And I knew there was just no damn way he’d survived that gut shot wound.
I walked up to the door with my Colt out, ready to shoot. Cocking the gun, I wrapped my hand around the door handle and flung the door open.
Again, no one was there.
But I didn’t care.
I stepped outside and fired a shot into the air. “Vincent!” I yelled. “It was your fault, Vincent! You got yourself killed, and don’t think you’re going to be haunting me! You try to and I will find you sister and tell her exactly what you were! You don’t have any leverage over me!”
I shut the church door and rubbed my forehead.
I had to get some sleep.
Sitting down against the wall next to the row of candles, I closed my eyes and listened to the now much quieter wind echo through the desert and drifted off to sleep. When I woke up, sunbeams shined through the windows, lighting the church in a golden glow. I pushed myself to my feet, walked to the church door, and opened it up. The sky stretched like a sea of light blue and the car sat at the side of the road just like I’d left it.
And the wind was only a gentle warm breeze.
I stepped outside, pulled the door shut, and walked to the car. It would take about six hours to reach the border and then I’d be home free. My leg still hurt, but my thoughts and vision were clear and I fired up the car and drove off. Maybe I’d try to contact Melissa once I got past the border, but it would be a while. I didn’t want to risk anyone finding me.
Although maybe someone already had.
And as I rolled the window down and held my hand out in the already hot morning wind, I hoped there’d be no more Vincent in my life.
But he’d always been a persistent son of a bitch.
And it wouldn’t shock me to hear that knife-tappin’ son of a bitch again one of these nights.
I gazed out at the frozen lake. Gray sky, a thin sheet of white snow on the lawns of the homes around the lake, and gray ice. The whole thing was like a white-and-gray painting—there was even a patch of gray fog straight ahead close to the shoreline at the other end. It was hard to believe we had something like this right behind our own backyard, but my family had moved away from Florida to Iowa last week and here it was. My skates, which I hadn’t worn since last year, were a little tight but they’d be fine for now; I stepped onto the ice. It’d been over a year since I’d finished 5th in the Midwest eleven- to twelve-year-old girls’ championship, but skating was sort of like riding a bike and I wanted to start practicing my moves again right away. My knees wobbled a bit as I started to move around but they weren’t too bad and I started to skate. As I glided back and forth past the shoreline for a few minutes my legs started to feel stronger and the wobbling went away.
It felt great to be on the ice again, and this would be a great place to practice on my own before I started really getting rating to compete again. I did a little spin and thought about a story I overheard a woman at the market tell my mom about a world-class junior skater who used to skate out here but suddenly died from a sick heart a few years ago. It was a sad story but it made me feel sort of inspired to be using the same ice that someone as good as her did—maybe I’d even figure out how to pull off a perfect double axel like the woman said the girl was known for.
Skating away from the shore, I started to head towards the center of the lake. I wouldn’t go past that of course—my mom had told me a bunch of times to stay close to the house—but the lake was big enough where I’d have plenty of room to move by just going part of the way out. As I skated around the ice I looked at the homes that wrapped around the lake. They were big and made of brick like ours and it was probably a couple of miles around the entire lake.
When I got about a hundred yards out, I picked up speed and did a couple of simple figure eights and then started practicing different jumps. After about a half hour I took a break and stared at the north side of the lake. The patch of fog had grown into a sort of cloudy gray wall that stretched maybe fifty feet end to end. I skated backwards while staring at it and my stomach quivered when what looked like a thin, gray arm and leg darted in and out of the darker part of the fog. I stopped and stared. A blurry figure, maybe about five feet tall, spun out of the darker part of the fog. It moved like a girl and I thought I could see wisps of long hair, but I couldn’t really see any details about her; it was like watching a thin shadow glide around. I watched as she did a perfect axel and then a toe loop jump and I decided I had to get a closer look at her.
I started to skate towards the fog as the cold air pressed against my face like an invisible ice mask. When I got to around the midway point, the girl did another toe loop and then faded into the thicker part of the fog. I stopped and waited for a couple of minutes but she didn’t come back. I shrugged, skated back to shore, put on my skate guards, and went home.
On Wednesday I was
