The Darkest Winter

by Lindsey Pogue

  A girl, probably seventeen or eighteen with strawberry blonde hair pulled up in a long ponytail, stuck her head out.

  “Oh, thank God.” I ran over to her, forgetting how crazed I must’ve looked.

  Her eyes shifted to the gun tucked in at my hip and she slammed the door shut.

  “No! Please—please don’t shut the door. I need to find my sister. She lives on this floor—Jenny St. James. Please—you’re the only person I’ve seen.” I knocked stubbornly. “Do you know her?” She had to, right? They all lived in the same building. They were all neighbors. “She’s my twin—she looks just like me . . .”

  I shut my eyes, pressing my warm cheek to the cool door, praying she would open up. “Please,” I whispered.

  The door creaked open, stopping where the chain lock ended.

  “Oh, thank you—do you know where she lives?”

  The girl’s blue eyes narrowed on me, assessing me. Then, they softened. “JJ lived there,” she rasped and nodded to the end of the hall.

  I stared at the last remaining door. “Thank you!” I rushed to the last apartment, wishing for a miracle. The door was unlocked, but it wasn’t until I opened the door I registered the girl’s words. Lived. It’s where JJ lived.

  Tears dripped down my cheeks as I stepped inside. “Jenny . . .” The light was already on and there was blood on the kitchen floor. “No,” I gasped and scoured the rest of the house. I rushed to the bedroom where a sick person would sleep, but her queen-sized bed was perfectly made and the room was empty. The oak dresser across from it had nothing on top to gather dust, the tv mounted on the wall was off. The only thing in the room was a side table with a wrought iron lamp with a black shade.

  I walked back into the living room and stared at the black suede couch and white walls with only a large, silver framed mirror to adorn them. I stepped closer to the coffee table, half-expecting to see a ring in the tan wood from where she always set her cold cups down without a coaster. But there was no ring.

  Everything was crisp and clean and sparse, which wasn’t Jenny at all. She was a whirlwind and a mess, and for the first time I was grateful for it. This wasn’t Jenny’s house—JJ was not Jenny. But just as I allowed myself to hope, I saw a loaf of Gluten-free bread on the counter, blackberry jam, and an open butter dish. It was Jenny’s favorite snack when we were kids—the sweet and the salty. And she was allergic to wheat.

  My arms fell to my sides. “No,” I said, more like pleaded. The blood was on the counter too, splattered on the tile and in the grout. Covering my mouth, I took a step closer. She was sick, I’d known she was, but the blood—I peered around as if her body would suddenly appear.

  My gaze caught on a single photo hung on the fridge, it’s edges well-worn and discolored. I stepped closer. It was us. We were young, probably ten or so based on the tie-dye t-shirt I was wearing, and I didn’t remember the photo.

  The girl from next door stepped into the doorway, arms wrapped around her and legs exposed in her boxer shorts. She looked as scared and confused as I was.

  “Do you know where she is?” I asked.

  The girl blinked, her shoulders heaving as she gripped her middle tighter.

  I stepped closer, desperation clawing inside. “Have you seen my sister or not?” I asked her.

  She nodded, her chin trembling. “They took her away in a stretcher.”

  I straightened my shoulders, unsure I could utter the words. “To quarantine?” I asked.

  The girl lifted a petite shoulder and licked a tear from her lips. “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know? Did she go to quarantine or not?” I bit out.

  “I don’t know,” she barked back and wiped her nose with the back of her arm. “I never saw her again. My mom told me to stay upstairs and not open the door or leave this floor—she made me swear.”

  It didn’t matter. I’d seen the list.

  “You mom’s the mayor.” It was only a half question, and my chest tightened before she could even answer.

  The girl’s red-rimmed eyes widened, and she stepped closer. “Have you seen her?” she asked. “She’s not answering any of her phones.”

  Reluctantly, I nodded.

  The hope in the girl’s eyes blurred with tears and she choked out a sob. “She’s dead? My mom’s dead?”

  I didn’t answer her; I didn’t have to.

  Her mom was dead. So was Jenny was dead[JB14].

