by Susanne Beck
The payback list was getting longer.
* * *
I awoke to bright sunshine streaming through the window, putting a smile on my face before I even opened my eyes. The bed was empty and I spared a brief moment of wondering if the events of the night before had been just a dream when Ice’s scent came to me from the pillow I’d cradled in lieu of her body.
My smile broadened as I treated myself to a healthy stretch, my muscles complaining only mildly over having shared sleeping quarters with a woman half again my size. The rest of me was just a happy puddle.
The tantalizing smells of breakfast cooking wafted gently into my awakening senses and I rolled over onto my back, finally thinking to open my eyes and take in the newly dawning day.
Well, perhaps dawning wasn’t the best word for it. From the looks of things, the sun had been up for a good while, rising slowly in the sky as I slept on, blissfully unaware.
That thought gave me a moment’s pause. For more than five years, I’d awoken at five thirty every morning to the sounds of guards’ shouts, bells ringing, and batons sliding against metal bars. The habit was so ingrained within me that even after I’d left the Bog for good, not a morning had passed where I hadn’t awoken in the dark, coming to my feet before my body even realized that my mind had given it a command.
Until today.
"Well, whadda ya know," I said to the patiently waiting ceiling. "Maybe there’s hope for me yet, huh?"
After another healthy stretch and a good, long yawn, I rolled out of bed and briefly debated pulling some clothes on. Tossing out that thought like yesterday’s bathwater, I shrugged into Ruby’s comfortable robe and padded silently through the room, reaching out to touch a tiny figurine of a unicorn that had always enchanted me as a child. "For luck," I whispered before opening the door and letting myself out of the room, which in itself was a wonderful feeling, let me tell you.
I walked quickly down the stairs, the scents of breakfast leading me on like those smoky fingers you see on Saturday morning cartoons hooked through some character’s nostrils.
Ruby turned from her place at the stove as she spied me coming into the kitchen. A wide smile of welcome creased her almost unlined face. "I thought this might tempt you into waking up. Good to see I haven’t lost my touch."
"Oh, you most definitely haven’t," I replied, walking over to help her with the plates.
"Just sit yourself down at the table, Tyler. I’ve got this all taken care of."
"Are you sure?"
"Positive. Just go sit down."
Resisting the urge to snap off a salute, I pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. Within seconds, a steaming plate piled high with food was placed in front of me. My mouth watering, I dug in without a second’s pause.
Ruby joined me at the table, cupping a coffee mug in her hands and taking small sips from it as she smiled at my talent for laying waste to vast armies of food, a trait I’d had since I was a small child. "Your friend is certainly the industrious sort."
My fork paused halfway to my mouth. I shot her a questioning look, wondering whether I had cause to be nervous or not.
She gestured with her coffee mug toward the kitchen window, and I found myself slowly rising to my feet, curiosity pulling at me like a fish lure.
"Wow," was all I could say as I looked down at the scene laid out before me. The walk had been shoveled and salted, as had the long, winding driveway that led out to the main road. Snow drifts which had covered the first floor windows were completely cleared away, down to the grass. Trees near the house which had almost been bent double with the weight of the snow now were free of their chilly burden and standing straight and proud once again. "Unbelievable." My breath fogged the window as I spoke, misting the icy clarity of the incredible scene outside.
"I agree. Is she always like this?"
Turning back toward the table, I gave my host a smile. "Pretty much, yeah."
"Quite handy to have around then, I’d say. Where did you meet her?"
I paused again, my thoughts running rapidly, if uselessly, through my brain. "It’s a long story."
Which it was. Five years long, to be exact. Just not a story I was comfortable telling to the woman who was housing us, for obvious reasons.
The smile she gave me brought to mind pictures of dinosaurs I’d seen in textbooks when I was in school. A predator’s grin, full of slashing teeth, topped by beady brown eyes.
Or maybe it was the way the light hit her face.
"I’m an old woman, Tyler. Time is one thing I have plenty of."
