oOo

1

There are birds overhead; gulls. They've winged their way up the estuary, driven by the harsh winds and constant hunger this season brings. Not for the first time, Rodney marvels at their effortless flight.

A voice says "I'm glad you brought me here."

There's a warm head resting on his shoulder. Jennifer wears a knee-length tan parka with a fur-lined hood. The hood is down, though; she has a bright red band around her head which snugly covers her ears. Her hands are protected from the chill December winds by matching padded mitts, the kind that school-kids wear. Rodney remembers having a pair just like them, and he smiles to himself.

It's a perfect winter day. Snow is crisp under their boots. The air, sharply cold and dry, with that same faint tang of pine from every Christmas he can remember. The river lies before them... wide, white and still, framed by pine forest on each side, and blue, misted mountains in the distance. He feels the occasional tingle of snow melting on his lips.

Next to him is the woman he loves, and he can't remember ever feeling so complete.

"Put up your collar, Rodney, you'll catch your death!" scolds Jennifer as she raises her head and reaches over, trying clumsily to turn up the inadequate collar of his overcoat.

"My mother used to say that..." he laughs.

"She did....? You think about her often, don't you?" Jennifer's voice seems to fall flat in the dry air.

He just says, "Mmm...." and his mind goes back to winters of years ago. Taking family walks along snow-covered trails very much like this one.

An unexpected gust of icy wind takes his breath for an instant and he clears his throat and chest noisily.

"How's the cough?" asks Jennifer, and she gives his arm a sympathetic squeeze. One of the joys of the season, thinks Rodney ruefully... a nice little head cold.

"Need a chest rub?" she asks, cheekily. She has hold of his arm now and peeps up at him, eyes sparkling. She leans heavily against him, and he is surprised at how keenly he feels the weight.

He doesn't answer her question because he coughs again, deeper than before. He feels colder now, like a lump of ice has settled in beneath his ribs.

A shiver catches him by surprise. Drawing his eyes away from his companion, he watches as, in the distance, spidery figures take to the ice carrying what can only be fishing gear. Poles, augers, buckets and wooden trunks. Rodney thinks again of the hungry gulls, and as if on cue they appear, wheeling down to harangue the fishermen who, intent on their mission, pay the birds no heed.

He's been ice-fishing before, of course, along the frozen shallows of the St Lawrence. Six boys crammed into a steaming ice-shack, huddled around a single hole. Catching just enough for one each, he remembers his mother's face, beaming with pride when, in triumph, he brings home his first northern pike.

So long ago now, but he feels an almost irresistible urge to join these men.... to re-live those days. He could do it... he could...

"Should we go back?" he asks suddenly, instantly unsure what he means by it.

The trail has led them a winding route and they are at the edge of the water now. Or at least the edge of the ice. Here the snow has taken no hold, and the ice is bare for the most part.

Squinting down past the tip of his boot, Rodney sees the depth of the frozen layer and the water bubbling and flowing beneath. Only a step farther and they would be standing in the river. He tries to remember its name.

He looks up sharply.

The trees... the river... the mountains... the jut of land on the far bank... his eyes flit from feature to feature, and then all at once he wonders...

... where am I?

At first the ice-bound river had felt familiar, now he realises it's unknown to him. The dark-coated fishermen move ever more slowly across the ice, until they seem to freeze into the landscape of which they are a part. To Rodney they look now like nothing more than smudges of paint on a canvas. Even the trees that tower above him on both sides have begun to drip out their colours like a child's painting.

"Jennifer?" he half whispers, half speaks, but she doesn't answer. Her face is in profile against the snow-heavy sky, and her hair streams like banners behind her.

He turns his face into the wind, wanting its icy edge to clear his mind. But somehow it's stagnant air that he breathes, strangely warm and cloying. It settles like a cold sweat on his brow.

He feels Jennifer's arm on his and, desperate with a new sense of foreboding, he twists his glove-covered hand and finds hers. He squeezes, but it is as if her hand diminishes... feels hardly there at all. He brings their joined hands up and stares. She is here.. next to him... her hand is in his. But still he feels nothing.... nothing but a dull pulse of life deep within his cold chest, drawing him further into himself and away from her.

Fear washes over him like a wave. He tries to call out but nothing can match the strident calls of the gulls, and he is shouting into a vacuum, where there is no sound and no air to sustain him.

Colours merge and run together, so very bright and so very green. He watches, detached, as the sky slides down and mingles with the green light that seems to be all around.

Snow is falling steadily now, and curiously it matches the white noise that fills his head. Afraid that he is suffocating, he struggles to draw breath.

"Breathe.... come on.... "

Someone has spoken; patiently... whisper-quiet...

He thinks, Jennifer? ...s'at you?

oOo

TBC and thanks for reading!