now than before. At least it sounded worse.
He’ll make it. It’s not him you need to be worried about. How much blood do you think you lost tonight? How much more can you lose without passing out? Will one more coughing, vomiting fit do it? If not one, two for sure. The blood loss alone might not kill you, but if you lose consciousness and don’t keep up the fire and Warren doesn’t make it back in time, you’ll freeze to death. That’s a fact.
That was all true, but she’d already decided to stay put. What more could she do? Worrying about it wasn’t going to help anything. She watched the flames and tried to think about something else.
But before she’d had a chance to search her memory banks for some happy recollection, the tickle in her chest returned. It wasn’t much of a thing at first, barely noticeable, but before long her entire torso was vibrating and she was rocking back and forth in the chair, trying to will the cough away, praying it would subside and not turn into another violent burst of vomiting.
A single cough escaped her. It was small, but it burned her throat. She braced herself for more blood, but it didn’t come. No blood, and no more coughs. The vibrations died down, and her body stilled. Bub got up, put his head on her knee, and whined.
She waited a full minute before she did anything. Didn’t talk, didn’t move, tried not even to breathe. When she thought it might be okay, she drew in a slow, tentative breath, closed her eyes, and exhaled.
No cough. No blood. No vibration.
“I think it’s okay,” she told Bub. “It’s okay for now.” She scratched him between his ears and gave him a kiss on his snout.
That was when she heard it: a second window breaking. This time it came from the end of the house opposite the kitchen, either from the bedroom or the bathroom.
Bub stood up, tensed, took a few limping steps toward the hallway and growled.
“It’s okay, boy. It’s just a broken window. Probably just a tree limb or a chunk of ice.”
She realized how much she sounded like Warren right then. But with him gone, she guessed it was up to her to be the sensible one.
“Relax, okay?”
But Bub didn’t relax. He took another step toward the hallway and barked. The sound was so sudden and ferocious that Tess jumped back. She’d never heard Bub bark like that (he wasn’t much of a barker in general, as a matter of fact), wasn’t sure she’d ever heard any dog bark that way. She thought again of wild beasts, of wolves and jackals and hyenas.
“Bub?”
And then she heard it. A thump. Like a low drumbeat.
A second thump followed, louder than the first.
Not drumbeats, of course. Footsteps.
There was someone in the house.
15
When Warren reached the end of the driveway, he almost didn’t believe it.
He couldn’t possibly have made it to the road already, could he? How long had he been walking? Half an hour? Forty-five minutes?
He wasn’t sure. He hadn’t brought his watch, and he’d been concentrating so hard on not thinking about the time that he’d lost all sense of everything but his thumping heart and his aching legs and back.
His heart hadn’t slowed, and his muscles still burned, but for the first time since leaving the house, he thought he might have a chance. He’d made it to the road, right? That was a third of the trip. Maybe more.
Of course, the road hadn’t been plowed. That would have been too much to ask for, and he’d never really been expecting it. Plowing a rarely-used road in the middle of a blizzard would have been a moronic waste of resources. Someone would drive a plow down the road when this was all over, but not for several days at least, maybe even a week. Finding a plowed road tonight would have been a miracle. He thought (and not for the first time) that he ought to get a plow for the GMC. Or a small snowmobile. Or both. For emergencies.
Isn’t this enough of an emergency to last you the rest of your life?
It definitely was.
He’ll make it. It’s not him you need to be worried about. How much blood do you think you lost tonight? How much more can you lose without passing out? Will one more coughing, vomiting fit do it? If not one, two for sure. The blood loss alone might not kill you, but if you lose consciousness and don’t keep up the fire and Warren doesn’t make it back in time, you’ll freeze to death. That’s a fact.
That was all true, but she’d already decided to stay put. What more could she do? Worrying about it wasn’t going to help anything. She watched the flames and tried to think about something else.
But before she’d had a chance to search her memory banks for some happy recollection, the tickle in her chest returned. It wasn’t much of a thing at first, barely noticeable, but before long her entire torso was vibrating and she was rocking back and forth in the chair, trying to will the cough away, praying it would subside and not turn into another violent burst of vomiting.
A single cough escaped her. It was small, but it burned her throat. She braced herself for more blood, but it didn’t come. No blood, and no more coughs. The vibrations died down, and her body stilled. Bub got up, put his head on her knee, and whined.
She waited a full minute before she did anything. Didn’t talk, didn’t move, tried not even to breathe. When she thought it might be okay, she drew in a slow, tentative breath, closed her eyes, and exhaled.
No cough. No blood. No vibration.
“I think it’s okay,” she told Bub. “It’s okay for now.” She scratched him between his ears and gave him a kiss on his snout.
That was when she heard it: a second window breaking. This time it came from the end of the house opposite the kitchen, either from the bedroom or the bathroom.
Bub stood up, tensed, took a few limping steps toward the hallway and growled.
“It’s okay, boy. It’s just a broken window. Probably just a tree limb or a chunk of ice.”
She realized how much she sounded like Warren right then. But with him gone, she guessed it was up to her to be the sensible one.
“Relax, okay?”
But Bub didn’t relax. He took another step toward the hallway and barked. The sound was so sudden and ferocious that Tess jumped back. She’d never heard Bub bark like that (he wasn’t much of a barker in general, as a matter of fact), wasn’t sure she’d ever heard any dog bark that way. She thought again of wild beasts, of wolves and jackals and hyenas.
“Bub?”
And then she heard it. A thump. Like a low drumbeat.
A second thump followed, louder than the first.
Not drumbeats, of course. Footsteps.
There was someone in the house.
15
When Warren reached the end of the driveway, he almost didn’t believe it.
He couldn’t possibly have made it to the road already, could he? How long had he been walking? Half an hour? Forty-five minutes?
He wasn’t sure. He hadn’t brought his watch, and he’d been concentrating so hard on not thinking about the time that he’d lost all sense of everything but his thumping heart and his aching legs and back.
His heart hadn’t slowed, and his muscles still burned, but for the first time since leaving the house, he thought he might have a chance. He’d made it to the road, right? That was a third of the trip. Maybe more.
Of course, the road hadn’t been plowed. That would have been too much to ask for, and he’d never really been expecting it. Plowing a rarely-used road in the middle of a blizzard would have been a moronic waste of resources. Someone would drive a plow down the road when this was all over, but not for several days at least, maybe even a week. Finding a plowed road tonight would have been a miracle. He thought (and not for the first time) that he ought to get a plow for the GMC. Or a small snowmobile. Or both. For emergencies.
Isn’t this enough of an emergency to last you the rest of your life?
It definitely was.
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