Chapter Twenty-Five #3
His daughters had pursued the monster that took their mother. Now it was his turn—
“Hey,” a man’s voice said behind him. Johnny turned around and saw Uncle Ricky sitting on Mazelle’s kitchen porch, his joint dangling from his fingers. Maybe he had never left.
“Go away!” Johnny said with fresh panic. He didn’t have a chance in hell of finding his daughters if he was out of his goddamn mind.
“You see all that snow? Might be as high as a couple feet. It’s national forest out there. How the hell you gonna walk in that? Go in the garage and get some gear, city boy.”
City boy. Johnny had hated when Uncle Ricky called him that, but how could he deny it? Still, it was better than being called old man, which was more apt because Johnny already felt every one of his sixty years in his sore joints.
“Better find some snowshoes in there,” Uncle Ricky said. “Boots too.”
“I don’t have time for all that!” Johnny said.
“You want your toes to freeze off? Those girls will need to rescue you.”
With a yell of frustration, Johnny trudged back toward the garage door beside the generator, which was still running with a gentle burr. He slipped so badly on the icy carpet of snow in the yard that he nearly lost his shaky balance.
“Told you,” Uncle Ricky said as Johnny passed him, and drew another long hit.
The light was already on in the garage. The girls had been here.
Their snowboards and boots were gone. Apparently, they hadn’t needed Uncle Ricky to remind them to equip themselves.
Johnny scanned the room for any other gear he could use.
He remembered seeing a pair of snowshoes hanging on the garage wall before he hired Hollman, but the garage walls were bare except for shelves of neatly laid tools.
Where was the snow gear? In his frustration, Johnny swept wrenches from the counter, clanking them to the floor.
A knife in a faded black leather sheath fell near his foot in the tangle.
Johnny unsheathed the seven-inch knife, which was stained red with rust, or blood, across its blade.
He had seen this knife on Uncle Ricky’s belt as a kid, the sheath black to match his favorite cowboy hat.
Back then, this knife had looked more like a sword.
In his hands now, it felt painfully small.
He would have to be close enough to the monster to smell its breath.
But with the Winchester gone, this was the best weapon in sight. Johnny shoved the sheathed knife into his jacket pocket opposite of the one where he’d stored the shells, since he wasn’t wearing a belt. The pocket only zipped up partway, but the knife felt secure enough.
Johnny finally spotted a tall, two-door wooden supply cabinet near the garage door behind him, teasing him in plain sight.
He’d passed it two or three times on this trip and never looked inside.
He expected the cabinet doors to be locked, but they weren’t—they parted to reveal a treasure trove of winter gear.
A pair of skis. Snowshoes. Two pairs of snow boots.
Ski poles. All of it was picture-perfect and ready for his lodge’s imaginary guests.
His Nikes were soggy from the morning’s ordeal, so he took them off and felt his socks.
Slightly damp. Shit. He wiggled his toes, which were complaining about the cold, his pinkie toes halfway numb before he rubbed feeling back into them.
No fresh socks were in sight, so he put his cold, damp socks back on.
Now the boots. The two pairs of snow boots, one gray and one brown, were so old that Johnny wondered if one pair had belonged to Uncle Ricky.
He couldn’t fit his foot into the first gray boot he tried, but the brown boots fit, even if they were snug.
He wanted to rush back out in only the boots, since he’d already wasted so much time—was it five minutes or an hour?
—but he knew that Uncle Ricky would tell him not to be a damn fool.
So he grabbed the snowshoes and a ski pole too, hugging the gear to his chest as he flung himself back outside.
“That’s more like it,” Uncle Ricky said, still nursing his joint on the side porch. Johnny hated craving the approval of a phantom, but his spirits stirred with new hope.
He made his way to the top of the ski trail, his feet much steadier in the boots. His eyes fixed again on the trails below marking the passage of his family. His life.
“Watch yourself out there, boy. See those snow clouds? They’re really gonna let loose soon.” Uncle Ricky’s voice sounded far away. Imaginary. Johnny’s mind kept trying to fool him, but he knew he was facing this alone.
Johnny clung to his snowshoes and ski pole like a shield and sword with one arm as he stared down at the ski trail.
He didn’t know how to ski and had no faster way down, so with his other hand he held tightly to the wooden rail because he was so dizzy that he saw dancing spots—not unlike the fireflies in his dream.
He began the climb down the gauntlet his daughters had named the Steps of Death.