Time ticked away on my research without me finding a single wolf. An old aerial photograph of Wolf Island showed two wolves here, but I didn’t find any proof of them, and I only had one day left until the boat arrived to take me home. The island was surrounded by the Arctic Ocean, and there was no way to get off and come back. This was a one-time trip unless I could prove that wolves could live here.
There was always the mystery of how they got here in the first place. Still, most scientists believed they walked across the frozen water and made a home here since moose, deer, and other prey were available. The frozen bridge never returned, and the wolves were stranded here.
I wasn’t ready to leave the island and go home. I tried to think of ways to stay, but being surrounded by the Arctic Ocean was not an easy hurdle to overcome, and my supplies were running out.
The day I left home, my boyfriend said he might not be there when I got back because a life of solitude was not his idea of a relationship. He accused me of loving wolves more than him. I didn’t argue with him. He failed to mention his younger girlfriend until I broke up with him.
Recent snow made the ground treacherous, but I went farther than usual since I was scheduled to pull out the next day. On the top of a hill, my foot slid on the snow, and I tumbled downward until I landed on a ledge. I hurt everywhere, but I almost yelled out in joy when I turned around.
Wolf tracks led to a den. I pulled out my flashlight and shone it into the darkness.
‘A wolf.’ I stepped backward. The wolf stayed on its side and didn’t move. I picked up a stone and threw it. It hit the wolf’s side with a thud, but it remained motionless.
The wolf was dead.
I stayed there for a long time, wallowing in self-pity. Darkness was coming when an idea hit me. A deception that could save my research and the wolves.
I dragged the wolf’s body out of the den. I could tell it was an old wolf but died recently. I had an idea, a bad deceptive idea.
I propped the wolf up against the hill, then moved farther away and snapped pictures of it. I pulled out the radio collar I always carried with me and activated it. I emailed the people involved with the wolf research and sent just three words along with the pictures. I found Wolves. It was a lie. Back at the cabin, a GPS program on my computer came to life, and it started tracking the collar on a map.
I walked in different directions making the collar travel on the map. With darkness closing in on me, I took a wrong step; the collar slipped out of my hand and fell down the slope into a crack in the ice on a creek. It sank.
The collar turned from green to red. Red meant a dead wolf.
‘No,’ I yelled out. My voice echoed through the woods. I stayed there trying to retrieve it with a stick until I couldn’t see the light anymore. I put my head down and held back tears until I looked up and saw an otter looking at me. It scurried away when I got up.
*
The boat bobbed in the water when I got aboard.
The captain helped me load up my gear.
‘Hi Claudia, how did your research go?’
‘No wolves.’
‘I thought I heard howls a few days ago.’ The captain steered the boat away from the island. ‘I guess you’re going home.’
I was friends with another researcher who studied lynxes in Canada. He offered me a research position there, and I planned to take it.
Out in nature, I was alone. It’s where I found happiness, and I liked the researcher. He even mentioned coming here to help me, but now that was impossible.
I drifted to sleep but woke up with a start when I got a notification on my satellite phone. It was from the radio collar. I opened up the tracking map, and it was moving. How was that possible? Was it possible a wolf found it? Maybe that otter found it, then dropped it, and a wolf picked it up; only a wolf could trigger the collar. I couldn’t think straight, and my head spun in circles, trying to think of the possibilities. Still, the thought that my research might be saved by magic or some strange occurrence made me eager to get back there. I had to know the truth.
‘Stop. I have to go back.’ I yelled to the captain. ‘The wolves.’ I didn’t finish the sentence.
He nodded and turned the boat.
William Falo lives with his family, including a papillon named Dax. He has been published in various literary journals. You can find him on Twitter as @williamfalo and Instagram as @william.falo.
Photo by Marek Szturc on Unsplash.
