Snowball

by Gregory Bastianelli

  The house stood about fifty yards away. It was three stories high and, with snow frosting its sides and roof, gave the impression of a tiered cake. A small roof extended over the front stoop and long icicles hung down from its edge, like long sharp dragons’ teeth. Above that roof was a second-floor balcony, also covered, a tall narrow door leading to it. Farther up was the gabled room of the third floor, an oval window looking out like an eye. In one window, in a room on the first floor to the left of the front door, was a flickering flame, the light that had guided him from the highway.

  That it was not an electric light dimmed his spirits, and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to make it across the yard between the woods and the house. In front of the house was a maple tree, whose barren snow-covered limbs hung down, as if defeated by the storm as well.

  Clark pushed off from the tree he leaned on, determined to make the final trek to the house. As he made his way into the clearing, he noticed the snow seemed to have stopped. The wind must have as well because the branches of the maple tree were still.

  He had to practically drag his snowshoes across the yard, his weary legs barely able to lift his feet to take each step. Clark hoped the resident of the house wouldn’t be too frightened to open his door to a lost traveler. He could smell smoke and noticed it rising from a brick chimney on the left side of the roof. Clark sniffed, sensing the warmth the smell of burning wood provided. He needed that warmth, and he tried to move quicker, anxious to get inside the house.

  The night was quiet as he crossed the yard, only the crunching of the snow beneath his feet breaking the silence. The wind, finally still, had lost its voice.

  Clark wondered if the occupant of the house was asleep and if it would be hard to wake him or her. Heck, he would break in if he had to, but he hoped it wouldn’t amount to that. He just needed to get inside, and hopefully get help.

  A soft plopping sound behind him after he passed under the maple tree stopped him in his tracks. He turned. A small pile of snow behind him had apparently fallen from one of the branches as its limb now revealed bare bark. He looked up at the tree, the branches towering above him. There was no wind. The branches didn’t even sway in the night air.

  Clark took another step toward the house and heard another plop behind him. He stopped again, looking over his shoulder at another bare branch. It was as if the tree were shaking off its blanket of snow, like a beast awakening from its winter hibernation. Given the odd occurrences of the night, Clark felt spooked and more than ever wanted to get out of the dark and inside the safety of the house.

  A rumble like thunder drew his gaze up as the tree shook its limbs. Snow rained down on him. Thick chunks pounded him, trying to drive him into the ground. Clark tried to move forward under the shower of snow, but the awkwardness of the snowshoes slowed him down.

  When he thought he was clear of the falling snow, something gripped his waist. He looked down to see a branch from the maple tree had wrapped its limbs around his stomach.

  Before his mind could even register what was happening, his body was lifted off the ground. The flashlight dropped from his grip, the light winking out when it hit the ground.

  Clark’s stomach dropped as his breath was squeezed out of him. The thickness of his ski parka was the only thing keeping his midsection from being crushed. The limb pulled him up toward the other branches, which twitched with frenzied eagerness as he struggled.

  This can’t be happening.

  But the hard wood wrapped around him said otherwise and he tugged on it, trying to release its grip while his mind struggled to understand his predicament. God no, he thought as the branch slammed him down onto the ground. If not for the thickness of the snow below, his bones would have shattered. His lungs expelled what little breath they held at impact. One of his snowshoes broke off from his boot.

  Before he had a chance to catch his breath, he was lifted again. Another branch reached out and clawed at his face, knocking off his snow cap. Clark dug his hands under the branch gripping him, trying to pry it loose. He felt another limb tugging on his right boot.

  The branch twisted him around and swung down. It felt like he was flying as he watched the ground rise up. He squeezed his eyes shut just before he felt his body punch into the snow. He tasted blood in his mouth, but also noticed the impact loosened the branch around his waist. He squirted out of its grip and scampered across the surface of the snow, away from the tree.

  Once out of its reach, he rolled onto his back and looked back at the tree. It seemed angry, brandishing its branches. Clark exhaled, exhausted from the ordeal, unable to move. Pain etched across his right cheek and he pulled off a glove and felt the side of his face. His cold fingers followed the outline of the ridge of a gash and came away wet. He kicked off his remaining snowshoe and looked over at the house. On the stoop to the right of the front door, an old wooden toboggan leaned up against the siding. It reminded him of the one he laid his grandfather on to pull him out of the woods when he was dying. It couldn’t be the same one. Could it? Anything was possible at this point, he thought.

  Clark wasn’t sure he had the strength to make the few remaining yards to the house, but he wasn’t about to stop. He just needed to catch his breath while his mind tried to comprehend what had just happened. He had stepped into some unreal nightmare and now didn’t know what to expect.

  Clark tried to put his glove back on, but the stiffness of the frozen fabric wouldn’t fit over his fingers so he tossed it aside. He was almost there. He could make it. He had to.

  He rolled over onto his front and pushed himself up to his hands and knees. It was progress. But he had no energy to rise any farther, so he began crawling toward the house, still keeping his eyes on the flickering light in the window. The cold snow stung the skin on his bare right hand as he worked his way toward the house, his abdomen aching from the pounding the tree had given him.

