Free When Is a Man by Aaron Shepard

all week. When they’d talked about being bushed and coming into town, the younger cop had given him a wink. Oh, yes: women. That’s what Davis had implied. Go see some coffee shop girls, cashiers, women jogging in their shorts and yoga pants along the lakefront. That built-up tension, the blue-balled bush man. But what he felt was slightly anxious. He certainly wasn’t starved for people’s company. They were dropping by camp on a regular basis, for Christ’s sake.
    While he drove, he kept the CB volume turned up and set to channel 5. A trucker’s voice came through the radio’s static. “Empty, twenty-eight on the Immitoin.” Paul looked for one of the orange kilometre markers so he could call his location. That was how to do it, according to Tanner. Empty when driving up the road, or north, and loaded when heading south toward town.
    He passed Hardy’s cabin without realizing where he was, and as he looked back in his rear-view mirror, a logging truck swung around the corner, the semi’s grill staring him down. “Fuck,” he shouted and tapped on his brakes, too hard, and fishtailed through a water bar, the nose of his vehicle slamming down hard, then skyward. He jerked to the right, his tires plowing through the soft shoulder as the truck slid past him. The driver gave him a long, angry blast on the horn. Paul cranked the wheel again and skidded back onto the road. Jesus H. Christ , he breathed.
    â€œHey, Fred.” An irritated voice crackled over the CB . “Some cocksucker in a Pathfinder doesn’t have a radio, heading your way.”
    â€œOkey-doke.” The accent sounded Russian. “Empty, twenty-eight.”
    His face burning, Paul waited until he saw the next marker. “Loaded pickup, twenty-nine,” he mumbled into the receiver. He pulled close to the shoulder and slowed down. A few moments later, another logging truck rattled around the corner, a cloud of dust billowing up beside it. The driver lifted two fingers off the wheel in greeting, a smirk on the broad, red-cheeked face.
    â€œFuck you too,” said Paul under his breath as he sped up again. A few hundred metres later, where a power line right-of-way crossed the road, he pulled over. Thimbleberry, bracken fern, and dogsbane, all caked with dust, hung in rows above the ditch. He walked around to the passenger side and dropped his pants. With a few swift movements, he ripped off his damp incontinence pad and flung it into the weeds.

    He swung by the police station, his first stop. Behind his desk, under the fluorescents, the constable looked dumpy and bored. Paul asked if there had been any confrontation with the old man. “Didn’t wave a gun at me, if that’s what you mean,” Lazeroff said. “Caught him at a lucid moment. Says he’ll come by and apologize if you’d like. Told him that probably wouldn’t be necessary.”
    â€œOr wanted,” said Paul. “Thanks.”
    The constable changed the subject and asked him if he’d seen anything out of the ordinary—besides Hardy, of course. They still didn’t know how Caleb Ready ended up in the river. “I haven’t really explored, to be honest,” Paul said. “Should I?”
    â€œWell, yeah, for your own sake. It’s beautiful country.” Lazeroff chuckled. “No need to poke around on our account.”
    â€œThat drowned man,” Paul said. “Did he leave a note? At his house, I mean?”
    â€œCottage.”
    â€œPardon?”
    â€œSummer cottage by the marina, just up from the dam. He didn’t live here year-round,” Lazeroff said. “There wasn’t a note.”
    He left and found a coffee shop with Wi-Fi, deciding to sit outside and soak up the small town buzz. He was enjoying himself far more than he’d expected, which maybe wasn’t saying much. The late summer heat of Shellycoat was different than the coast,