COREY REDEKOP
There’s a monster outside.
Terry shifts his gaze in Nomi’s direction. The little girl is sitting atop a kitchen chair she managed to drag into the den. Her forehead is pressed up against the bay window, warm breath fogging the glass beneath her nose. From where Terry sits, his daughter’s reflection looks to be sporting a goatee made of steam.
What’s that?
Nomi turns, leaving the fog beard to dissipate behind her. There’s a monster, Daddy. Out there.
Monster, huh? She nods, solemn, as utterly unfeigned as he knows only a six-year-old girl can be. Is it going to cause trouble, kiddo?
Don’t know. Maybe.
What kind of monster?
She lowers her voice, pitched (Terry presumes) so that only the two of them may hear of her discovery. An outside monster.
Terry pushes himself up from the couch, leaving the movie he has been only half paying attention to anyway to continue on without him. He squats next to Nomi, feeling his muscles renew their list of complaints, and peers into the night.
No monsters. Only more of the snow that has transformed the house from cozy domicile to wintry prison.
It’s been – Terry silently tallies it up – forty-plus hours now, with no near end in the forecast. Terry’s no novice when it comes to dealing with snow (dear old Daddy McCleary made goddamn sure of that), but even with north of three decades’ experience battling winter storms, he’s never faced one this relentless. His every move to keep his driveway clear has been effortlessly thwarted by a blizzard so powerfully obstinate he’s beginning to take it personally. It’s like the weather has declared a vendetta against him.
A once-in-a-lifetime climate event, the news moron proclaimed when it began, his tone suggesting he’d rather be announcing wrestling matches. The dreaded El Niño going head-to-head against the great northern Chinook. A battle of titans, with the Atlantic provinces caught in the middle.
It’s a superstorm, the idiot called it. A monster.
So Terry supposes Nomi’s kind of right.
Hmm. He squints, playing the game. Outside monster, huh?
Uh-huh.
Those’re the worst.
I know.
Terry loves his daughter’s flights of fancy, how she absolutely commits to her fantasies. He’d swear she’s telling the truth if he didn’t know she has a history of discovering similar creatures in her closet, bed and, one memorable night, sock drawer. She must get her creativity from her mother; Terry’s ancestry consists of absurdly pedestrian thinkers, people for whom the possible existence of life beyond the township’s limits is at best hypothetical.
Not for the first time Terry is deeply grateful for his wife’s influence. She manages to bring out the best in their daughter – and in himself. Without Alyx to keep him steady, Terry often worries he’ll end up an angry clone of his father, berating his daughter at the slightest provocation.
Thank Christ Dad never had a daughter, Terry thinks. The man had barely grasped the rudiments of raising a son on his own, but a daughter? Terry doesn’t like to think about it.
Don’t see anything.
Nomi points, tapping her fingertip against the window. It’s out there. Tap tap tap. Right there.
What’s it look like?
Can’t tell. It’s big, though. Really big. She’s barely talking, the words more mouthed than spoken, as if the slightest change in volume might warn the beast it’s being spied on. It’s invisible.
So how are you seeing it then.
She huffs at this, impatient with her father’s doltishness. I can’t see the monster, Daddy. I can see the snow moving around it.
Huh. Makes sense. He looks out again, debating whether there’s time to make one more blower run tonight, and damned if he doesn’t see…something. A glimpse of movement by the neighbour’s fence. A shudder of snow curling in over itself, thickening the air for a brief instant, just long enough for Terry’s brain to subconsciously connect the dots.
He rubs at his eyes; Christ I must be tired. It’s just the storm. The way it’s furiously scouring the city, slamming up against walls and channelling through back alleys, it makes the snow in any given area behave erratically. This, plus his utter exhaustion, means Nomi could suggest there’s a parade of dancing sasquatch in the front yard and he’d probably see it too.
He watches the snow shimmy about by the fence. So what if there’s no real monster? If it’s real for Nomi, even for an instant, why can’t it be real for Terry? It’d do him some good to stretch his imagination a bit, if only because his own father would never have conceived of doing so.
Is that it? he says, motioning with his chin. Near the fence there?
She shakes her head. No, it’s moving now. It’s over by the car.
Ah. He looks at the Everest of powder that entombs the hatchback.
It’s standing right there. By the front. Her eyes are bulging as she tracks the creature. Alyx thinks the girl’s going to be an actress when she grows up, and Terry can’t argue with that. Nomi throws herself into her roles.