  We stood in my sister’s apartment as the world finally crashed down around us.

  I didn’t wipe the tears away as they poured down my cheeks.

  Every exhausted muscle wavered, every glimmer of hope dimmed, and I struggled to breathe.

  My heart broke, for me and for the girl. For the mother who had kept her daughter safe even if she knew she wouldn’t make it herself.

  The girl doubled over, barely able to catch her breath, and I wrapped my arms around her.

  She grabbed at my shirt, clasping onto me. “Why?” She sobbed. “Why is this happening?”

  I had to steady my breath enough to speak. “I don’t know,” I whispered. I felt immobile. Numb. “I . . . don’t know.”

  Closing my eyes, I held the girl back, more tightly this time. Whatever happened next, my sister was a lifeless body in a mass grave, and I was alone.

  The girl’s body trembled against me. Both of us were.[LP15]

  Chapter 14

  Jackson

  December 11[LP16]

  Do I look like the kind of girl who would date a drunken stranger from a liquor store?

  I stood at the glass sliding door in my kitchen, staring into the backyard, arms folded over my chest. I could picture Hannah’s lifted eyebrow and tilted head perfectly; she could scold me with a single look and I wanted to reach for the bottle defiantly.

  If she were angry enough, she would come back from the grave and give me a ration of shit. If she was disappointed, she would tell me and we’d fight about how I’m weak and she would tell me how strong I was, even if I never believed it.

  I stared at the wine bottle on the table until my eyes were so blurred and wet, I couldn’t see the silhouette anymore.

  The toilet flushed in the bathroom, the door opened, and I thumbed the tears away. I didn’t have many left in me, anyway.

  Ross stepped out, his shoulders slumped. He nodded to the bottle, still untouched. “I figured you would’ve chugged it by now. I wouldn’t blame you.”

  “She would,” I told him. I almost smiled, but it ached too much. “Someone gave it to us a couple years ago, not knowing I’d been dry since Hannah and I met. I told her she could have some, that it would be fine, but she never drank it and she never threw it away, either.”

  “I remember when she told me she’d met the guy she would marry at a liquor store, and that you were a drunk—no,” he shook his head. “Her exact words were ‘functioning alcoholic’.” Ross looked at me with shimmery eyes. “I told her she was fucking crazy.”

  Ross picked up the bottle and turned it over in his hands. “Why do you think she kept it?”

  I stared out at her stone grave where the garden would’ve been in spring, then down at my hands, trembling as what remained of the liquor left my system. “To remind me how strong I am,” I said, but my voice was paper thin. “She was standing in line at the liquor store,” I told him, remembering the way her long, blonde braid draped over her shoulder. She had a paisley purple bandana wrapped around her head and a dozen woven bracelets that looked handmade around her wrist. “She was such a hippy,” I mused. “But I wanted her. Especially when she glared at the cashier who’d told her she couldn’t use the bathroom unless she was a customer.” I looked at Ross. “You know what she said?”

  “I can imagine.” He wiped a tear from his eye.

  “I can pee on your floor instead, if you want.” Even in the cloudy darkness her smile shined through. I wanted her smile to be real. I needed it to be.

  Ross clasped me on the shoulder and took a deep br
eath. “You’ll get through this,” he told me. “You and I both will, okay?” I peered back at him, seeing the fear in his eyes. He didn’t know what awaited him in Fairbanks. Kelsey might be alive, she might be dead. She may not want to leave her mom. All of it was uncertain.

  He sniffed and wiped his nose with his sleeve. “Leave it to women to make us weep, right?”

  Closing my eyes, I thought of Hannah and what she would want if she were standing there to tell me. To be strong and thrive even if I wanted to crawl in a hole and die. She’d want me to take care of Ross, for us to take care of each other. I picked the bottle off the table, opened the back door, and threw it against the back fence as hard and mighty as I could. To my surprise, it shattered, and I felt relief in that. It was gone. I’d made a choice, for her, and now I could move on.

  Ross and I had a plan. We were in this together, whatever this was.