Strike one.
I smiled, weakly. "You’re not that old."
The grin widened, recognizing, no doubt, my pitiful delaying tactic. "Old enough."
Strike two!
I took in a deep breath, the breakfast I’d consumed sitting like a leaden ball in my stomach. My fingers were pressed white against the polished wood of the table top.
As I opened my mouth to speak, there was a brisk rapping on the front door, followed by a "Yoo hoo! Ruby! Are you home, dear?"
Yes!
As Ruby slowly moved to her feet, the look she gave me let me know in no uncertain terms that this conversation was far from being over.
Oh, well. I’d take a rain delay any day.
* * *
I walked outside, feeling the warmth of the sun on my face and smiling into the perfect blue sky. The snow the night before seemed a sort of harbinger of spring and the temperature rose to lend strength to my supposition. The air was filled with the sounds of overburdened trees and rooftops dropping their heavy loads to the ground. Birdsong wove its way intermittently through the low percussion of the falling mounds of snow, and when I looked up, I spied a sizable flock of ducks circling the lake and looking for a nice, wet place to land.
My grin broadened as I walked down the shoveled path, my boots crunching the salt beneath my feet. It was a glorious day. The kind that made you believe in God, if you didn’t already. And right then, I most certainly did.
Looking down the small hill that led to the lake, I saw Ice standing on the little green dock on our beach, looking out over the frozen water, her dark hair blown off her brow by a gentle spring breeze. Her posture was attentive, alert, but relaxed in a way I didn’t often get to see.
I stopped, taken by the sight.
At that moment, I wished I were a painter so I could capture the beauty of what my eyes were seeing.
Because I wasn’t, and still am not, I settled for a long, comfortable stare, capturing in my mind what my hands refused to render.
As if feeling my eyes upon her, she turned and her welcoming smile brightened up an already fabulous day. She lifted a hand in a casual wave. I waved back and resumed my trek toward her, stepping carefully around the shoveled square that had brought back to the surface the foundation of what had once been the cabin.
Quickly joining her on the dock, I slipped an arm around her waist and leaned into her body as I, too, looked across the frozen expanse of the lake, watching as the ducks finally found a patch of melted ice in which to land. "Beautiful day," I murmured quietly, unwilling to break the peaceful silence with too much idle chatter.
"Mm."
We stood there in companionable silence, enjoying each other and the day, for quite awhile before my attention was captured by a young boy and his dog who were coming toward us from the right. The boy threw a stick, and the dog, with a volley of barks that echoed across the lake, ran to retrieve it.
His attention was diverted, apparently, by the ducks which, alarmed by his barks, rose to take flight and he headed out after them, his paws slipping on the ice.
"King!" the boy shouted, running after his fleeing dog, "Come back!" His feet slipped on the slick surface and he fell, hitting his head a good one against the ice, but he was quickly back up and running again.
Suddenly, I heard a loud crack and the ice opened up to swallow the scrambling dog, who yelped and tried desperately to get back up out of the water.<
br />
Seeing what had happened, the boy tried to stop, but the ice’s slickness, combined with his forward momentum, caused him to follow his friend into the water’s icy depths.
Ice was out of my arms and running before I even thought to blink. "Ice! No!" Like the dog’s yelps, and the boy’s screams, my words echoed over the lake, damning me repeatedly with their sheer impotence.
Her feet were slipping and sliding in the worn boots she’d donned, but she managed to keep her footing and continue forward, ignoring my cry. "Get help!" she shouted, not even looking at me as she headed for the hole in the ice which had claimed two victims in a moment’s short time.
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t respond to her tersely voiced order. My body condemned me to stand and watch as the boy’s head disappeared beneath the ice and my lover, not hesitating for even a second, gathered up her strength and dove into the water.
"Ice!!"
