Chapter 21: The Mill Office
The corridor outside the review room smelled of floor polish and wet wool. A strip light overhead ticked as it warmed, and behind the wall somebody's printer worked slowly through a stack of paper.
Kaelen stood with his back against the plaster and read the clearance form one more time. The signature at the bottom was the small black one he'd known for six years, and beside it the date, and under that the box the doctor had ticked. Fit for modified duties. No felling.
Inside his throat, Liam lay still and warm. Kaelen could feel the flat of both palms pressed against the lining and the shift of his feet when he turned. The pouch had closed around him the way it always did, snug and reflexive, and Kaelen had stopped pretending that he minded.
Eight fifty-eight. He said it under his breath, and Liam tapped twice against him. Two minutes.
Kaelen looked down at his hands. Clean bandages, wrapped tight across the knuckles, the blisters gone flat and grey underneath. He flexed his fingers once and let them hang.
At nine he pushed the door open.
The room was long and cold. High windows threw a pale light that caught the dust hanging over the table, and the floorboards gave one dry crack under his boot. Three people sat behind a folding table at the far end. A woman in a grey cardigan had a folder open in front of her. A man with a laptop sat at her left. On her right was a man in a hi-vis vest holding a clipboard he wasn't writing on.
A jug of water stood between them with one glass, chipped at the lip.
There was a single chair facing the table, and along the wall under the window, three chairs pushed back against the radiator. Drew sat in the middle one with his hands on his knees. He didn't look up. Pete stood by the door with his arms crossed and nodded once.
The woman waited until Kaelen was sitting. The chair was too small for him and creaked when he settled his weight.
"Thank you for coming in. This session is recorded. Do you consent to that?"
"Yes."
"Then state your full name and your job title for the record, please."
"Kaelen Thorson. Faller, second crew, Glen Farrar yard."
She wrote it down. Liam had gone perfectly still against him, a small warm weight behind his breastbone, listening.
"Mr. Thorson, in your own words, describe the moment the cable ran. And tell us why you were standing under the log."
The four sentences were worn smooth. He'd said them out loud on the couch, over the fire, in the dark, until Liam stopped asking him to repeat them. Kaelen let them out flatly, with no more weight on them than the wood deserved.
"The cable ran. The log came loose off the stack. I stood where I was sent. And Mr. Drew's account leaves out where his feet were."
The pen in the woman's hand stopped. For a moment the only sound was the laptop fan and the radiator ticking.
"Mr. Drew has given a full account," she said. "Forty minutes, on the record, two days ago. Do you dispute it?"
"I've said what happened."
"You put yourself under a moving load."
"The log was already coming. It came off the top of the stack, and it came down the slope toward the tail hold. I got under it, and I stayed under it until it stopped." He heard his own voice go deep in his chest, the way it did when he was working, and felt Liam adjust against the vibration. "That's all."
She turned a page. "You've brought your clearance."
Kaelen slid the form across the table. The man with the laptop took it and read it, then passed it to her. She read the ticked box twice.
"No felling," she said. "Modified duties. The doctor wants you off the saw for eight weeks, reviewed after four."
"That's what it says."
"Head office has offered you a position at the mill. Days only, no felling, rate protected. Have you considered it?"
"I'd rather finish this first."
"Of course." She set the form down and squared it against the folder. "You understand this file goes under your name. Whatever you say here, that's what stays."
"I understand."
Under his jaw, Liam moved. It was small, just a slide of a palm along the lining and a press of his forehead, but Kaelen's throat tightened around it and his next breath came in through his nose a little too sharply. He kept his face still. The pouch flexed once, gently, and settled.
The woman watched him. "Are you all right, Mr. Thorson?"
"Long drive."
"It's twenty minutes."
"It's a long drive in the dark."
She let that sit, then closed the folder halfway and rested both hands on it. "Is there anything you'd like to add to the record before we finish?"
The room was very quiet. Kaelen could hear Pete breathing by the door. Along the wall, Drew's boot had started a slow, small tap against the floorboards, and stopped.
Kaelen spoke quietly. "One thing. Drew gave you forty minutes and never once said where his own feet were when the cable ran."
Nobody moved. Liam had gone rigid inside him, both palms flat and hard against the lining, holding on.
The woman looked down at her folder, then along the wall under the window, and her voice came out mild and even.
"Mr. Drew. Stay behind, please. The panel will want to hear that part again."
Drew's chair scraped back an inch, and his hands came off his knees.