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“Lake Richie.”
While A
“Why don’t you go ahead and start toward us,” Bob said authoritatively. “They’re coming,” he added u
“I heard.”
Bob wasn’t going to do as she asked. He had it set in his mind that the ice wouldn’t hold him. Or he was afraid that it might not, which amounted to the same thing. A
Arguing a person out of being afraid – particularly when they wouldn’t admit to being frightened – seldom worked, and A
“I suppose I could just balance here till the ice refreezes along the seams,” she said sarcastically.
“How long do you think that would take?” he asked seriously.
A
“The ice won’t-”
“Big circle, Bob, big circle, stay as far out as you need to just-” She stopped to let off the steam building in her brain. She’d been about to say “just move your fat ass,” etc., etc., expletive not deleted, but, from what she’d observed of Bob Menechi
For a moment, he didn’t speak or move, then she heard his boots squeaking over the snow to her left. He loomed into her peripheral vision then, finally, to where she could see him without straining. Pissed off as she was, the sight of him relieved her. He didn’t look like he was about to run off and leave her to perish. She had that going for her.
“I need you to go to the shore and get a tree limb, a long one, as long as you can manage.”
Bob looked toward the shoreline. Though less than half a football field away, it was murky, dark and out of focus behind falling snow. “Visibility is getting bad,” he said. “I’d be afraid I wouldn’t be able to get back to you. I don’t want to leave you alone out here.”
A
“Don’t go into the trees,” she said. “There’ll be something along the shore. Something is better than nothing.”
“I don’t want to leave you alone,” he said. “It would take too long.”
His words sounded fine, his voice was even and strong. Still, she suspected his sudden devotedness had more to do with not wishing to go into the spooky old woods alone.
Blinking past the snow and the shards of tears frozen in the i
It had been a number of years ago, back when “crazy” was as much a medical diagnosis as an insult. The ward wasn’t for neurotics; the people who ended up there were desperately ill. Most had lost so much of their world to mental illness and the drugs administered to control it that they didn’t care what was said to them. It had little to do with what they heard. Those who could still interact tended to respond instantly, and sometimes violently, if their delusions were challenged. A
Sane people weren’t a whole lot different; they just didn’t drool as much.
Bob Menechi
At the moment, A
The tic in her thigh graduated to a twitch. Soon the muscle would cramp.
“Get the traps out of your pack,” she said. Bob was as formless and shadowed in the snow as tabloid pictures of Bigfoot. He went down on one knee and slung the backpack to the ice. As he fumbled with the buckles, A
“I was just thinking that,” he said.
A
“How’s it going?” she asked to take her body’s mind off just yelling “Fuck it!” and leaping for the good ice.
He looked up, his hood thick with snow, his shoulders white with it. “Good,” he said. “Another minute. Hang on.”
The work of his hands had driven thoughts of the oversized wolf from his mind. The linking of the three chains had relieved him of the necessity of getting near where the ice had broken. He sounded manly, strong, stand-up. It was hard to believe not too many minutes ago he was poised to leave her to her fate or, worse, watch while it visited itself upon her. He wasn’t afraid now, A
“They should hold,” he said and held up the three chains attached to each other by the steel-jawed traps.
It would work, A
The dull pull of a muscle trying to cramp moved out from the twitch above her knee. If she waited any longer, she would not be able to execute the straight-backed deep knee bend and rise without tottering after she picked up the chain. Inside the Sorels, she flexed toes grown numb from lack of movement. “Let’s get going,” she said. “My legs are starting to cramp.”
Bob hurled a trap at her.
“No!” she heard herself shout. Ten pounds of metal struck her in the chest. Clamping her arms across it, she fought for balance. The ice tilted. Her boots began to slide. White lake and sky rushed past as she fell backward. Her head struck lake ice. Her brain slid forward inside her skull. Her chin smashed into her chest, slamming her teeth down on her tongue.