  Just before the front steps of the house, he collapsed onto the ground and rolled over onto his back. Clark felt dizzy, his head throbbing and foggy. Can’t make it, he thought, reaching a hand up as if it could stretch up the steps and across the stoop to the knob on the front door. He dropped his hand, fingers clawing at the snow. No use, he thought. I came this far, but couldn’t finish.

  Clark closed his eyes, wishing sleep would just overtake him and end it all. That would be the best solution, the way he felt. Sorry Shelby, he said in his mind. I tried. It just wasn’t enough.

  With his eyes shut, he could hear the sound of a door opening and footsteps approaching.

  It took great effort for him to open his eyes, even just a slit, and through them he saw a man peering down at him. The man wore a black coat over a red work shirt and had straw-colored hair and a craggy face. The man looked familiar, but in Clark’s dazed state he couldn’t quite place where he’d seen him before.

  Just before his eyes closed again, it came to him. This was the figure he had seen in the forest when he was dragging his grandfather on the toboggan.

  Have you come to claim me? Clark thought just before passing out.

  Chapter Four

  Tucker Jenks sat upright in the sleeper cab of his truck, afraid to stir. He still had on his outerwear and boots, even his gloves. He didn’t dare take anything off, even though the heater kept the inside of the cab so toasty that sweat dampened his forehead and the back of his neck. He kept still so he could listen for any sound coming from inside the trailer. Tucker also listened to the wind, wondering if it was calling him.

  Can’t just sit here, he told himself.

  But sit he did.

  He stared at the lights on his dashboard. He looked at the CB radio. It didn’t work earlier, no reason it should work now. But how long would he wait? Do something (stupid boy). Don’t just sit here. They almost got you. They’ll be coming for you.

  Tucker leaned forward and looked out the driver’s side window. He could
n’t see the snowmen on the edge of the highway. Who would build snowmen out here, you stupid boy? They’re here for you.

  He reached out and grabbed the mic of the CB radio and turned the power on. Static jumped out. “Breaker breaker,” he spoke softly into the mic, as if afraid he would be heard by someone not on the radio. He felt like a child, scared and lonely, calling for help. But why shouldn’t he feel like a child? It was Christmas morning after all. Didn’t everyone feel like a child on Christmas morning? It was a time to be excited about opening presents.

  There was a present waiting for him in the back of the tractor-trailer, waiting for him to open it, a surprise for him on Christmas morning.

  But wait, it was already open. Open and waiting for him.

  “Help,” he called softly into the mic. “Please.”

  A barrage of static poured from the speaker, interrupted by a voice.

  “Stupid boy.”

  It was his nana.

  “Don’t be a stupid boy.”

  The banshee howled outside.

  Tucker switched off the CB. There was nobody out there. Nobody who could help him at least. Not even his nana. She was dead. The banshee had called for her a long time ago.

  He turned his headlights on. The beam was dimmed by the snow covering the lamps, but what light spilled out illuminated a small stretch of the highway before him. The SUV was just ahead, the one that had spun out after passing him, causing him to hit his brakes and jackknife the truck. It was that asshole’s fault he was stuck here.

  But not really. What had stopped them all was what blocked the path farther down the turnpike.

  The snowplow.

  The beams from his headlights just caught the back end of it. Tucker thought about the missing driver and the blood they’d found inside the cab. But another thought formed in his head. He remembered seeing the keys still in the ignition in the plow truck.

  Maybe it was time for him to try to get the hell out of here.

  Tucker zipped up his coat, opened the door to his truck and stepped out into the night.

  Chapter Five

  It was much less crowded in the RV since the two men left, and Lewis Felker was glad of it. Let the pretty boys try to be the heroes, he thought, as he maintained his seat at the table. He doubted he would see either of them again. It didn’t matter. At the moment, the only thing that mattered was the bottle on the table in front of him, and with two fewer people around, it decreased the chances anyone else would want some of it.

  The only other person who seemed interested in the bottle was Mason Drake, sitting across from him, and every time the man reached for it, Felker shot him a glare. The man ignored it. His wife continued looking out the window.

  “I can still see the light,” Joy said, not moving from the glass.

  “Any sign of them?” Shelby asked from her seat on the padded bench.

  “No,” Joy answered.

  “I’m sure they’re fine,” Francine said, sitting beside Shelby. She reached out a comforting hand and caressed Shelby’s shoulder.

  Felker noticed the younger woman stiffening up at the touch. Tense. He didn’t blame her. He eyed the older woman and her husband with suspicion. They seemed too calm about everything. Maybe it had something to do with the story the old woman had told about the Iceman. It couldn’t have been a coincidence that he had seen the same man out in the storm with his bloody ice tongs, back down the highway where the road should have led, but didn’t.

  He wasn’t sure what it all meant, but it must be bad. And if the pretty boys miraculously made it out of here somehow, they would be better off not trying to come back for the rest of them.

  Felker glanced down at the bottle. It was more than half-empty. He slid the bottle toward himself, eyeing Mason as he did. If they weren’t where everyone thought they were, and if this was some form of hell frozen over, then he would need this more than any of the others and he didn’t care to share.