He scratches at the stubble on his chin. Wait. Wouldn’t there be tracks, then?
Daddy. She stretches the word out, quiet no longer, stuffing its vowels with her annoyance. It walks on top of the snow. She marches two of her fingers across the glass to demonstrate. See. Just like this.
So, not a very heavy monster then.
Nope.
Is it still there?
Uh-huh. It’s sitting on top now.
What, on top of all that snow? Way up there?
It’s pretty big, Daddy.
But light.
It’s a magic outside monster.
Must be. Guess I’d better check it out. Terry stands, again surprised at how loudly his body argues for stillness. Can’t have a monster sitting on our car.
Nomi nods. It might steal it.
Exactly. Then where would we be?
Oh. Her eyes widen. I wouldn’t be able to go to school tomorrow.
Hmm. He stops to consider this, watching her face as he deliberately walks into her trap. What do you think we should we do then?
Nomi furrows her brow in pretend thought. We should leave it alone, she decides.
Ah, but if it steals the car, you’ll miss school.
Maybe. You’d miss work too.
Wouldn’t that be bad?
Not really.
Terry snorts, and Nomi laughs at her cleverness.
You just want to skip school.
Yeah.
You had me going there.
Yeah. She’s laughing harder, tickled by her cunning. It’s too infectious for him not to chime in. He’s still chuckling as he heads to the mudroom and starts pulling on his gear.
He stops laughing when he slips his coat on. The clothes are still damp, unpleasantly so, clammy. He’s cleared the driveway of snow four times now, twice yesterday, twice today. The weatherman predicts no end to the blizzard until at least tomorrow.
He could leave it for morning. But if he hadn’t been clearing the driveway in stages – the way his father forced him to do it – by tomorrow he’d be dealing with five feet, easy. Smarter to do it in manageable stages. Better to face four or five stretches of doable effort rather than one Herculean task.
But goddamn does he hate Canada right now. And the weatherman.
Mostly the weatherman.
Oh, bullshit.
As Terry zips up, the usual disparaging phrases amble through his head, imprinted as they are since childhood onto his psyche.
Bullshit on your complaints.
One of his father’s favourite go-to responses. A choice piece of wisdom employed as argument against his shiftless son’s pitiful attempts to get out of chores.
Bullshit on your complaints, boy. You’re just lazy.
As always when life forces Terry to do something he doesn’t particularly enjoy, right now it feels like the old man is standing directly behind him. Derisively adjudicating Terry’s every action. He finds himself instinctively biting back a retort, just like when he was a kid. Wanting to tell the old man to eff off, fearing the consequences should he actually gather the nerve to do it.
Which he did, once. He pissed red for a week.
Terry’s face flushes, feeling the man’s fists work their way through his body. I’m thirty-nine, he thinks, and I’m intimidated by a memory.
Don’t go, Daddy. A pair of small arms encircles Terry’s right leg. Nomi’s pressing herself against him. Her bunny pajamas are soaking up the pool of water that surrounds his boots.
Gotta do it, Nom. Can’t let the monster steal our car. Next it’ll want our television.
It can’t come in, Daddy. It’s an outside monster, ’member?
Either way, better not take chances. He pulls on a pair of mitts and tugs his balaclava over his head. It covers most of his face, leaving only the eyes free. He screws up his eyes, trying to look menacing for her. Think I’m tough enough to fight an outside monster?
She squeezes tighter, pressing her cheek into his thigh. Don’t go. There’s a catch in her throat, and Terry is shocked to see Nomi is near tears.
Hey, hey. He crouches down and gathers her in his arms. What’s wrong?
She sniffles. I think the monster is hungry.
Why do you think so?
She points at the door. I can hear it outside.
That’s just the storm.
No, that’s its stomach. It’s growling, Daddy.
He listens as the wind caresses the house, pushing at the wood. The walls of the mudroom groan, and Terry feels the hair rise on his arms.
Goddamn if that doesn’t sound like cries of an empty belly.
He shakes his head. He’s so beat he’s freaking himself out. Maybe he should just call it a night.
Typical, Terrance.
Terry hugs Nomi tighter. Sometimes, holding his daughter, it’s the only thing that shuts Dad up.
Hey, Nom, you know there’s not really a monster out there, right? You were just playing with Daddy.
I saw it.
There’s nothing out there, Nomi.
There’s a monster out there.
He grits his teeth, suddenly mad, wanting to tell her, Quit it! Grow up! He breathes through his nose, ordering himself to calm.
