Snow Blind-J Collins 4 by Lori G. Armstrong Page A

neither the generator nor the backup would kick on.
    Vaguely I remembered hearing someone say my dad didn’t keep his equipment in top-notch condition, but I didn’t ask questions. At least we still had the woodstove in the living room as a source of heat.
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    Dad tracked down a couple of flashlights and I lit the way as he shoveled a path to the woodpile. We hauled the split logs and stacked them on the porch. I tripped with an armload full of firewood, and a chunk of wood sliced me under the chin, slammed into my rib cage, and bounced off my shin.
    My toes and face were cold, yet everywhere else I sweated like a pig. After I filled the wood box, I returned to my truck. Keeping the window cracked, I lit a cigarette and flipped open my cell phone to call Martinez. Completely dead. Not good. No one besides Trish and Brittney knew where I was.
    I’d worry about dealing with Martinez later, since I had a more pressing problem to deal with right now: being stuck alone with my father.
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    Dad stoked the fire. Following his lead, I’d taken off the coveralls and the rest of my borrowed outerwear in the small entryway. Sweat plastered my clothes to my body and I wanted a shower something fierce. But no electricity meant no hot water. Yippee.
    A cold sponge bath.
    My stomach rumbled. I hadn’t eaten all damn day. I suspected Dad hadn’t either. I was too tired to pull any of that feminist a-man’s-capable-of-making-his-own-meal crap. He’d started the fire; I could rustle up dinner.
    I rummaged in Trish’s kitchen, finding roast beef, ham, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, spicy German mus-tard, everything to make hearty sandwiches. I added a slice of homemade apple pie, and a side of canned peaches. By the time I brought Dad a plate, he’d fallen 111

    asleep by the fire. No reason to wake him. Wasn’t like the food would get cold.
    Plus, I’d rather listen to him snore than listen to him talk.
    After I ate, I set my head on the table and closed my eyes.
    I dreamed. Wind howled and snow gusted through the cracks in the settler’s cabin, an abandoned shack where I’d seen horrific things. A location my mind returned to again and again whenever I was stressed out. Snowdrifts covered the windows. My gaze tracked the ghostly snow snakes slithering across the dirty plank floor. They dissipated upon reaching the discarded bodies.
    I couldn’t escape the vision of those bodies, even in my sleep.
    Bodies once full of life, once smooth flesh plumped with blood, were deflated like forgotten balloons. Dried husks of skin and brittle bones, a human powder that would blow out through the cracks of the shack like earth’s dust had blown in.
    A baby cried. The wind shifted tones, masking the mournful wail. But I knew that sound. Was that my baby? I saw the manger in the corner and ran. Before I reached the brown box where a bloody chained hoof waved at me, the roof split open. Mountains of snow crashed through the gaping hole, sleet stung my face, flash-freezing my eyeballs. I tried to scream, but the snow funneled into my open mouth like a white 112

    tornado. Spinning, filling me with coldness, first my toes, then my legs, packing my womb with ice, distending my gut, coating my throat with frost until I couldn’t breathe.
    The clank screech of the woodstove’s iron door jolted me awake.
    Whoo-ee. Talk about a nightmare. Not the bloody carnage and Old West shoot-out variety I’d recently had, but bad enough.
    Thud thud sounded as Dad tossed two split logs into the black-bellied stove and slammed the door.
    Both sandwiches I’d made him were gone. He’d shoved the empty dishes to the center of the table. I imagined he’d expect I’d clear them. I imagined I would do it despite not wanting to.
    I wondered how long I’d been asleep and I scooted my chair closer to the fire. Molten red embers glowed through the ventilation holes at the base of the stove.
    Hot air streamed out as the dry wood crackled and popped. There was