Campfire

The fire began to fade long ago. Glowing embers were all that remained. The conversation too had faded. Three grown men, silently captivated by the dying spectacle.

It was the way every night out there finished. A long day of fishing followed by a fire. There was an unspoken law they all unknowingly agreed that said they had to see the fire out. The red glow had to dissipate into darkness. They all knew they could keep it going if they quick around the embers a bit, a little more red might be revealed, but they weren’t the type for digging up scraps.

Bruce was wrapped in the poncho he’d bought thirteen years ago during a holiday to Buenos Aires. He only ever used it on these trips. Something about the colour and fabric made him feel like a real outdoorsman. A gaucho. He never said as much to the others. When he wore it the first year he insisted it was his wife’s doing. The guys gave him a hard time about it, but it became too much of a joke to not be worn the next year. Then it just became the norm. On his belt was a small gaucho knife he’d ordered online six years after the poncho. He never told the others about it, didn’t use it in front of them when they were in the boat, only when he was preparing his fish while Jim and Morty went searching for more wood did he use it.

They all had something like that. Jim only wore his grandfather’s watch during those trips. The grandfather who fought in World War II, who lived off the land in Italy with the rest of his platoon. Morty kept his boy scout pocket knife in his pocket. It never saw the light of day, the Swiss army knife his son gave him for his fiftieth birthday was far more effective and stayed on his belt at all times, but his childhood knife was always at his side.

Whenever one of their spouses commented on their strange traditions they all played it off as a joke. Tradition, no matter how ridiculous, was still tradition. All that’s required is to consistently show up at a given time, and then, after enough cycles, a connection is formed. A connection not to the act or the object, but to something deeper, to what the things represent. The intangibles.

An owl hooted off in the distance. None of them blinked an eye. Then a breeze rolled through, ruffling the branches. Bruce looked up. He watched the swaying shadows for a moment, then shifted his gaze to his friends. The two old men staring at the campfire glow. They looked so old. They were old. And so was he. And this was all they had. Three nights every year to spend time in nature. Pretending like they knew how to live off the land. Pretending like they were kids. A tradition of make believe.

“You guys ever thought about leaving the city?” Morty said, his eyes still on the fire.

“Don’t get into all that again,” Jim replied calmly, his focus unaffected.

Morty blinked and looked at Jim. “Why not?”

Jim exhaled and returned Morty’s gaze. “Can’t you just enjoy the quiet?”

“All I get is quiet these days. I need to talk.”

“Not everyone has what you have, Mort.”

“I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about honest to God conversation.”

“You want to talk about how you hate life in the city and want to move to the woods? We’ve been over this, it wouldn’t stick.”

“It’s not just that.”

“Then what is it?”

“It’s life. Death. Everything.”

“Jesus Christ.”

Jim shifted in his chair and shook his head.

“Bruce,” Morty started, shifting his attention accordingly, “don’t you think about it.”

“Course I do. Just try not to pay it much attention.”

“Exactly,” Jim added.

“How? If it’s right there in front of you . . .”

“I don’t know, I just let it go.”

“Like this conversation.”

Morty shot Jim a cold look, hidden in the darkness, but felt all the same.

“Let it go to what? Mowing your lawn? Paying the bills? It’s all bullshit.”

“And what do you propose the alternative is?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”

“Typical.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You think about this stuff all the time but you have no idea what to actually do.”

“I have ideas.”

“Let me guess. Recreate Walden?”

Jim shot Bruce a look, both cracked a smile. Morty had read Walden in his forties and referenced it during each trip ever since. Nine years ago he gave Jim and Bruce each a copy before they parted ways at the end of the trip. Eight years ago Jim said it was still sitting on his bookshelf, next in line after he finished the book he was working on—a book about the Civil War he’d been reading for the past four years. Bruce said he’d read a passage here or there but was too busy to really get into it. Morty re-read the book every year.

“I’m not talking about recreating Walden.”

“What then? You want to join a commune?”

“I’ve thought about it.”

“Of course you have.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“It’s not a bad thing. It’s a stupid thing.”

Morty was silent for a moment. Looked into the trees, then back at Jim.

“Haven’t you ever thought about why you’re alive?”

“I’m alive to die. That’s it.”

Morty opened his mouth. The others heard the inhale that was to fuel his response, but then then there was nothing, only a slow release of breath and the sounds of nature. Morty looked at the fire. Jim did the same. Bruce looked at Jim.

“Is that really what you think?”

“Yes.”

Bruce suppressed the inhale that followed, not daring to let the others hear it. He simply furrowed his brow and shifted his gaze towards the fire. Though he did not look at the fire directly, he looked to the right of it. To that which lay outside of the dying glow.