14 Degrees Below Zero

by Quinton Skinner

  Bob folded his arms and looked at the grass.

  “Something bad happened,” Stephen said. “Something so bad that I’ve been trying to forget it.”

  “Story of my life,” Bob chuckled.

  “Don’t be a wiseass,” Anna told him.

  “You have to find Lewis,” Stephen blurted out. “He’s looking for you.”

  “I know.” Anna sighed. “He’ll find me when he’s ready, I suppose. It hasn’t been easy, waiting for him.”

  “That’s your husband you’re talking about?” Bob asked.

  “One and the same,” Anna replied.

  “Too bad,” Bob said with a flattering smile.

  “All right, I’m going to forgive you for being obnoxious,” Anna said. “Wait until I tell Lewis you flirted with me. His head will explode.”

  “I have that effect sometimes,” Bob replied.

  Now they were someplace else, as flat as before, but snow-covered and icy. The wind blew chill, but Stephen didn’t feel cold. The landscape was deserted, and big clumps of snow fell lazily from the sky.

  Bob frowned. “Looks familiar,” he said.

  “You’re getting closer,” Anna enthused.

  “Closer to what?” Stephen asked. “Waking up?”

  “Sort of.” Anna moved behind him and put her hands over his eyes. “Try to remember sort of sideways.”

  “This is getting interesting,” Bob observed.

  “There was a path, it was snowing,” Stephen said. “And then Lewis was there.”

  “That’s a start,” Anna said impatiently. “Remember more.”

  Stephen removed Anna’s hands from his eyes. Bob was kicking at a chunk of ice with his pointed cowboy boots.

  “Mr. Dylan?” Stephen asked.

  Bob winced. “You did not just call me that.”

  “Do you know what she’s talking about?” asked Stephen.

  Bob moved the snow around with his boot, seeming to take in Stephen’s question in degrees.

  “I got sick a few years back,” he said. “Thought I might die. The pain was terrible.”

  “What happened?” Stephen asked.

  “I thought I was going to meet Elvis,” Bob said, his eyes turning wistful at the memory. “Not that I’m on a level with Elvis, but that’s just the way it was. I knew the pain had to end one way or the other. I was going in either direction.”

  “What are you trying to say?” Stephen asked. “What does that mean?”

  Bob shrugged. “Hey, man, this is your dream. Who knows where I’m going when you wake up?”

  “Wake up,” Anna said.

  “You look so much like Jay,” Stephen observed.

  “She has a daughter?” Bob asked.

  “Don’t,” Stephen said.

  Bob chuckled.

  “No more dreams,” Anna told him.

  “I can’t stand too many more,” Stephen said sadly. “Anna, I’m so tired.”

  “That’s the way it gets,” Bob told him.

  “You can make it stop,” Anna said.

  “It’s about time to go,” Bob agreed. “There’s nothin’ going on around here.”

  Stephen stepped into the wind, leaving Bob and Anna in the snow, and he walked with his eyes closed. He struggled through a dark space, stumbling and afraid, and then came to a painful awareness of his body. When he opened his eyes, he was in a room with his parents. He blinked and saw Jay moving toward him—she was wearing her coat and hat, as though she had just arrived.

  “Lewis,” he whispered. “It was Lewis.”

  Jay kissed him on his forehead, deep and tender, then took his hand.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “Don’t go.”

  “I have to,” Jay said. “He has Ramona.”

  “She’s not safe,” Stephen said.

  Jay just looked at him, then she nodded.

  Stephen looked at his parents, who were teary and distraught, then back to Jay. Even in his state he longed for her.

  “Then go,” he whispered. “Go get your little girl.”

  He closed his eyes, felt his parents’ touch, and knew that Jay was lost to him forever.

  25. HAPPY TO HAVE EVEN TRANSITORY COMPANY.

  Lewis spent another night in a motel with Ramona and Carew, perhaps seventy-five miles from their lodgings of the night before. The cold snap had locked in, and sunrise saw the advent of stiff winds that whipped the snow into near-blizzard conditions. They set off in search of breakfast with the car buffeted by gusts, and with few other vehicles braving the southern Minnesota roads. The prospect of driving far enough to escape the weather seemed impossible.

