I walk

No, trudge

No, swim

Through the snowdrifts, and the stars---

Crystalline, cold, clear as the colorless-carbon in a wedding ring

---lie like shards of ice on a blanket of midnight velvet.

(Wesley Carrigan, poet extraordinaire. Not.)

The snow hugs the earth

And the trees, and the ice-covered lake

And numbs the world,

Shushing everything but the creak of my boots

And the rustle of my jacket

(Quiksilver, black, $47.03 plus shipping and handling).

 

It’s funny to be walking through Sunriver when there’s no sun.

Makes you feel like the travel brochures must be lying

Not that I care, though

I never wanted to come here anyways.

Sure, it’s beautiful

Can’t argue with that

But the brochures didn’t mention the subzero temperatures.

Come to think of it, neither did my parents.

Hypocrites

How do they expect me to tell them stuff

When they never tell me anything?

 

I’m not paying attention

And it takes me a minute to realize that I’ve ploughed my way into...

What?

Some kind of clearing in the woods?

Maybe part of the lake?

The drifts lie in heavy mounds across it,

Gleaming bright, bright white.

I head left, following the snow-weighted trees around the edge.

I don’t want to test the ice (if there is ice)

Especially if I can’t see it.

The moonlight angles down through the pine needles,

And the trees’ shadows stretch long, greedy fingers

Across the snow,

Reaching for the center of the clearing/meadow/pool.

I shiver, and not just because I’m freezing my butt off.

I can’t say why, but I get the feeling

That it might be a good idea for me to leave.

 

That’s when my heart gives a few arrhythmic kicks

And starts to pound like thunder in my ears

I stop moving.

Nervous as I am

I want to know what’s going on

In the past ten seconds, something about this place has changed

But I haven’t seen anything scary

Or unusual

Or...

Wait a sec---

RATE THIS CHAPTER!