  “I better get on the road,” he said, grabbing his jacket. I didn’t tell him he stood where his sister got shot in the stomach even if it felt like a million needle pricks punctured my heart each time I thought about it. Every time I took a breath in this house.

  Ross lifted the satellite phone. “I’ll call you on this.” Then, he lifted a handheld CB radio. “Or, I’ll try you on channel seven.”

  I nodded.

  “Worst-case scenario, we meet in Whitehorse,” he reminded me. “You hear me?”

  “I’ll be at your place, waiting for you to come back,” I reassured him.

  “If something happens,” he started, but I held up my hand. “Shut the fuck up,” he commanded, knowing exactly what I’d say. “If something happens to me—or you—we go to Whitehorse and meet up there. Traveling in this shit is going to suck, so if I’m not there by Spring—”

  “I’ll see you in May, if not before,” I finished for him, even if I couldn’t imagine the agonizing months in between.

  Ross nodded. “Wish me luck.” He exhaled, long and deep, then swallowed thickly. He hadn’t uttered the words aloud, but he worried his wife was dead. Why else hadn’t she figured out a way to get ahold of him, or answered her phone—or her mother’s.

  “Be safe, brother,” I said, wrapping my arms around him.

  “You too. Good luck with your dad.”

  I nodded, because I wasn’t sure what else to do. I didn’t want my dad to be dead, but I was too exhausted and spent of all shits to have any left to give.

  I walked Ross out to his truck, a knife ripping through my gut as I watched him drive away. I didn’t have a good feeling about this, but I knew he had to go find Kelsey, he had a right to know.

  Shoving my hands in my pockets, I stared at my lifeless street and walked back into the house. It was time to say goodbye to this place, and my wife. For the last time.

  Chapter 15

  Elle

  December 11[LP17]

  Hands braced on the sink, I stared into the mirror, not so much looking at myself but staring straight through. At nothing. At everything—at a blur of angry, resentful past and terrifying, uncertain futures. So much of the past had been awash in regret and bitterness, and what was it all for? I thought my problems before were bad, but this . . . What was the point of surviving if everyone else was dead?

  It hurt to think about it. My head, my body . . . everything ached from crying and, well, whatever happened with Thomas. I stared at my hands, feeling the burn beneath my skin. It was liberating without the gloves, but dangerous.

  Mind throbbing, I dug through my bag for the emergency ibuprofen stash in my coin purse. I laughed silently to myself. Emergency was a word for it. I unlatched the coin purse and fingered through a few coins clinking around, but I didn’t feel the pills. “Dammit . . .”

  I leaned down and closer to the light to see inside. I’d taken them already, I remembered. I’d needed them after Thomas slammed me onto the wood floor. “Shit,” I hissed. I was close to throwing the coin purse across the room when a beige piece of paper in the purse pocket caught my eye. It was Jenny’s riddle. I’d forgotten about it until now.

  What people said about twins was true. Even if Jenny and I were never close, there was a connection between us I couldn’t easily explain. I knew when something was wrong, even without her telling me, just like I knew it was from her the day I received it with no return address, before I even opened it.

  I unfolded the discolored corners and read the words that had made no sense. The sound of silence will set you free. In the silence there I’ll be. Jenny had never been sentimental, so I knew it was a song lyric or a riddle she wanted me to figure out.

  “So, the note you sent, is it a riddle I’m supposed to figure out or something?”

  She laughed, but it wasn’t with humor. “Yes. Have you?”

  “Have I what?”

  “Figured it out yet?”

  “The quiet will liberate me? Is that a threat? Maybe morbid song lyrics.”

  “Keep it until you figure it out, okay?”

  “We’re not nine anymore, Jenny. I don’t have time for riddles—”

  “Don’t throw it away, Eleanor.” Her sharp tone wasn’t entirely surprising. She was the dramatic of the two of us; always had been. But there was a tinge of panic in it I hadn’t expected.

  “Why not?”

  “Because, Elle, just don’t. Figure it out first—promise me.” For all of her theatrics, I was always the gullible one, and even though I knew she was probably playing with me, there was still a peak of uncertainty I couldn’t shake.

