Chapter 36

Sunday, February 3, 2002

Duane was tired and just a little bit drunk as he went to bed after midnight, and he had every reason to be. He'd spent long days behind dog teams recently, and he may have gone more miles before, but this was different. Saturday had been the Warsaw Run, the big local endurance race at Spearfish Lake. It was another hundred miler, from the lakefront of the town of Spearfish Lake, through the woods on the North Country Trail to Warsaw, then returning to Spearfish Lake on the railroad grade. Duane had been told that the race had been run considerably differently in years past, and it had been changed around to minimize night running for the benefit of the more inexperienced mushers and teams. Josh and Tiffany had been peripherally involved with the first Warsaw Run, back in '87. They had been powers in the race in the early years; each had won it three times before they started doing the Iditarod, that had them in Alaska when it occurred. The Warsaw Run had also been Phil's first exposure to dogsled racing – a second place in '93 – and Candice's too, finishing fourth the previous year.

Since Run-8 Kennels had started doing the Warsaw Run again, they shied away from using the top-line dogs in order to keep from blowing the amateurs away too badly, and mostly ran second or third line dogs as a training run. But, they did like to have the exposure in the race, so both Candice and Duane were running training teams in the event.

A hundred miler was a big event for most of the competition – for most of the racers it was the longest race they ran all winter. It was almost a bore for Duane since it mostly ran over trails they ran virtually every day, and the distance was an everyday distance too. Just to make life a little more interesting, Josh and Tiffany let him choose the dogs he'd take on the race, so long as they weren't dogs earmarked for going to Alaska. With a couple exceptions, like a retired leader known to be a very good dog, he picked out dogs that had just missed the cut of going to Alaska. So, he thought he had a pretty good team when he stood out on the ice in the darkness of early Saturday morning waiting to start. This was the day the sailing trip in the Bahamas ended, he'd thought absently, so Michelle ought to be on her way back, or pretty close to it. He'd missed her for the last couple weeks, and only had one brief phone call reporting that the weather was great and they were having a good time.

After the race got under way, it proved he did in fact have a pretty good team, and he pushed them. Though starting midfield, he was the first musher into the rest stop and checkpoint at Warsaw several hours later. Start times were equalized at Warsaw by varying the minimum length of the rest stop, so that meant he was first out of the checkpoint on the return trip with a big lead. It would be unfair to say he loafed on the way back, but he kept up a good trail pace and never saw another musher. He got back to the crowd waiting for the finish in the late afternoon and crossed the finish line at a good trail pace. It wasn't until he was being interviewed on the loudspeaker in front of the crowd that he found out he'd broken the course record, set by Josh in '93! "Not a bad run for third-rate dogs," he told the announcer modestly, and truthfully.

"I think that's a little leg pulling from a Grand Canyon boatman," the announcer said. "Like I said this morning, Run-8 mushers won this race six times in the early years and were second several times. They say that they're just using the race for training now, but Duane MacRae's rookie of the year finish shows just how much of that you can believe. I'm told they call this guy 'Icewater', and that's just how cool he is. Icewater, in addition to the check, you get a nice trophy to put on the mantle."

"That's the problem with being a Grand Canyon boatman," he replied, still being modest and honest, but wondering where this guy came up with the "Icewater." It had to be Nicole – they used their AT nicknames with each other occasionally. "Our rafts don't have a mantle to put it on," he continued, "But I'll find a place for it." Maybe in the Canyon Tours office, he thought; it would tickle Al. It would be fun to show to Michelle, too; the one downer about the whole thing was she hadn't been here to see the race. But all that had been earlier, and now the bed felt good.

Sometime later, he found himself dreaming. When he tried to remember his dreams later they were fuzzy; all he could remember was he was in the Canyon by himself with a dog team, go figure, when a UFO landed. Michelle got out in the nude and came to make love to him in the sled basket. That part was more real, he could see her, smell her, feel her, taste her lips ... somewhere their dream and reality merged...

"Good morning," Michelle whispered sweetly, her face about two inches from his. She seemed very real, not like a dream at all; somehow they were in his bed, and not in a sled basket. "I didn't want to wake you up."

One hell of a dream ... he opened his eyes wider, and looked into the deep blue-violet of hers only inches away. He was aware of her long blonde hair casually resting on his bare skin, of her nude body snuggled next to his, one arm thrown around him, as he had one around her ... and her other hand had a comfortable but firm grip on his erect penis. Right, one hell of a dream...