He’s just tired.
You’re just lazy, his father spits.
Terry gives Nomi one more squeeze, then looks her in the eyes. Honey, I know you’re having fun, but you can sometimes take things too far. Do you know what I mean?
She nods, mute.
There’s no monster outside.
But…
Nomi. There’s no monster outside.
There’s no monster.
You were fooling around, that’s all.
I was fooling you.
That’s my girl. He pokes at her tears with his mittened hand. So no more tears, okay? It scares Daddy when you cry.
I’m sorry.
I know. It’s okay. It’s just been a long day. He sighs. There’s just so much snow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You gonna clean the driveway?
Well, since I’m already dressed to fight the monster, figure I should.
Can I come out and help?
He shakes his head no, shuddering. She’s about the same age Terry was when his father started heaping chores onto his thin shoulders. The day he treats his daughter like his father treated him is the day his father wins. Something Terry’s not about to let happen.
I could protect you.
I got this, hon. He rubs her head, his mitten pushing snaps of static through her waves of brown and blonde. I think it’s too late now, almost your bedtime. Besides, I think you’re too scared to go outside.
I’m not scared.
You look it. He lifts her, lets Nomi look at her reflection in the glass of the screen door. See that? Your hair is standing up. Nomi the Fraidy-cat, that’s you.
Daddy! The word squirms with irritation, but she’s smiling, and Terry feels the weight on his shoulders lift a little. You did that. You made my hair stand up.
Yup, I did, Fraidy-cat. Cause I’m magic too. So that outside monster, see, if it’s there, it knows not to mess with me. Too tough and too magic.
He lowers her to the floor, careful to land her on a dry spot. Go on, get inside, you’re getting wet. Mom’s gonna get mad at both of us.
Nomi’s eyes roll up, another trait of her mother’s. Ooh. That’d be bad.
Yup. Tell you what, you can watch me from the window. Give me warning if that monster of yours makes a move. Nomi nods and heads inside, leaving the mudroom door open and tracking wet down the hall. Tell Mommy I’m going out again, okay?
Mom! She hollers it up the stairs. Dad’s going outside again!
Don’t yell in the house! her mother howls back.
You’re yelling, too!
Stop yelling, I said!
You’re still yelling!
Terry closes the door after her, grinning beneath his mask. Nomi may have Alyx’s looks, brains, and imagination, but her voice, that’s all McCleary. In a battle between wits and noise, Nomi’ll win out every time.
He opens the door to the outside and is hit with a shock of air that numbs his eyes. His smile flips itself into a tight scowl. All traces of the day’s work have been filled in, smoothed over, and erased from existence.
You gonna cry about it, Terrance, or are you gonna get to work?
Knock if off. I’m going.
He shuts the door behind him and stands on the stoop for a moment, letting himself re-acclimatize. He’s startled at the contrast between the warmth and amiable noise he’s just left and the stark nullity before him. The world is nothing but white-noise wind and a dearth of colour. It feels as if he has moved beyond reality and entered an absence.
He walks down the steps into the gathering snow, sinking up to his knees. Not too bad, he says aloud, willing himself to believe it. The snow is light. Shouldn’t take long.
Just gotta keep on keepin’ on top of it.
He clomps to the shed, swings the doors open. He hadn’t bother to lock it after the last time, because any fool crazy enough to try and steal old lawn furniture and rusty yard tools and cans of used motor oil in this blizzard is welcome to it.
The blower sits there, coated with remnants of that afternoon’s efforts. He struggles to squeeze past it in the small enclosure, gets himself behind its handles, pushes it out. He can’t hear anything at all out here, in the whiteout. There’s only wind, groaning through the achromatic streets, underscored by the unsettlingly heavy hush of falling snow.
Wait, there’s something else, a faint mechanical roar, coming from up the street. A neighbour’s blower. He’s cheered by this: Terry’s not the only lonely soul fighting the good fight tonight.
He holds down the throttle bar, pulls the starter cord.
Again.
Again.
Terry checks the gas, tops it up, gives the cord another tug. No go. Lets it rest, tries again, pulls until his shoulder burns. Feels himself warm beneath his clothes, the frustration heating his blood. He plugs in the blower’s electric starter, the never-fail last resort. He hates using it, knows his reasons are ridiculous, but Terry knows his father would think less of him for not starting it manually.
Not a click.
He curses a frosted ring into the wool of his balaclava. Glad Nomi’s inside, can’t hear his complaints. She’d learn a lot of new words.
