Free The Retreat by David Bergen Page B

night, cocking an ear towards the forest. His father didn’t like the forest, and neither did he. He missed hot water, television. He missed streets, sidewalks, pavement.
    The sky was getting brighter now, rosy. A door slammed and he heard footsteps approaching. Then he saw the Doctor step out of the far cabin. He walked right up the path, past Everett who was still standing, out of sight, at the edge of the treeline. The Doctor was wearing only red shorts and he had a towel draped over his neck. He was talking to himself, something about declaring the facts. Everett went down onto the path and followed him at a distance. The Doctor turned towards the pond, and when he arrived at the pond’s edge, he folded the towel and laid it down, then he slipped off his shorts and looked up at the pink sky and walked into the water.
    Everett had cut around the pond and was standing in the trees off to the side, quite close to the Doctor. When the Doctor bent forward and removed his shorts and thenstraightened, Everett saw the Doctor’s penis. Then the Doctor walked into the water and Everett saw only his mouth moving. He was talking to himself again, nothing Everett could understand, and then he was singing. He had a deep voice and he sang so loudly that his voice probably carried back to the cabins. He came up out of the water and bent to retrieve something from his towel. A bottle of shampoo. He soaped his hair and his armpits and he soaped between his legs.
    The Doctor’s legs were thin and ropey. He was very blond and did not have much hair, except under his arms and at his groin, and even this blended in with the whiteness of his body. Everett turned away, and then looked back. The Doctor had gone into the water again and he was knee-deep and rinsing himself. Then he dove in with a soft splash and his head resurfaced far out into the pond. When he finally came back on shore and towelled himself dry, Everett’s legs were shaking and his mouth was dry and hot.
    For the next two mornings, Everett woke early and walked out to the pond and waited in the trees. The Doctor came. He undressed and he bathed. He towelled himself dry, put on his shorts, and walked back to his cabin. Everett did this for several more mornings and always it was the same. And always, standing there hidden in the bushes and watching the Doctor bathing, Everett felt a strange thrill and then shame. When he returned to the cabin that last morning, Lizzy lifted her head and looked at him.
    “Where are you going every morning?” she said.
    “To pee,” he said. He sat on his bed and removed his runners.
    “You’re gone a long time, Everett,” she said.
    Everett didn’t answer. The image of the Doctor’s ropey legs appeared and disappeared. He said, “I couldn’t sleep. I was walking.”
    Lizzy seemed to consider this, then she lay back down and said, “Oh.”
    Later, at breakfast, the Doctor asked Everett if he wanted to come by the Den. “Just a little meeting,” he said. “I like to get to know everyone here.”
    Everett looked around at the rest of the group. His father wasn’t present, he’d gone into town for building supplies. His mother smiled encouragingly. She said, “Of course he’d love to. Right, Everett?”
    Everett shrugged. He believed that the Doctor had seen him down at the pond, spying, and this was why he was to join him in the Den. He searched for a reason why he wouldn’t be able to go, but his mind was empty.
    His mother said, “You’d think he was going to his death. Don’t look so glum, Ev.”
    And so, after breakfast, Everett knocked on the door to the Den, and when the Doctor called out, he entered. The room was cool and dark. There was no fire, as Lizzy had said there was when she had come here. The Doctor was sitting in a canvas chair, holding a book. He put the book down and got up and pulled a chair over for Everett. There was a large desk in the corner of the room with papers and magazines scattered across the