My rebellious body moved quickly then, though still not in the direction my partner had ordered. I was out on the ice before my feet even realized it, which caused me to fall after a single step. My head hit hard against the edge of the dock, causing stars to float tantalizingly before my eyes as I lay dazed for a moment, staring up into the sky and wondering what my name was.
It came back to me in a flash, though, and I tried to regain my footing, only to fall once again. "Damnit!! Ice!!!"
A strong hand hauled me back to my feet and pulled me easily onto the dock. I spun to take in the heavily bearded face of a large man who was looking at me with wide eyes. "What happened?"
Shaking my head, I tried to jerk from his grasp, my need to get out on that lake paramount. But he held me easily in his grip, shaking me as one would a rag doll. "What happened?" he asked again.
"A dog ...a boy ...chased the dog into the water! My friend went to help. Let me go!!"
"No! It’s too dangerous. You can’t go out there."
"Like hell I can’t!" Raising my leg, I stamped down hard on his foot, wrenching away at the same time. I would have toppled back onto the ice for a second time if he hadn’t reached out and grabbed me, pulling me to him once again.
"Listen to me. People are coming to help. People who are used to this kind of thing. You need to stay here. You’ll only get in the way. Do you understand?" He spoke to me as if speaking to an infant, his words slow and clearly enunciated.
"You don’t understand! That’s my friend out there! She needs help!!"
"And that’s exactly what she’s gonna get. Now just stay here and let us do our jobs, alright?"
After a moment, I relaxed and nodded, convinced by the sincerity in both his voice and eyes.
He smiled. "Good."
Releasing me, he turned his head, and I followed his gaze to where a group of men were hurrying down the small hill and onto the ice, armed with hooks and nylon ropes, looking for all the world like an army of industrious ants after a discarded candy wrapper.
"Where’d they all come from so quickly?" I asked, not aware I was speaking aloud until the man turned his smile back on me.
"Well, you hear a dog yelp, a boy scream, and a woman yell ‘ice’, and you get the picture pretty quick, Ma’am."
The mention of my lover’s name, though not intended, caused my attention to snap back to the lake and its unfolding drama. I could just see Ice’s dark head bobbing above the tilted sheets of ice which had fractured even more with the struggling of three living beings trapped within its confines. I could also see, and hear, the crazed struggling of the dog, but of the boy, there was nothing.
Ice took in a deep breath, and then she too disappeared into the black and hungry water.
Everything went silent then. Or at least it seemed that way to me. I found myself holding my breath in empathy with Ice until spots swirling before my eyes threatened to merge together into unconsciousness.
Gasping, I took in a fresh breath of air, then blinked.
Only the dog could be seen, paddling in useless circles in the ever widening pool, obviously too cold and too tired to even try to get a purchase on the ice surrounding him.
It’s been too long. Too long. Too long.
My mind replayed this endless litany like a mantra that, instead of soothing, forced adrenaline and hopelessness through my body in equal measures.
I had just made up my mind to bolt off the dock yet again when Ice resurfaced, the small boy clenched tightly against her chest. Gasping for air, she flung her head back and opened her mouth to the sky, her hair slinging rainbow sheets into the warm, moist air. Her choking gasps were the only sounds I could hear above the joyful beating of my heart at the sight of her, alive and whole.
With a mighty heave worthy of a Titan, she threw the boy onto the firmer section of the ice. He slid several feet before stopping, a rag doll at Nature’s cruel mercy. His skin was marbled purple and pasty white, his lips and the flesh around them a sullen blue, and I imagined, were I to touch him, that he would feel the way he looked, a marble statue tossed aside by a forsaken god.
Beneath his drenched parka, his chest was still and lifeless.
The group of men crept forward on tentative legs, one reaching out with a large grappling hook and snaring his jacket, tugging the lifeless boy slowly, carefully, back toward the shore.
Another splash. Another body hitting the ice.