Terry thinks it out. Blower’s dead. Snow’s still falling. Come morning he’ll be greeted with at least two more feet of this shit.
If the monster blizzard has stopped.
Which, right now, feels like an impossibility.
He tells himself, go back inside. Deal with this later. Nomi’s school will probably be cancelled tomorrow anyway. No rush to finish. Borrow a neighbour’s blower if you have to.
But he’ll still be left with all this snow. Jeering at him.
Just like dear old Dad.
Fuck it.
Terry grabs a shovel near the wall. You can’t ever let the snow win, he says. Another in Dad’s endless parade of clichés, delivered with intonations of disapproval that insinuated his son was a washout, a weak link in what was up until his godforsaken birth a mighty chain of manly men.
Terry trudges down the driveway, wading through thick. He breaks the beam of the motion detector and the security light above the driveway clicks on, guiding his way.
He’ll take it easy, he promises himself. Only dig around the van and down to the street. Such obvious practicality would drive his father into fits, but who cares? The old man isn’t around anymore to shame his son into killing himself.
The blizzard’s not letting up, the flakes thick as goose feathers. The other side of the street has vanished. The rumble of his neighbour’s blower is gone, swallowed whole by the storm. If it was ever really there.
He turns to the house. Nomi’s set in position, poised at the window. He raises a hand, gets a tiny thumbs-up in return.
Should have dragged her out. Do her some good, teach her what real work is.
I’m so thankful she never met you, Dad.
Figures you’d have a girl.
Gimme a fucking break already.
Like father, like daughter.
You’re lucky you’re not here, old man.
Like you could ever stop me.
Not listening to you anymore.
Slide the shovel in.
Lift.
Toss contents over shoulder.
Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
Soon, Terry’s seeing the driveway beneath his feet. The snow is as light as he’d hoped, there’s a cleared concrete track around the minivan now, and he’s much closer to the street. The progress heartens him, even though he’s drained. Fifteen minutes in and already he needs a break.
He leans against the drift camouflaging his car, panting a little. His breathing is rough. Not used to this much effort. Need to hit the gym, do some free weights.
Owning a blower, Terry realizes, has made him soft. He also realizes that his father would take this as proof that his son always takes the easiest route.
The insight feels worse than the ache in his back and the whine in his shoulders.
It suddenly goes dark, casting the driveway into murk, spooking him. Terry waves his arms until the sensor catches his movements and switches the light back on. He pulls his balaclava away from his mouth for some air. Takes in a lungful, gasps, coughs, hard enough to weaken his knees. The inhalation had been mostly flakes.
I’m drowning in my driveway, he thinks. It’s so absurd an idea his hacks alternate with pained laughter. Wouldn’t his father have loved that? His shirker son, so unfit for manual labour he suffocates to death on snowflakes. The most bizarre I told you so ever. The thought makes him laugh harder, weakening him until he has to drop to one knee and lean on his shovel for support.
Eventually the coughs subside, leaving Terry lightheaded, his body a mass of shaking muscles, his throat scraped raw. He wonders if Nomi saw his fit. Would she be frightened? Maybe he should head back in, make sure she’s okay.
Gonna quit?
Even over the wailing of the storm, Terry hears his father’s blistering contempt. It’s like the man is lurking there, right behind the snow, just outside his reach.
Haunting him.
Preying on his weakling little boy.
Had enough?
Goddammit, Dad, leave me alone for once why don’t you.
Terry stands, picks up the shovel. It feels twenty pounds heavier.
Gonna go inside?
Nope.
Slide. Lift. Toss.
Go cry to Mommy?
Never knew her.
Slide. Lift. Toss.
Crying won’t make it easier.
Like you’d know.
Slide. Lift. Toss.
Sweat dribbles into Terry’s eyes. He drags a mitten across the balaclava’s eyeholes. His lashes are scabbed with frost. He blinks, dislodges the ice. Fancies he can hear tiny crystalline boulders tumbling down. An avalanche over his face.
Snow’s worse now. Wind’s picking up. Fucking weatherman.
Glancing up, Terry can barely see the bay window through the squalls of silver white that gust in every direction. Nomi’s sitting there still, her face smooshed up against the glass, watching intently for…
Right, the monster. He had almost forgotten. It’s near the car. Where he is now. He looks around for any sign of creature, playing up the search for his audience. He frantically sweeps his arms back and forth in front of him as if trying to bump into the invisible threat, knowing he looks ridiculous but hoping his goofy pantomime brings a smile to Nomi’s face.
