I had been snowed-in at my grandad’s cabin for over a week, and I was bored. Sure, it snowed in the city, but not like this. Even the animals couldn’t stand to be around here this time of the year. It was the silence, the nothingness, that I couldn’t get over. No games, no TV, and, worst of all: no girls.
I took my daily walk. It was one of the only things I had to look forward to. The snow crunched underneath my feet. I leapt and snapped an icicle off one of the barren oak tree’s skeleton arms. A mini avalanche of snow crashed on me. I dusted off my raw, red cheeks and kept going. How anyone could live like this, I didn’t know.
The lake was frozen during this time of the year. I took my glove off and selected a suitably smooth stone. It skipped across that cold, shiny mirror and I heard the sound of splintering ice faintly echo off the surrounding hills. Grandad always said that hollow, foreboding sound was Niles being restless during his hibernation. You see, Niles, our local seamonster, was the brother of Nessie over in Scotland.
Since I had just turned thirteen, I considered myself too old to believe in those stories. Although, when I was little, Grandad said that if I ever stepped foot on the ice, Niles would burst through and eat me in one bite.
I picked up a larger rock and slammed it down. Nothing happened. It was thick and impenetrable as I suspected. I put one foot down then another. Soon, I was skating around freely without a care in that boring world. I could see the stony bottom of the lake through the crystalline ice. The chilly winter sunlight was scattered across it like a kaleidoscope. It was amazing.
Then the hollow, crackling sound returned. Several feet away, a plume of water broke through the ice and exploded into the sky. Lightning bolts of ice shattered in every direction around me.
It was Niles coming to get me. It had to be.
I set my sights on my grandfather’s cabin. It was the lone red dot nestled underneath the distant gray sky. I ran and, with each step, the ice gave out from underneath me. I turned only once and saw the horrific jaws of death threatening to consume me.
I approached the shore and leapt forward with everything I had left. I thudded onto the ice a few feet short of safety and bit my tongue. Blood dripped onto the thin shoreside ice before it broke and I was plunged into the water. I tried to swim towards the surface, but was trapped by the invisible frozen membrane threatening to suffocate me. The winter sun grew darker as I slipped deeper into the water.
As my eyes drifted shut, I felt something grab my collar. I was roughly thrust upwards and into the air.
I gasped for air and wiped the water from my eyes. Instead of seeing a sharp toothed maw, I saw my grandfather. I had never been happier to see his wrinkled smile.
With an auger in one hand and me in the other, Grandad walked us back to the cabin.
I dried out by the furnace and listened to the fire crackle. I looked through the frosted window and thought that the animals must be comfortably asleep underneath that comfy blanket of snow. Wisps of sweet smelling tobacco puffed from my Grandad’s pipe. He stoked the fire and put another cover on me. I loved it; the quiet, the warmth, the love.
The nothingness.
Millerwiller 