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catch them high, with a little wiggle jump she figured sufficiently nymph-like.
     
    He was a man of fortitudinous shame, but the act overloaded some circuits. His head swiveled for a half second, snapped back in reflexive piety.
     
    She’d practiced the incredulous double-take in her mind and executed it perfectly. “Jesus, Leslie! Did you try to look again ? What the fuck is wrong with you?”
     
    That scene alone probably kept him at attention for a few weeks.
     
    After the stunt, their life together in the cramped cabin understandably got a tad more uncomfortable (she knew she needed to tone it down, despite the fact that watching him squirm seemed somehow more entertaining than anything in her previous life had been), but they both slowly found comfort in the household roles that began to define themselves. She was the matriarch, the woman warrior, the one who kicked ass and took names. He, on the other hand, was like a friend’s little brother, the kid you just have to fuck with every time you see him. If he lingered around the cabin a little longer than she liked, she’d bray in disgust, “smells like old balls in here,” or “Did you steal my Kotex again, Leslie?”—stuff to remind him of his exceedingly tenuous place in their arrangement. He’d just snort that nervous nose-laugh and go back to whatever useless task he was immersed in. After puttering just long enough to preserve some personal dignity, though, he’d find a convenient excuse to clear out.
     
    He was probably going a little nutty, but it was fun. Besides, he didn’t seem to be much worse for wear: the diminishing stock of black-plastic magazines at the trading post proved as much, though she pretended not to notice. She had no interest in finding out what he did out in the woods by himself, but she guessed it always involved one sort of gun or another. Though they ate together, scouted together, demolished ex-people together, and slept within two feet of each other, she kept interactions to a minimum. Leslie still made plenty of attempts at conversation, sure, but she’d developed the ability to dismiss him with a glance. It was a good system.
     
    Even so, once, when they’d just come back from one of their grocery runs—and, between them, downed a box of tepid Franzia—he’d tried to kiss her. It was a vintage of weirdness she hadn’t yet tasted.
     
    She told herself it was the because of the unexpected shock, but she’d actually gone with it for three or four seconds, a blossom of warmth and heat expanding in her chest. It’d been a long time, and, admittedly, she luxuriated in the electricity of connection. And then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw his wolf tee. The cheesy redneck one with el lobo howling at the moon against the backdrop of another, semi-transparent wolf. The shirt he’d admired on the rack, talked about always wanting to own, without a hint of sarcasm. It was too much— she exploded in laughter, blowing air and spit into his face.
     
    “I’m sorry,” she’d sputtered, between laughs. “This is surreal.”
     
    “Of course. My fault.” Then he’d crumpled into himself, and, except for the occasional clank of pans or the click of the door latch as he went out to pee, stayed silent and morose for days after.
     
    On the third day, though, he’d risen from his torpor like a skinny Rambo Jesus. Plucking the rifle from its spot on the table (and knocking two plastic cases of bullets to the floor), he announced that he’d be “doing solo missions from now on.” He would rid the area of mumblers—popsicles or no— for five miles around. Snow would not stop him, exhaustion would not stop him; he would become a one-man mumbler murder machine.
     
    “Oh,” she had said, gravely, pinching her thigh to keep from spilling over with acidic giggles.
     
    Let him have the illusion , she thought. More time to myself.
     
    ***
    Things had started getting better in mid October. On a trip to the east