There’s nothing around him to bump into, of course. Nothing but snow, battering his face.
What else was he expecting?
He looks back to the window. His daughter’s a faded blur now, a pale smudge behind the storm. He can’t tell if his playacting is being appreciated. He can’t even be sure it’s
Nomi anymore. He’s looking at a silhouette through television static.
He waves. No response from the shape.
No, it’s moving. Or is it only the snow, fooling him again? Either way, it looks to Terry like the silhouette’s head is bobbing about a bit. Tracking something.
Nomi’s not watching her father at all, Terry thinks. She’s following her monster again.
The outside monster. The invisible creature stalking Daddy in the static.
Terry scans the stretch between himself and the shadow. Just in case something’s really there.
There’s nothing there, idiot.
Leave it.
You’re acting like a little girl.
He does feel slightly imbecilic. There’s nothing to see. He knows there’s nothing out here. Just Terry and his daughter’s silhouette.
He raises his hand again. The silhouette mirrors his wave.
The storm is heavier now; an almost solid wall of dirty ivory surrounds him. It’s only him and the shape now.
Terry thinks; would he even know if something was out here? Stalking him?
He’s aware of tightness in his chest. He’s nervous.
Goddamn, stop weirding yourself out.
He waves to Nomi again, but the storm must be too thick, her shadow remains still. Flakes gambol about his head in eldritch spirals, upsetting his equilibrium. They begin to push, hammering insistently from one side, then another, until he has to plant his feet to stabilize himself.
He gets the impression that he’s being boxed in.
Cornered.
Trapped by a monster ( I think it’s hungry) that would be right on top of him before he’d even see it.
The shape is still there, lit dimly from behind, safely inside the house. Or is it? It looks too solid to be that far away. It must be the storm, warping his sense of distance, but Terry’s suddenly convinced, if he reaches out into the blizzard his fingers will come up against something coarse and muscular.
Something watching him. Patient. Waiting for him to lower his guard.
A monster, Terrance? That’s your excuse?
The light vanishes again, plunging Terry into gloom, evaporating the silhouette. He shouts this time, swearing as he motions to trigger the sensor. He’s rattled, almost panicked, shocked to realize he’s been staring into nothingness ( not nothing I’m staring at the shape it’s right there) for minutes now. The silhouette is back where it should be, in the house, of course it’s inside, it’s Nomi, why would she be out here? He’s seen this in movies; actors pretending to lose their sense of time and space, becoming lost in a blizzard mere feet from camp. He never honestly believed it was possible, but now the reality of such an event hits him. He’s weirdly afraid of what it might mean.
He thumps the side of his head with his fist. You’ve been daydreaming, Terry. It’s all this goddamn snow, whirling about. It hypnotized you. The cold is numbing your senses, that’s all. You’re tired. Need a good night’s sleep.
Sleep is for babies.
He looks down. The concrete beneath his feet has vanished. Already his meagre efforts are being obliterated.
Motherfucking…
Again.
Slide. Lift. Toss. Slide. Lift. Toss. Slide. Lift. Toss.
I never once let a driveway go uncleared, his father yells from somewhere out in the netherworld. That much was true; like everything else in his life, he approached shovelling snow like a battle he intended to win. Him and his useless off-spring, freezing themselves numb, risking frostbite. No rest allowed until they’d scooped an oasis of concrete from a frozen desert.
Not that Dad is around any longer to fight the weather.
The snow, it finally beat him. Forced the old man to his knees.
Terry watched it happen. He’s never told anyone. He leaned on his shovel and idly watched the man crumble. Listened to him moan. Went inside and called for an ambulance only when he felt compelled to do so.
It took a long time.
Mr. McCleary, forced to his knees by the snow.
Then pushed onto his back.
Then shoved into his coffin, interred in the earth, and wholly forgotten. Such was his impact on the world beyond himself and his son.
It was why Terry bought the blower to begin with. He’d purchased it at Alyx’s insistence, making noises about how unnecessary it was, blowing off her worries about his health but secretly delighted at this rebellion against his father.
Any excuse to not put in an honest day’s work.
Jesus wept, Dad…
Slide. Lift. Toss. Slide.Lift.Toss. SlideLiftToss. Terry’s breathing is ragged. SlideLiftToss. His temples begin to pulse.
Hot blood sluices through his arteries in waves, keeping tempo with the shovel.
SlideLiftToss.
Gotta find the right rhythm.
