The man who accidentally amputated the newly-wed's other leg had not stolen her husband's bees – they had simply taken up residence in one of his sculptures. Charles, the chainsaw artist, didn't want the insects there any more than the husband did. But their enmity was not about the bees; it began and ended with Jeane, who had grown up in the same harbor as Charles. Many an hour he had spent imagining their life together, but almost immediately upon coming-of-age, Jeane was whisked away by Winston, a rich vacationer who had spent only his summers in that harbor.

Charles noted Jeane's return by the moving trucks in front of the local Inn, but found it hard to come up with a reason to say hello, so took to strolling beaches – hoping for a serendipitous meeting. On one of these hopeful walks he spied a red shape undulating with the water. When the swimming figure came closer to shore he could see that she was a woman. She knelt in the shallow waves lapping the shore, grains of sand sticking to her shin as she crawled from the water. Her traversal of the land was singularly graceful, Charles thought, as though being unbalanced forced her to engage the world by a more refined physicality. He was thinking of her missing left leg, gone below the knee. Jeane had been that way as long as he could remember.

"Hey!" He called out, raising his right arm high and waving from the shoulder. He heard her shout something across the beach, but couldn't tell what. He looked over his shoulder to where the waves had pushed up dried seaweed, and laying along that boundary was a prosthetic leg. He saw her waving him over, so he made up his mind and met her in the sand with her leg balanced in the crook of his arm.

"I think this might be yours." 

Jeane let herself fall into the sand. She took her leg from Charles, and he sat by her side. She smelled the same as when they were kids, a hint of rain and jasmine. He forced his breathing to slow. 

"They seem to like running away," Jeane offered by way of a hello. Charles pointed to the fact both of his were accounted for, and she grinned. He relaxed. He asked her where she'd been. She cut him off.

"Everywhere." She turned to watch the sun fall, asking why a destination had to be particular.

"It doesn't, necessarily," he mused, "but you must want to go somewhere to end up there."

"And where would you go?" She countered.

"Away."

Jeane favored him with a glance at this response, tearing her eyes away from the cooling sky to watch him study her. "Then let's run away," she said, startling Charles out of a contemplation of the limb he held in his arms minutes ago. 

"The first time wasn't enough?" Charles asked. He saw her frown and regretted the jab. He tried to humor her and amend his mistake. He also wanted to know if she meant it. 

"Where, how?"

"Anywhere, just like we talked about when we were kids," her eyes grew bright, her voice animated "nobody like Blake to come kick them down–"

"Did our school bully find you and Winston during the honeymoon?" 

Consumed by the shared memories of schoolyard bullies, they watched the waves drown the sun. Jeane invited him to a dinner with friends at her home later that week, which he accepted as a polite way to end their unscheduled rendezvous.

That evening he found Jeane, a vision in lapis, blonde hair held up by a sparkling gold clip, exposing her swan-like neck. She saw Charles approach and left Winston to take his arm. He didn't see Winston glare.

"Let's find someplace a little quieter," she whispered in his ear. Close enough to feel her breath. She guided him out of the main hall and unlocked an old wood door. It opened on papers towering in haphazard piles.

Charles stood puzzled, and then took a closer look at the papers marred by red PAST DUE stamps. "He really does know how to spend." 

"And I need saving," she sighed, her eyes meeting his. 

"You think a chainsaw artist from Butt Harbor, Nowhere, can save you from Winston's awe-inspiring expenditures?" 

She turned and sighed. 

"I've been putting a bit away," he said, more impulse than intention. "Enough to get out of here, not in as much style as you had the first time, but enough for two."

"Where?"

"Anywhere."

"Why?"

"Because."

And it was true, he had been literally storing cash away, inside a hollow statue of a bear his father had carved. The trunk had a knot in it, with an opening just big enough to slip plastic baggies of bills into the sculpture. 

"It has to be today," she told him.

"When?"

"Now."

"I can be ready in an hour."

Charles left the party for home. He spent a moment in front of his woodshed, considering how best to transport the money. He started dragging the cash log into his skiff. 

Jeane arrived. She looked at him, silent and trusting, and he felt at peace. He knew she was his since the fifth grade; now he had her. He crossed the yard and lifted the suitcase from her hands. They heard gravel crunching from behind; a car coming around the bend in his driveway. No time to reach the dock.

"The woodshed!" He dragged her inside. The musty smell of shavings filled all air pockets. Half-carved trunks and totems stood like sentinels in the shed. He pulled her to the workbench at the back and took out his chainsaw. She gasped when she saw it.

"Just for show," he reassured her. 

Winston burst in, holding a knife he had probably bought in a Bass Pro Boutique.

"Just for show?" Charles asked, knowing there was no way to hide among the wooden pillars. Still, there was no direct approach to the back of the workshop, and as one party wove between the sculptural obstructions, so did the other. 

"Shut up, woodchuck! I want my wife and my bees!" Winston was angry. 

"I don't have the bees!" Charles took the chainsaw's handle and pulled it towards him, starting the roar. He gestured at Winston, pushed him backwards. Charles sidestepped a row of logs, thinking Jeane was still behind him. He hadn't seen her edge around a trunk to his left, trying to reach the door. He thrust the spinning teeth of the saw into the space between him and Winston. Just for show. He was so focused on the weapon in one hand he wasn't watching the bankrupt billionaire's other hand. Winston yanked Jeane's ponytail. She fell backwards, limbs flailing to regain balance. Charles watched in slow motion as the fangs of the saw made contact with her right leg, severing it mid-calf. He almost couldn't hear her scream over the roar of the weapon, almost couldn't smell Winston's vomit over the aroma of sawdust and woodchips, almost couldn't feel his feet as they carried him swifter than he knew he could run, out of the shop, flinging the saw to the ground. 

The saw was still tearing a deadly circle in jagged jumps as Charles started the skiff's engine. The buzzing had not left his ears since the moment it met Jeane. He tore through the water, his small craft bouncing wildly on the waves. For a moment he thought the chainsaw had followed him, or was still locked in his unfeeling fingers. But when he looked down, it was the steering wheel he white-knuckled. He felt a splinter in his neck and smacked it away. A dead bee fell into his palm. He turned around in time to see the swarm emerging from the mouth of his wood grizzly, having picked a rather unfortunate home to reside in. There was no time for him to think. There were too many insects. Could he throw the bear and the bees overboard? But how much cash was he willing to lose? How much wood could the Woodchuck chuck, if the Woodchuck would chuck wood?