11. Open Ice #2
“Probably.” Connor shrugged. “Come on.”
Caleb studied their joined hands, then Connor’s face. They were both different somehow.
“It’s minus sixteen out there,” he said.
“Closer to minus twelve, I think. Besides, we won’t be long.”
“We’re going to die.” He laughed as they sat on the couch naked, pulling on thick socks and tying on their skates.
“We’re not going to die,” Connor scoffed.
“We’re going to die and Jessie is going to be very confused when she finds our bodies.”
Caleb laughed, a real one, the helpless kind as he was pulled toward the door.
The cold hit like a wall. The air on bare skin left no room for any other thought. They stood on the cabin step for one suspended second, Connor making a sound that was equal parts profanity and laughter. Caleb pulled him onto the narrow path Connor kept swept between the step and the bank.
They ran the few yards to the bank. Caleb hit the ice first. His feet almost went out from under him, but muscle memory saved him from a sore ass and nothing to show for it.
Connor followed, somehow still upright, already counting.
“Let’s do this!” he called, and the laughter carried through the trees.
They pushed onto the near end of the bay together. Nothing about it was sensible, but for one fast circuit they did it anyway. Caleb’s blades cut into the surface. The cold was extraordinary, every nerve awake, every inch of skin reporting in with something between outrage and exhilaration.
Connor caught up with him. Their hands found each other and they carved one quick turn together, reading each other’s movement the way they did on the ice and in each other’s arms. The cold, the sky, and the trees made it strange, new, and beautiful.
The boreal forest stood around them and said nothing.
Caleb let go of Connor’s hand and spread his arms. Cold struck every bare inch of him. His breath tore out in another laugh. There was nobody he had to cover himself for, nobody to obey or fear. There was only Connor swearing behind him and the thick, dark ice under his blades.
He turned and found Connor skating in a slow circle, face tipped toward the sky, dark curls loose in the cold air. His eyes were closed. For once, he was not waiting for someone to need him.
Connor opened his eyes, found Caleb’s across the ice, and grinned. Then he said, loudly enough to carry:
“My body.”
“What about it?”
“It is extremely cold, Caleb.”
“We’ve been out here forty seconds.”
“It’s been longer than that. And we’re completely fucking naked.” He was already turning for the bank. “This was a bad idea. This was a terrible idea. I want that on record.”
“It was your idea!” Caleb called after him.
“You’re a bad influence,” Connor said, with great dignity, skating toward shore as fast as his extremely cold feet would carry him.
Caleb laughed until he was bent over on the ice and his own body registered serious complaints.
Then he turned and skated after Connor. They scrambled up the bank and made a deeply undignified dash across the snow in their skates, which was much worse on the way back.
They burst through the cabin door into the warmth of the fire and slammed it behind them.
They stood in the middle of the cabin floor, dripping slightly and breathing hard, and Connor took in Caleb with the expression of a man reassessing several things simultaneously.
“I’m too old for this shit,” Connor said.
“Baby,” Caleb teased.
“My feet,” Connor said, “are not attached to my body anymore. They have made their own decisions and left.”
“You’re so dramatic,” Caleb said.
“I’m frostbitten.”
“You’re not frostbitten.”
“How do you know? You were homeschooled.”
Connor’s smile faltered at Caleb’s stunned expression. Then Caleb collapsed to the ground laughing, and Connor dropped beside him, laughing too.
Connor pulled him close and pressed his cold nose against Caleb’s neck, which was not fair, and Caleb yelped, and Connor said, “Too cold. Your fault.” They lay in the middle of the cabin floor holding on to each other, laughing.
The fire crackled. Afternoon light came through the window at a low angle. Outside, the lake was still and white under the blue sky, holding the marks of their blades until the next snow covered them.
Later, when the feeling had returned to everything, they sat on the couch in their underwear, under a blanket, watching the fire burn down. Their skin thawed against the wool blanket. Every few minutes one of them remembered the sprint across the ice and started laughing again.
And then they were quiet together. There wasn’t anything that needed to be said, at least not yet. The rest could wait.
September meant Thunder Bay, ninety minutes away. Saturday nights in a faster, more competitive league. Coming back afterward, turning off the highway onto the gravel road and seeing smoke from the cabin chimney through the trees. Connor watching from the door as he drove up.
He still didn’t know how any of it worked. He didn’t know whether distance changed things, or what maintaining their relationship would cost. What he did know was that he intended to find out.