  “How’re you guys back there?” Lewis asked of the backseat, trying to keep his voice chipper. “Hungry for breakfast?”

  “Sure!” Ramona shouted, with her own version of false enthusiasm.

  Lewis glanced in the mirror. Ramona and Carew were huddled in a sleepy ball. The dog had his big head pressed into Ramona’s belly, and the girl was stroking his ears.

  He wished he could reach out to the sky and peel it back, because surely underneath he would find Anna. She had revealed herself to him in brief flashes, she had spoken to him. But how was he to search for her when he had no idea what she had become? She wasn’t a ghost, he knew that. He was looking for her.

  Where?

  “Ramona, honey?” he said.

  “What?” she said from behind him.

  “Remember when you saw Grandma Anna?”

  “Sure!”

  “She didn’t say anything to you?”

  “No, she just smiled,” Ramona said. “She was so pretty!”

  “It would make her happy to hear you say that,” Lewis told her. “But honey, I need you to think. If you had to guess, where would you say Grandma Anna is right now?”

  There was silence from the backseat. Lewis looked back and saw his granddaughter lost in thought.

  “I don’t know,” she finally said. “Heaven?”

  She was obviously searching for the right answer, the one that would earn Lewis’s approval.

  “What do you really think?” he said after a pause.

  No answer. Lewis steered carefully on the two-lane road, its edges obscured by drifting snow. If he lost concentration, he knew, they would end up in a ditch.

  “Honey?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” Ramona said in an odd voice. “It’s like she’s here already. It’s like she’s everywhere but I can’t quite see her.”

  Lewis knew exactly what she meant. It was as though if he listened hard enough, he would hear her voice. He squinted into the stark whiteness that surrounded them, sensing her close by. Anna was so close, like an oasis just over the next rise of the desert in which he now lived.

  Ramona was worried about Grampa. He didn’t seem like himself. And she knew they shouldn’t be out, driving and driving, without at least calling Mama and letting her know where they were.

  It was so important for him to find Grandma. Ramona had figured that, since she saw Grandma at day care, her reappearance in their lives would take place anytime. She hadn’t thought of actually looking for her, but there they were. Grampa was smart, and he always knew what to do. It made her feel kind of excited to think they might find her, maybe that morning. Ramona had doubted, in a way, whether or not she would really see Grandma again. But Grampa Lewis was so sure they would.

  She rubbed Carew’s head while he slowly wagged his tail. Carew would be very excited to see Grandma again. He would probably slobber over her.

  But then an idea occurred to Ramona, one that made her sad: Grampa was going to find Grandma Anna. Ramona didn’t want to go with him. She had to go back to Mama. Mama was looking for her, for Ramona. She didn’t know why she thought this, but she was sure of it. It was like the snow and the morning sun.

  “Grampa?” Ramona said.

  “Yes, dear?”

  “Go there,” she said, pointing at a gas station approaching by the side of the roa
d.

  “Why?” Grampa asked. “Do you have to go to the bathroom?”

  “Maybe?” she said.

  “Maybe?”

  “Yes! Slow down!” she yelled.

  Grampa tapped the brakes and the car skidded and slowed. He said something to himself, kind of mad, and Ramona heard cuss words.

  “Go in there,” Ramona said. “You have to go in there.”

  Jay was on the highway heading south. She had the radio on to an all-news channel, and she gasped when she heard the first mention of Lewis and Jay Ingraham.

  “WMIN has just received confirmation that Lewis Ingraham was involved in a recent assault in Minneapolis,” the announcer said. “Police had no immediate word whether he’s considered dangerous, but he was last seen picking up his granddaughter from a day care center and she hasn’t been seen since.”

  Jay gripped tight the steering wheel and peered into a cloud of snow kicked up by a passing truck. The radio announcer sounded bland and unconcerned—it was the kind of story he’d read countless times, another instance of family life gone bad.

  Hopefully it will turn out for the best, his tone suggested.

