let his heartbeat settle; his breath coming regularly in short puffs. His muscles began to relax.
It wasn’t so bad, he thought.
The soft pat of falling snow. Faint music from the radio coming through the window above him. He turned his mind to the music that slowly faded, then a voice saying:
This is for our sick and shut-ins.
Then a chorus of voices singing a hymn, slow and deliberate, the words unclear.
Forrest jerked his eyes open. Somewhere across the road and at the edge of the wood there was a smear of movement. He couldn’t tell what it was. If it was God then he would have him. He would reach out and break his head and kick him to pieces in the road like a clod of dirt. It wasn’t so bad, in fact it all made perfect sense. Then his face was down in the snow, the ice on his cheek, fingers still holding the edges of his throat as he fell into darkness.
H OWARD B ONDURANT AWOKE lying on his side on the front seat, the steering wheel pressed against his bared teeth. He sat upright and stared out the windshield. A whiteness enveloped the world as if the ground were lit up from underneath. He lay back down on the seat for a while, pulling his legs up into a fetal position, kicking his toes against the dashboard to regain feeling, groping at his armpits with his burning fingers. His gut ached and he shuddered and wished desperately to slip back into unconsciousness.
Later Howard wrenched the truck door open, breaking a crust of ice and nearly a foot of snow from the roof that fell into the cab, covering his pants and shoulders as he swung his legs off the seat, some of the cold powder going down his neck. Sky and ground were the same, luminous white and rolling and for a moment he didn’t understand if the truck was straight or crooked or floating in the air. To his left the snow undulated up a hill then across, evenly spaced bumps of white suggested a fence line. To the right a stand of pines stood in a line as far as he could see, their tops bent with weight, each drooping in different directions like a crowd of people sitting in chairs asleep. The truck lay half-buried at a steep angle and Howard figured he must have put it in a gulley. He watched the trees for a while until the thin breeze ruffled their bent tops, sending sprays of snow drifting off like banks of rolling mist. The mountains began to separate from the air, and putting a frozen elbow awkwardly against his knee he bent and retched into the snow.
Forrest.
Using the muffled fence line and the pines as a guide Howard started off down the road, heading east, toward the pale disk of the sun.
Chapter 4
T HE NEXT MORNING Emmy Bondurant stood in the kitchen in her housecoat with a book of matches in her hand, the air in the house spiked with cold and the damp chill of morning. Jack watched his sister light the stove and make coffee for their father who was sleeping later now than he ever did during the first fifty years of his life. Emmy was tall and bird-stooped like Jack and his brothers, the narrow blades of her shoulders like fins as she craned over the stove. She cut off a hunk of fatback and tossed it into the skillet. She kept her hair short and pushed to the side with a nervous finger as she stirred the sizzling fat. Her hair was once blond-white, almost like glass, but had developed streaks of steely gray even though she was only sixteen, two years younger than Jack.
Jack stood by the window as he buttoned his shirt, watching the snow-covered road for signs of his brother. Forrest made a delivery on the first Friday of each month around the county and sometimes he took Jack along to run the cans. Jack had to watch the road because Forrest would never come up the drive to the house with a carful of liquor, and he would stop on the road only for a few minutes. If Jack wasn’t sharp he would be left behind.
On these mornings Jack would spy Forrest’s car nosing the end of the drive and he would gulp the rest of his coffee and bolt out
It wasn’t so bad, he thought.
The soft pat of falling snow. Faint music from the radio coming through the window above him. He turned his mind to the music that slowly faded, then a voice saying:
This is for our sick and shut-ins.
Then a chorus of voices singing a hymn, slow and deliberate, the words unclear.
Forrest jerked his eyes open. Somewhere across the road and at the edge of the wood there was a smear of movement. He couldn’t tell what it was. If it was God then he would have him. He would reach out and break his head and kick him to pieces in the road like a clod of dirt. It wasn’t so bad, in fact it all made perfect sense. Then his face was down in the snow, the ice on his cheek, fingers still holding the edges of his throat as he fell into darkness.
H OWARD B ONDURANT AWOKE lying on his side on the front seat, the steering wheel pressed against his bared teeth. He sat upright and stared out the windshield. A whiteness enveloped the world as if the ground were lit up from underneath. He lay back down on the seat for a while, pulling his legs up into a fetal position, kicking his toes against the dashboard to regain feeling, groping at his armpits with his burning fingers. His gut ached and he shuddered and wished desperately to slip back into unconsciousness.
Later Howard wrenched the truck door open, breaking a crust of ice and nearly a foot of snow from the roof that fell into the cab, covering his pants and shoulders as he swung his legs off the seat, some of the cold powder going down his neck. Sky and ground were the same, luminous white and rolling and for a moment he didn’t understand if the truck was straight or crooked or floating in the air. To his left the snow undulated up a hill then across, evenly spaced bumps of white suggested a fence line. To the right a stand of pines stood in a line as far as he could see, their tops bent with weight, each drooping in different directions like a crowd of people sitting in chairs asleep. The truck lay half-buried at a steep angle and Howard figured he must have put it in a gulley. He watched the trees for a while until the thin breeze ruffled their bent tops, sending sprays of snow drifting off like banks of rolling mist. The mountains began to separate from the air, and putting a frozen elbow awkwardly against his knee he bent and retched into the snow.
Forrest.
Using the muffled fence line and the pines as a guide Howard started off down the road, heading east, toward the pale disk of the sun.
Chapter 4
T HE NEXT MORNING Emmy Bondurant stood in the kitchen in her housecoat with a book of matches in her hand, the air in the house spiked with cold and the damp chill of morning. Jack watched his sister light the stove and make coffee for their father who was sleeping later now than he ever did during the first fifty years of his life. Emmy was tall and bird-stooped like Jack and his brothers, the narrow blades of her shoulders like fins as she craned over the stove. She cut off a hunk of fatback and tossed it into the skillet. She kept her hair short and pushed to the side with a nervous finger as she stirred the sizzling fat. Her hair was once blond-white, almost like glass, but had developed streaks of steely gray even though she was only sixteen, two years younger than Jack.
Jack stood by the window as he buttoned his shirt, watching the snow-covered road for signs of his brother. Forrest made a delivery on the first Friday of each month around the county and sometimes he took Jack along to run the cans. Jack had to watch the road because Forrest would never come up the drive to the house with a carful of liquor, and he would stop on the road only for a few minutes. If Jack wasn’t sharp he would be left behind.
On these mornings Jack would spy Forrest’s car nosing the end of the drive and he would gulp the rest of his coffee and bolt out
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