My Abandonment(47)

The day was so sunny and the sky blue but already the storm is coming when we don't need it. Neither one of us says anything about the snow as it starts out and this time it doesn't start slowly.

"We could just walk back down and hide our things again," I say. "We could get a motel room at that place near the grocery store."

"We can't afford it," Father says.

"You have all the money," I say. "And we just got those two checks from the post office."

"I mean the exposure," he says, "not the expense."

"You could get a room for yourself," I say, "and I could sneak in later."

Father stops for a moment and looks back toward the lights of town that we can still see down below.

"No," he says. "This is better. This will be better. Trust me."

The snow blows down hard and sideways and slanting. It's cold in my eyes.

"Walk behind me," Father says. "You'll get a little cover, that way."

He's pulling the sled though so I can't walk too close and the toe of my snowshoes keeps kicking it.

"Caroline," he says.

"I'm not used to how long they are," I say.

I can tell Father is checking all the houses we see in case they're empty but there's lights in the windows so far.

"It's the weekend," he says. "That's why they're out here."

"Why?"

"These are just their vacation houses," he says.

Smoke twists out of chimneys and inside people are probably sitting watching the orange fire and its sparks crackling.

"Those people don't care if anyone sees their smoke," I say.

"Yes, Caroline," Father says. "That's right."

"That would be nice," I say, and he doesn't say anything back.

We keep walking past big houses and log cabins and A-frames like the one we slept in last night even if that seems longer ago. I know Father won't let us go back there even if we could find it. It's a long way away. Even if it was close it wouldn't matter since we couldn't see or find it.

A dog barks somewhere, the sound mostly lost in the snow. After a while I can't tell if we're walking up or downhill. The snow swirls around from every direction and blows straight up from the ground.

For a while there's the thin posts like orange fishing poles sticking up through the white snow, a curving line that we can follow one at a time since that's as far as we can see.

"Is this the same road as before?" I say.

"No," Father says. "I don't know. We'll find someplace. Don't worry. Right up ahead somewhere."

"When we left the city," I say, "you told me you would take me someplace that wasn't so cold."

My snowshoes seem heavier than his. They look like they're heavier. Even if we could hibernate I don't know where we'd go. All we have left to follow now is the poles for the electrical and telephone lines that could be stretching to a city a hundred miles away. The sled keeps dumping the packs off and I have to put them back on top.

"Are we walking in circles?" I say. "I haven't even seen the road posts for a long time. Those orange ones."

"I don't know," Father says. "I'm trying to guess where the moon should be."





We can't even follow our tracks back to where we knew where we were since they are all filled in. The snow is only falling thicker. It's later and it's darker.

"Over there," I say. "Look."

"What is it?" Father says.

The little shack is almost buried in the snow. Its outside curves, rounded. Two windows glow only a little like there's something inside but not enough light to really see anything. We stand there. The snow piles up on our heads and shoulders since we aren't moving.

We walk closer next to black cords of wire that snake down off the telephone pole and down low, just above the snow to the tiny round building.

Father knocks on the wooden door three times and nothing happens. He knocks again louder. He pushes the door and it scrapes open. Snow shifts down from the roof above.

"In anybody inside?" Father says.

There is a faint glow and a buzzing sound at first.

"Yes," a voice says, then. "We are inside."

"Who?" Father says. "Sorry," he says as the headlamp lights up their faces and they squint at us. It is two people. A lady and a boy.

"We found it first," the lady says. "Close the door if you're coming in. If you're not coming in, close it, too."

Her hair is blond and wavy down past her shoulders, one side sticking up more. The boy wears a yellow and black striped cap like a bee, his face wide and pale and staring.

"Don't trip over those wires," she says as we step in.

Father closes the door and we are inside. I can't see except for the circle of light from Father's headlamp sliding along the dirty plywood floor.