Story Notes: This story owes an obvious debt to Tim O'Brian's fantastic "The Things They Carried."

There is his cot, of course, and Diefenbaker, but he doesn't truly own Diefenbaker, as one being can never truly own another. Also, the cot belongs to the consulate, therefore to the RCMP, therefore to Canada -- not to Fraser at all. There is his uniform, though that's Canada's, too, in all honesty, even the hat. The boots are his, as are his hiking boots and the comfortable yet overly casual sneakers he only wears when he runs. He owns several pairs of sturdy jeans, several Henleys, three flannel shirts, two sweaters, a jacket, a coat. He owns socks and underwear and undershirts and long johns. He has six handkerchiefs, embroidered with his initials by his grandmother, a present when he'd left for Depot. He owns one suit, though he never wears it and Diefenbaker ate his only tie.

He owns a rucksack and a bedroll. He owns a compass, a canteen, several maps, a protractor, a spyglass, flares, waterproof matches, a sewing kit, a first aid kit, a tuning fork, a tape measure, a flashlight. He owns his gun, a standard .38 service pistol. He owns several hunting knives. He owns his father's rifle.

He owns two metal plates, two forks, two spoons, two knives. He owns two tin cups. He owns one pot, one food bowl for Diefenbaker, one water bowl. He used to own many, many candles, but most of them had burned down to stubs even before the rest were destroyed in a fire.

He owns several books -- poetry by Milton, the RCMP manual, a Bible. He owns notebooks and pencils. He owns his father's journals and a small tract of land in the Yukon with the remains of a charred cabin. He owns two axes. He owns one photograph of his family. He doesn't remember when or where it was taken, exactly, even though he's in it.

He owns the ghost of his father and the memory of his mother, both of which haunt him in equal amounts. He owns the memory of a night spent frozen on a mountainside. He owns his own cowardice and despair. He owns his solitude and the darkness of the night when he feels as if there is no one left alive on earth and he'll go mad with loneliness.

He owns his pride of Canada, his pride of being a member of the RCMP, his belief in justice. He owns a mastery of seven languages, and he owns the fact that his most constant source of conversation is a deaf wolf.

He owns his longing.

He owns his heart and its perverse habit of loving those he can never have. He knows no one can ever truly have another person, but he owns his desperate, secret wish to have someone of his own. He owns his dreams and his dark thoughts and his fears, and even though it seems like sometimes he'll stumble under the weight of everything he owns, when it comes time to go all his belongings fit easily in one box, and her carries them effortlessly across the border to the home which had once disowned him but now claims him as its own.