  In the summer Lewis, Anna, and Jay used to go to a cabin owned by one of Lewis’s coworkers at American Express—Lewis would take a week off and the three of them would picnic and ride their bicycles in the bucolic countryside, feeling fresh and expansive after escaping the city.

  Jay remembered these roads, and she knew Lewis did as well. Lewis loved familiarity. He might have taken Ramona in this direction.

  A squall of wind pushed her little car and she felt her wheels spin beneath her. She slowed down to sixty. White blanketed everything, and the fresh-plowed road was already covering up with snow.

  “Hold on, baby,” she said through clenched teeth. “I’m coming for you.”

  Strange girl. Lewis pulled up to an empty gas pump—they were down to a quarter tank—and let the engine idle before switching it off. Ramona had said nothing about needing to use the restroom. Now it was apparently urgent that they go into this little minimart.

  It was squat and shaped like a shoe box, just like every other gas-station convenience store for the next thousand miles. There were only a couple of trucks parked in the lot; all around snow-covered farmland stretched out to a horizon blurred by wind-whipped powder.

  “Let’s go,” he said to Ramona, opening the door and taking her hand. He pressed Carew back, promising the dog to bring him a treat.

  The journey from the car to the door was far more difficult than Lewis had anticipated. From the safety of the driver’s seat he hadn’t realized how cutting and severe the winds were; he had to hold Ramona close as he leaned into the squall, his breath fleeing from him in a startled gasp. Ramona was shouting something he couldn’t understand.

  Once they were inside, the door shut behind them and all was peaceful. The clerk looked up from a small TV on the counter and said good morning. Lewis got the bathroom key and led Ramona to the ladies’ facilities, making sure she was alone inside before leaving her to her privacy.

  “Some morning,” the clerk said, startling Lewis.

  Lewis looked up. The clerk was stocky, about his age, and seemed happy to have even transitory company. A pair of truckers were engrossed in conversation by a counter full of coffee and doughnuts.

  “Yes, it is,” Lewis replied. “A hell of a time to be out driving.”

  “That your kid?” the clerk asked, motioning to the restroom.

  “Yes. No, my granddaughter, actually,” Lewis said.

  The clerk was still smiling, but only with his mouth.

  “We were taking a trip to see my . . . my former wife,” Lewis explained.

  “You from the cities?” the clerk asked.

  “You guessed it.” Lewis affected calm.

  Lewis looked down at the newspaper on the counter, folded open to the local news. There was a picture of him next to a photo of Ramona. The headline read:

  MINNEAPOLIS GRANDFATHER, CHILD MISSING:

  ABDUCTION FEARED

  Lewis looked down. Ramona was poking him with the big plastic shingle that secured the restroom key. The clerk’s eyes moved from the newspaper to Ramona, then to Lewis.

  “Well, thanks,” Lewis said. “You have a good day.”

  “Wait a minute,” the clerk said, getting off his stool.

  “No need,” Lewis told him. “Thanks again.”

  He led Ramona back out into the swirling winds, his chest locked tight with panic. Halfway to the car he looked back and saw the clerk waving his newspaper, talking to the truckers and pointing at Lewis. The truckers put down their cups of coffee.

  Lewis got Ramona into the car and crouched next to her. She looked over her shoulder at the men in the store.

  “Are we in trouble?” she asked.

  “No. At least you’re not,” Lewis said. He sighed. “Shit. Ramona, honey, I wasn’t supposed to take you away from your mama.”

  “I know,” Ramona said.

  Lewis blinked in surprise. In the girl’s eyes was an expression of perspicacity that was wholly new. She sat back in her seat, snow clumped to her big pink hat, and held out her arms.

  “Hug,” she said.

  Lewis took her in a long embrace, feeling the contours of her narrow shoulders and the press of her soft cheek against his own. She was a creature of perfection.

  “Come with me,” he told her. “We’re going to find Grandma Anna together. It’s the right thing. It’ll be like old times.”

  Lewis looked over his shoulder. The men were making for the door. Carew moaned with anxiety.

  Ramona was staring into his eyes. She shook her head. He grabbed her hand.

  “Is this good-bye?” he said, not knowing why.