The light blinks out. He waves, but the gloom persists. The ferocity of the storm had fooled the sensor into thinking him vanished. The streetlamps are only glimmers. Might be 40 feet away, or 40 miles.
There’s only himself and the shape now. Nomi’s silhouette, floating, its position unaffected by the wind.
SlideLiftToss.
Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today, Dad directs from behind the blizzard’s curtain.
Slide.Lift.Toss.
Nothing good ever came of a lax attitude toward life.
Slide. Lift. Toss.
( I can see the snow moving around it)
Slide.
He leans on his shovel, lets his head droop. He waits for the throbbing in his forehead to subside.
If you have time to lean…
Cold blows past his balaclava, down his neck, melts against his skin. Feels good. He opens his coat to the wind, letting the chill revive him.
You killed your mother, you know.
( I can’t see the monster)
You don’t know what monsters are, Nomi.
Slide. Lift. Toss.
Tore her insides out, you did.
( it’s really big)
Yes it is, hon.
Slide. Lift. Toss.
I’m glad she never lived to see what a disappointment you turned out to be.
( the monster’s hungry)
I’ll protect you.
Slide.Lift.Toss.
Terry can’t see past the end of the shovel now.
You’re letting the snow win!
It just won’t stop, Dad.
SlideLiftToss.
Again.
SlideLiftToss.
( it’s growling, Daddy)
SlideHeaveToss.
His arms are lead.
SlideHeaveThrow.
His back screams in disapproval.
DigHeaveThrow.
A few seconds respite. Just to catch his breath. Just enough time to envisage the weatherman’s smug asshole face.
Sorry, folks, didn’t see this thing coming. My bad.
DigHoistThrow.
Every plunge cleaves the weatherman’s skull.
DigHoistThrow.
Right along the line of that arrogant weatherman smirk.
GougeHoistHurl.
Fuck fuck fuck you fuck you fuck fuck fuck
GougeHoistHurl.
Gouge.Hoist.Hurl.
Gouge. Hoist. Hurl.
Gouge.
Hoist.
A tremor ripples through his body.
( it’s hungry)
Hoist.
You never could finish a job.
The shovel slips from his grasp, vanishing beneath the snow.
…aw goddammit
Terry tries to bend over. He’s mildly confused when he can’t. His body is stiffening.
…out of shape
You’ve always been weak.
…can’t argue that
( there’s a monster outside)
His arms dangle loose. The tips of his mittens brush vainly against the surface of the snow, the shovel beyond their grasp.
…finish…goddamn driveway
He tugs at his balaclava, it’s too tight. It takes an eternity to pull it over his head.
…goddamn
Terry’s coat feels too close. No, can’t be that, it’s open. But there’s pressure around his chest.
Pain is in your mind, boy.
…so are you, Dad
Doesn’t hurt that much. Should be able to work through it. Feels like a hug.
Maybe it’s Nomi’s monster. Come over to keep Terry warm. Awful nice of the big fella.
…again
He pushes his body forward, squeezing in his stomach, trying to bend a few more inches.
Something’s pressing at his eyes from behind. They’re about to burst.
…pick up…where’s shovel…
A little hard work never hurt anyone.
His knees buckle.
…should probably take a break…
The silhouette. Maybe it could help. Terry reaches toward it. Dimly, he wonders how it is he can see it in the dark.
Terry crumples into himself. His head falls back into soft.
…feels nice…
Excuses, excuses.
…can’t stay…
( hungry)
…Nomi’s gonna miss school…
If you lifted with your legs, you wouldn’t tire so easily.
Terry looks up at where the sky should be. The world is gone. All that’s left is white against black, and vice versa.
…time… …get up…
Snow collects on his face.
You can be lazy when you’re dead.
…oh shut up
Ice crystals fill his sockets. He can’t be bothered to blink them away. Too much of a nuisance.
…what did she say… …outside…
He’s becoming one more drift among thousands.
Terry notices he’s not cold anymore.
There’s a movement, in his periphery, beyond the veil. The shape, the silhouette. It lingers in the corner of his eye.
…something there?
Small piles of snow gathered atop its hunched shoulders.
…that’s how she saw it…
You really do disappoint me, Terrance.
…oh, it’s you…
…of course it’s you…
You never amounted to anything.
…at least I tried…
There’s a roaring in his ears.
…monster…in the snow…hungry again…
…should’ve listened…so sorry…
( I can protect you)
…s’okay, hon…I got this…
Terry surrenders to the monsters.