  “Oh no,” Joy said from her post at the window, and everyone looked over.

  “What is it?” Shelby asked, sitting up from her seat.

  “The light’s gone.”

  Chapter Six

  Clark awoke to the sound of flickering flames. He opened his eyes to view the fire before him. He felt warmth from the small blaze in the fireplace, watching orange flames dance along blackened logs.

  Where am I?

  He remembered collapsing in front of the house. There was a man. Or was there?

  Opening his eyes wider, Clark turned his head to take in his surroundings. He was lying on a couch in front of a fireplace. Someone had removed his jacket and ski pants, and even his boots, leaving his feet covered only in socks. He wiggled his toes, noticing the socks were dry.

  How long have I been here? he wondered. Outside it was still dark, so morning hadn’t come yet. Unless he’d been here even longer. He thought about the skeletons in the car on the highway.

  The highway!

  Clark sat upright, glancing around the room. At each end of the couch was a wingback padded chair with a dark floral pattern that matched the couch. They were positioned at an angle to face the fireplace. Along the outer wall to his left, between two windows, was another pair of cushioned chairs, facing each other with a small table between them. On the table was a large chess set. The pieces were situated as if a game were in progress.

  As he moved his head around, he felt a twinge of pain on the right side of his face and reached his hand up to feel a wound along his cheek. He remembered the incident with the tree. What the hell was that? And where the hell was he?

  At the front of the room, he spotted a lit oil lamp on a small table before a window that looked out onto the front yard and that nightmare tree. That was the light he had followed through the woods. But where had it led him? What was this house? And more importantly, who lived here?

  Someone had brought him inside, removed his outerwear and placed him in front of the fire to warm. He had seen the man before he collapsed, the same figure he had seen in the woods as a child the day his grandfather died. How was that possible? Was that the man who had brought him inside? If so, he had saved his life. But for what?

  There was a doorway that led to a foyer by the front door. He had the urge to get up and explore the house, rouse its occupants, but his body still felt too stiff and sore from his ordeal and the battle with the tree. His muscles throbbed throughout his body. The only blessing was he felt warm. The flames from the logs in the fireplace had driven off the cold that had settled deep into his bones, and it comforted him.

  Clark stared at the flames, mesmerized by the flickering as they lapped the logs. He wanted to just sit and absorb the warmth and the soothing feeling it gave him. But because of the odd occurrences since he left the RV, he could not feel at ease. He looked away from the flames.

  On the mantelpiece above the fireplace was a sole brass candlestick, long and tapered, but empty. Flanking the fireplace were two mahogany bookcases. But the shelves weren’t filled with books. Instead, there were stacks of boxes piled on each of the shelves. He got up from the couch, stood on wobbly legs, and maneuvered over to one of the bookcases.

  The boxes were board games, stacks of them piled on top of each other. Most of them looked old, the worn boxes coated with a thin layer of dust. His eyes ran across them, reading the names. Some of them he recognized from his childhood, games he had owned or played with friends. Others were unknown to him. Snakes and Ladders, Scotland Yard, Bagatelle, Ludo and Haunted Mansion. There was a slew of war games on another shelf: Waterloo, Blitzkrieg and Shenandoah. There was a game called Transylvania that Clark had faint memories of playing when he was a small boy intrigued by spooks and goblins. Not so much anymore. Not after the things he had just experienced.

  “Do you enjoy playing games, Mr. Brooks?” The voice came from behind him.

 
Clark turned around to face a well-dressed elderly man standing in the doorway. He appeared to be in his eighties, but with a full head of silver hair slicked back and a neatly trimmed white mustache and goatee. He wore a dark gray suit coat over a vest and white shirt adorned with a red-and-white striped ascot tie. His gray slacks were well-pressed. It looked like he was dressed for a formal dinner.

  But it was almost morning. Why was this man dressed like this so early in the day? Or had he just returned from some late-night engagement, such as a festive Christmas Eve celebration? But in this storm?

  The more important question was how did this man know his name? Clark felt the back pocket of his pants and noticed his wallet wasn’t there. He figured that was how the man knew his name.

  “Most people keep books on their bookshelves,” Clark said.

  The old man chortled. “These days, people don’t read books much anymore,” he said, striding into the room. “Of course, they don’t really play board games either.” He paused by the back of the chair to the right of the couch and scanned the bookshelves before him. “No, everything is all video games and e-readers nowadays. Such a sorry waste.”

  “I take it the storm’s knocked out the power here, and phone lines,” Clark said, changing the subject.

  The old man walked over to the chessboard on the table. He stood over it, examining the pieces. “There’s been no power here for a long time.”

  Clark’s heart sank, thinking about the others back on the highway. He had come here looking for help, but it didn’t look like he’d found any.

  “I came from the highway. There are several people snowbound in their vehicles.” He thought about the skeletal remains in the hatchback and shivered.

  “It’s a nasty storm out there. Not fit for man or beast.” The old man picked up a black knight and moved it to a new position on the board.