  “She’s out there,” Ramona said, pointing to the field beyond the convenience store, where visibility quickly faded to nothing in the tornado of snow. “Go find her.”

  “I love you, my dear,” Lewis told her.

  “I love you, Grampa,” Ramona said. “Now go.”

  Lewis dropped the car keys next to Ramona and looked back. The three men had just come out of the store, flinching in the wind. Lewis broke into a sprint in the other direction. The men shouted at him, but he had the advantage of surprise. Quickly he was off the concrete and running hard over the furrows of a farm field.

  The angry voices behind him receded quickly as Lewis vanished into the whiteout conditions of the open field. Lewis ran as hard as he could, slipping and sliding, snow stinging his face like needles, his chest burning hard with the threat of an imminent explosion. He knew the clerk would call the police, and that Ramona would be returned safely to Jay. Anyone would be crazy to venture out into these fields in pursuit of Lewis; finally, he was alone.

  He began to call out Anna’s name. A huge gust of wind smacked into his face by way of reply, and he staggered. He could see no more than a few feet in front of him, but he continued to run.

  “Anna, please!” he yelled.

  The wind replied angrily. Lewis ran more, he wasn’t sure how far, maybe a half mile, then passed over a small rise and let himself sink down into the snow on the other side.

  He reached into his coat pocket and upended his pill vial into his mouth. There were about a dozen left, and he crunched them with his teeth and washed them down with a handful of snow. He lay on his back, the cold seeping in through his ankles and neck like a caressing hand.

  It was over, all of it. He felt the pull of exhaustion and, with it, sleep. In somnambulant torpor Lewis rolled over onto his side and hoped that no one found him before his heart stopped. He shivered and felt his pulse race. He unzipped and slipped out of his coat to better embrace what was coming.

  Time passed.

  Lewis rolled over onto his back with what remained of his strength. His ears had grown used to the howl of the wind, and his eyes were nearly frozen shut with icy tears. With what he imagined was one of his final thoughts, he regretted not say
ing good-bye to the dog. No matter. Jay would see to Carew—and herself. They would be fine.

  “Yes, they will,” Anna said.

  Lewis slowly sat up with a groan. Anna was standing on top of the rise, looking as she had when they first met.

  “Took you long enough,” he said.

  “Don’t start,” she frowned. “I could say the same about you.”

  “You look so pretty,” Lewis told her.

  She spread her arms wide and looked at herself. “I was, wasn’t I?”

  She wore only a sleeveless dress.

  “Aren’t you cold?” he asked her. “Look—the snow isn’t sticking to you.”

  She shrugged. “Special dispensation.”

  Anna came down to where he was and sat cross-legged in the snow by his side. She brushed her hair off her forehead and gazed at Lewis with a look of infinite understanding.

  “I’m so sorry,” Lewis said.

  “For what?” she asked.

  “For all of it,” he said, the words coming out in a rush. “For being such a shithead.”

  “Well, we could all say the same,” Anna told him.

  The wind battered his spent frame, and Lewis pulled his arms tight around himself.

  “I think I’m freezing to death here,” he said.

  “Ignore it,” Anna commanded.

  “That’s easy for you to say.”

  Anna laughed, and suddenly she looked as she had in her thirties: her hair lighter and shorter, her clothes plainer, a hint of weariness in her thickening features.

  “I’m also sorry for . . . you know.”

  “What?” Anna asked innocently.

  “For what I did,” Lewis whispered into the wind. “That night.”

  “Oh, that,” Anna said. “Well, it’s important that you remember. But there’s no need to apologize.”

  Lewis flashed back in his mind to Anna’s final night. She had been moaning in pain, begging for release from the cancer that had invaded all parts of her body, the disease that was starving and choking her and turning her reality into an endless barrage of pain.

  He remembered finding the needle that the doctor had given them and loading it carefully with her next dose of morphine. Then, without thinking, he had continued to pull back the plunger until it was entirely full. He had then stuck the needle into her arm and listened to her tortured breathing turn slow and shallow. He had pulled her into his lap like a child, whispering into her ear until the breaths stopped coming.