Woodsmen

A divorced father takes his estranged teen son camping in "Woodsmen," which appeared in 2010 in the handsome Berkeley-based zine Riverbabble. Wordsworth plays a part. The story begins:


“It was your idea to go camping,” snapped the dad on a winding backroad in search of the campground. He wiped perspiration from heat and embarrassment, braced for the retort.

“No it wasn’t.” The boy’s sour glare darted the man’s chest.

The dad smiled grimly with comprehension that consoled little for his foolish reliance on a sketchy downloaded road map. “Your mother said you wanted to go camping.”

“She was wrong,” son declared as if flicking a gnat.

Years before, with a plastic bat fresh from Toys R Us, the boy had swatted ball after ball while his dad “attaboy!-ed” at the machinelike consistency of his son: fifteen now, he still murdered the fat ones. His set his chin on a grasshopper knee, gazed at the sunlight that strobed through the redwoods.

“No she wasn’t wrong,” the dad brayed. “I said, ‘What’s Danny into these days?,’ and she said, `Camping, the boy loves the outdoors.’ So we’re camping.’”

“We are?” the boy chortled as they rounded yet another shady bend.

“Yes,” the dad crowed. “There’s the sign, behind that huge redwood. Nice job they did of hiding it, no?” He looked over. “Congrats, Danny, you’ve perfected your smirk.”

“It’s Daniel now. No one calls me Danny.”

“Daniel,” said the father, wincing as if tasting dust in his mouth. “These trees are hundreds of years old ... Daniel. Some are over a thousand, maybe.”

Beneath the tires, gravel crunched and twigs snapped. On each side giant redwoods peered down at a father and son going thankfully silent. The dad slowed the car to take in the scene, and mentioned the one other camping trip they had taken. In wonder he squinted up at the trees. “Coast redwoods: sequoia sempervirens.”

“Latin. Wow.”

“Yeah, Latin, wow. I sure wowed `em at the bowling alley with my Latin. Gutter ballus. ...