had an insurance policy and I was the beneficiary, but Kate would never let a dime of that go for anything here. I bet we could sell the town house in Anchorage and use that money for anything we wanted here, but she won’t touch that, either. And I’m not even going to college. Man. Women.

As long as I live I will never forget Kate facing down Mom across that table. Kate is-she’s-I don’t know how to describe her. I remember Dad said once, “Trust me, kid, it’s always better to have Kate Shugak on your side than on somebody else’s.” Boy, was he right. She always knows the right thing to do, and then she does it. How many people are like that? She even scares me sometimes, she’s so fearless. And smart. And beautiful.

Jim Chopin thinks so, too. I can’t tell if she likes him, too, or not. I hope not. He’s not good enough for her. Nobody is.

There are a bunch of snowshoe hares living on the other side of the creek behind the big stand of cottonwoods. Lepus americanus, according to the ADF &G Wildlife Notebook. They can grow up to twenty inches long and get as big as four pounds. I was up early this morning (Kate was tossing and turning and the whole RV was shaking so I couldn’t sleep) and I went outside to write in my journal and I could see them from where I was sitting on the rock. There’s an open space that is kind of sandy and they were running around and into each other and chasing each other and I think their tails. This afternoon after school I went to Dinah’s and looked them up on the Internet and the notebook says they’re most active at dusk and dawn. I’ll say. If Mutt had been there she wouldn’t have to eat again for weeks. The Wildlife Notebook says that the hare is a primary food source of the lynx. Man, I’d love to see a lynx. It also says that the hare competes with the moose for forage. I’d love to see a snowshoe hare go up against a moose for a willow twig, too.

I told Kate about how crazy they were acting and I asked her if they maybe had hydrophobia or something. She laughed and said no. I think she’s spent a lot of time on that rock herself, watching the bunny rabbits go berserk.

Only two more weeks of school. Yay. I asked Van if she could remember anything more about Len Dreyer but she clammed up on me. I wonder if Kate missed something up at his cabin. We’ve been finding stuff around here that didn’t burn all the way up, even some books that were in the loft and only smell like smoke, you can still read them and everything.

Somebody ought to go look.

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