  “What if I don’t want to play?” I asked. It was our first year of college, me at a JC while she miraculously got into a University in Anchorage. With what money I didn’t know. Dr. John had cut her off the day she ran away.

  “Elle, please. Just . . . keep it, okay? At least until you figure it out.”

  “What if I never figure it out?”

  “Then keep it forever,” she said.

  I stared at the words, churning them over in my mind. I’d do some Googling later and play her game. “Fine,” I agreed. “But if it’s something stupid or some prank, I swear I’m sending you a box of dead spiders in the mail, and you’ll never know when it’s coming.” Jen hated spiders, she sobbed whenever there was one in her room when we were little, dead or alive.

  “Okay,” she said easily, which meant it must’ve been a good riddle if she would risk my wrath.

  I’d never figured the riddle out. I’d put it in my purse that day, got too busy with flunking school, and eventually forgot about it.

  The floor creaked in the adjacent room and I stilled.

  “Elle?” Sophie’s voice was soft and hesitant in the living room.

  “Yeah,” I said, pulling my sleeve down and wiping my nose.

  “Can you come here for a sec? There’s something you should see.”

  I ran my fingers through my loose hair, resigned to look like hell since I was living in it. “Ugh, yeah. Give me a sec.”

  “Okay.” I heard Sophie’s retreating footsteps and let out a breath. What the hell was I going to do now? What about Sophie? I couldn’t leave her, but I couldn’t stay here either. Like staring at my reflection would produce answers. It was the first time I’d bothered looking in a mirror in, well, I wasn’t sure how long. Day, night—it all blurred together. Incoherent, chaotic moments that bled from one memory to the next.

  My eyes weren’t just green, but looked sickly, red-rimmed, and swollen. The shadows beneath them making my cheeks hollow. When was the last time I’d eaten anything?

  Clearing my throat, I grabbed a rubber band from my purse and tossed my hair up, then turned on the faucet. I didn’t wait for it to get warm; I didn’t want it to get warm. I reveled in the chills that rose on my arms and neck as I splashed cold water on my face; the jolt I needed to pull myself together for a while longer.

  After my face was dry, and I pulled my gloves over my deadly fingers, I abandoned my things in the bathroom for the time being and headed for the front of the apartmen
t. Unlike some of the building’s hallways and floor levels, Jenny’s place didn’t reek of death or decay. One of a few things I was thankful for.

  I didn’t bother closing the door behind me as I walked to Sophie’s apartment. There was no one left, but us. I thought.

  I stopped in her open doorway and stared at three new faces.

  A small boy and a girl, maybe six and nine years old, sat on the couch. Their pajamas were filthy. Sophie handed them both a glass of water which they happily accepted.

  Another kid, a teenage boy of Latin decent, with dark hair and features, crouched over a tablet in the recliner, frontward on the edge of the seat, his fingers frantically tapping on the screen.

  There were other survivors.

  A weight lifted, one I’d grown so used to bearing, and I felt lighter, and the world didn’t feel so lonely. If there were five of us, there were likely others.

  “Hello,” I whispered, leaning against the doorjamb.

  Four sets of eyes shifted to me.

  “I’m Elle.”

  The little girl blinked at me, curiosity lifting her brow. Her hair was a rumpled mess, and her eyes were red and lashes damp, like she’d been crying. The brother, I guessed, older and less curious, studied me, distrusting.

  “This is Alex,” Sophie said, nodding to the teenager. He didn’t bother looking up from the tablet this time as he swiped maniacally at the screen. “He’s in my class,” she explained. “And this is Beau and Thea.”

  I had a dozen questions to ask them, but as the little girl sat there shaking, I knew it wasn’t the right time, so I stuck with one question only. “You all know each other then?”

  Thea shook her head as Sophie tucked a blanket around her. “He found us,” she said, and the questions continued to swirl.

  “Found you?” I asked calmly.

  Thea’s head bobbed then she slurped down half a glass of water, licking her lips when she finished and catching her breath.

  “Are you hungry?” Sophie asked. “I have cheese and crackers.”