This time, it was the dog who’d started the entire chain reaction, and of the three victims the water had captured in its gaping maw, only he looked none the worse for wear. Scrambling to his feet, he shook the water briskly from his fur, and after a moment of stumbling, trotted back toward the shoreline, seemingly without a care in the world. Another rescuer grabbed the dog and bundled him in a warm blanket.
All that was left in the middle of the half-frozen lake was my lover.
The sounds of sirens in the distance were unimportant things to me as I watched Ice try for purchase on the twisted blocks surrounding her. I could see her steady herself and take a few deep breaths for strength. My entire body clenched, a coiled spring, as I willed my strength to her from across the lake, my jaw clenched so hard I swore I could feel pieces of my teeth chipping away.
With a last, deep breath, she straightened her arms, her powerful strength managing to drag her body half out of the water and onto the ice. Her legs still dangled in the murky depths, kicking hard to give her the momentum needed to pull out fully.
The force was apparently too much for the still weakening ice to bear, and it split once again, sending a wide fissure almost to the shore and dumping my partner back into the freezing water.
When her body disappeared completely beneath the water, my paralysis broke and, without thinking, I ran out onto the ice, using my arms the way a tight-rope walker would, keeping my balance only by the strength of my will.
And where Ice was concerned, my will was pure steel.
Unfortunately, will doesn’t count for much when you’re tackled from behind by a bearded behemoth who’s twice as strong as you’ll ever dream of being.
I hit the ground hard enough to force the air from my lungs in a coughing bark, and the stars that had faded from my last meeting with the dock’s splintered edge came back with a vengeance, swirling around me like multicolored fireflies.
I was hooked under the arms and unceremoniously dragged back toward the shore, my jacket and shirt rucking up around my shoulders, the ice burning my bare flesh as it slid beneath me.
The shouts of the men combined with the swiftly approaching sirens, both sounds helping to clear my head. I struggled to sit up, turning my head just in time to see a yellow nylon rope, a large loop knotted at one end, sail toward the hole where Ice had fallen.
The second fall through the ice had profoundly affected my lover, as I could tell by the slow, almost clumsy movements of her arms as she tried to reach out and grab the rope so close to her.
"Slip it over your head and under your arms!" one of the men yelled as another tied the other end off around a stout t
ree which hung out over the water like a flightless vulture.
I could see her dark head nod as she tried to follow her rescuer’s instructions, fumbling several times with the rope before finally getting it under her arms.
"Hold on! We’re gonna pull you out!"
She nodded again, trying to get a firm grip on the narrow rope with hands, I was sure, that were numb past the point of feeling anything but pain, if even that.
"One! Two! Three!" Several men stood on the ice, the rope firmly clenched in their gloved hands. On the final count, they pulled, snapping the rope taut and slowly dragging Ice up out of the water, their grunts combining with the ice’s moaning protests at having to give up its feast and filling the air in a primal symphony.
Something happened, and to this day I don’t know what, but she suddenly stopped helping and fell limp against the ice, her body half in, half out of the water. The men, still pulling, dragged her a few scant inches before her arms slipped upwards and the rope pulled away completely, leaving her stranded once again; this time totally unable to help free herself from the icy prison trapping her.
"Ice!" I screamed, trying desperately to get some reaction from her. My heart shattered into splintered fragments as the ice beneath her moaned threateningly and her body teetered on the edge of oblivion.
.
She lay there, limp and unheeding. My mind flashed back to another time, another place. Kneeling over her, holding her life in my hands as her blood pumped between my fingers in a red river. Begging anyone who would listen to help her; to save her.
No. Not again. Please, not again. Please. I can’t go through this again.
Realizing what had happened, one of the men, throwing all caution to the wind, grabbed a long hook and ran out onto the ice with surefooted grace, straddling the fissure that was threatening to become wider as he ran.
My sigh of relief came out in a wail as he managed to hook the back of her sodden jacket and carefully pulled her away from the immediate danger. He pulled her to him, then dropped the hook and grabbed her under the arms, much as my own rescuer had grabbed me, and carefully pulled her to the safety of the shore.
