Crash

16: What are we doing?

Three days later

Lyra-

I sat outside the cave, scraping away at the deer pelt and wiping the sweat from my forehead. The skin, that was to minuscule for our knives to cut, was starting to brown and peel away. I scraped it off, sitting on my knees as I bent over the crude wooden frame Nathan had helped me stretch the fur on.

I sat back and took a drink out of my canteen. It was quiet today but the distant honking of geese going south was still there. It was also hot. It may have been getting close to fall but today was just a hot day. You could never tell with the weather of the Rockies

Nathan and I had set a few mink and squirrel traps very early this morning when it was still cool. Now he was off to check them. Baine dozed at my side as I scraped the last flecks of peely skin off and dragged the frame over to the cave wall to prop it up in the sun.

Wouldn't be too long and it would be soft enough to sleep on. This one would be better. A lot better than my first one, which was rushed and wasn't as soft. I'd washed this one, strung it up, washed it, strung it up, scraped it, washed it, and strung it up again. It was a lousy process to be honest.

Baine nosed my leg and I turned around, looking at Nathan trekking closer to us.

"Any luck?" I called, straightening my back.

"No," he sighed when he got close enough.

I tried to remain optimistic as I shrugged and smiled at him,  "Well there's always this evening and tomorrow morning."

He shook his head and went inside. I checked the drying deer meat, then the last of it that we decided to cold smoke. Everything was looking good. The sun was pretty harsh up here with no cover but it sure did speed things up.

Standing on my tiptoes, I looked at the deer head that I'd strapped to the top of the cave. It was far enough away to were we couldn't smell it but close enough to where I could watch it. Flies buzzed about the remaining rotting meat, which was fine. They'd eat it all away and give me a squeaky clean trophy.

Satisfied with my organized camp, I went inside the cave, which was a relieving ten degrees cooler. Nathan looked up from his trap and grinned at me, "Hot one today huh?"

"Oh yeah," I muttered, taking a swig from my canteen, "New trap?"

"Yeah, I figured the more we have, the better chances we got. This'll be the fifth."

I nodded and sat down to stretch out on the cool rock. This is what we did, sit around and do some meager chores while the day was hot.

We would do more in the evening, but that's when the biting flies came out to swarm over the lake and would make a meal out of us. It's not like this was paradise island but we didn't have it the hard way per-say.

I gave up with trying to cool off and grabbed my 'broom' that I had fashioned out of a birch limb and marsh grass I'd lashed onto it.

Sweeping out the excess dirt and pebbles, I lifted up things and cleaned underneath them, even going over the 'shelves' in the rock wall to clean out long abandoned cobwebs. Nathan laughed as I swept the dirt out the door.

"You can't sit still can you?" He chuckled.

I rolled my eyes good naturedly, "We may live in a cave but it will be as clean as Buckingham palace if I have my way."

"Go a head, I'm not complaining."

I picked up the deer pelt and hauled it outside to shake out, beating it with the stick a little bit to make sure it was dust free. I even cleaned Baine's little mat.