26
Several hours later, I’m taking off my snow-caked boots and walking over to the fireplace to warm myself after cleaning the path to the smokehouse.
I can’t feel my toes, my fingers might have fallen off from the cold, and the sun has already climbed over the white glare outside.
The clock stares back at me with its ten-a.m. accusation.
A red apple catches my eye, sneering from the wooden bowl in the middle of the table, and though I remember the tart sweetness of the last one, I also remember what came after it.
My stomach doesn’t care about trauma, though. As I approach the table, reaching for the fruit—
Elias appears at the entrance and tosses a bundle of keys onto the table. They strike the wood with the finality of a guillotine blade.
He’s already suited up with his balaclava on and goggles atop his forehead.
‘What are those for?’ I ask, eyeing the silver.
He then flings a piece of cloth and another pair of goggles right over the keys. ‘We’re going into town.’
My shoulders pull back as a chill slithers down my back.
I glance up at him.
My heart flips. The road beyond him flashes in my mind. The cabin shrinks behind me. No locked doors. No Elias. Hunger forgotten. Freedom.
Then he looks from the keys to me, and the frame collapses.
Searching his eyes for the tell-tale glint of a taunt or warning reveals nothing. Just the stubborn, glacial blue.
‘Don’t tell me one camera session made you so self-conscious you decided to let me go.’
‘No one’s holding you down,’ he says flatly, pushing the bundle of cloth, goggles and keys across the table towards me. ‘You’re driving.’
He turns and opens the door like he hasn’t just put both our necks in my hands.
I look at the keys, then whip my head up so quickly pain bites through the side of my neck. ‘The snowmobile? I’ve never driven a snowmobile!’
‘Not a factor.’ He jerks his chin towards the outside and stalks out.
My mouth drops open.
Is this another punishment?
The red book winks at me from the bookshelf through the open bedroom door. My jaw sets.
I should have skimmed it ahead to brace myself in case decided to re-enact something from it again.
Please let there be no snow-fucking-mobiles in the damn story.
My eyes flit to the flames dancing in the hearth. Then back to the red cover as I listen to Elias’ footsteps getting further away.
I consider what he might do if he caught me introducing the two.
A hard swallow barely passes through my throat when I decide to leave it where it is.
The sight of the paperback pulls me back to what happened in the early hours of the day – to the unresolved quiet that has never quite lifted since.
After snatching my camera, he disappeared indoors only to return several minutes later in winter gear.
Avoiding eye contact, he shovelled the snow behind the cabin, working harder than the task required.
With our standoff brought to a halt, I’d watched him for another beat, then started at the opposite end of the path near the smokehouse, because the alternative was standing there with all that we’d done to each other still bleeding between us.
When he turned towards the animal shed, I knew better than to follow.
The animals would take food from his hand without asking what he did with it last night. They would breathe steam into the cold, shift in the straw and let him exist beside them without demanding a confession.
So I stayed away and let him have that silence.
We sorted the chickens, busied ourselves with the generators, had our breakfast cereal – from a single bowl. All done in silence.
Even now, neither of us apologises. Neither mentions last night’s dinner, or the camera. His shoulders stay locked beneath his coat. His eyes never come up to mine.
I pull the cloth over my head and realise it’s a balaclava when it closes snugly around my face. The goggles go on last, atop my forehead the same way he wears them. The navy snowsuit follows, then the boots.
Outside, he sits astride the snowmobile, boots braced in the snow, the heavy bulk of the engine beneath him like a waiting beast.
His eyes, framed by the narrow opening in the fabric, hook into me and hold as I approach. When I’m close, he scoots back and taps the seat.
‘Is this going to be another groping session?’ I jab.
The humour drains from his eyes as they settle on his gloves, and he pulls them on slowly, smoothing each finger as if every one requires that much attention.
I regret the words immediately.
‘Sit.’ The command is quick, clipped.
I let the words die and slide to the front of the seat between his knees, my back grazing his chest.
He takes one of my hands, bringing it up to the handlebar. ‘Throttle,’ he says, pressing my gloved thumb gently against the right-hand control. ‘Don’t stab at it. Coax it. Ease your thumb into it. Feel it.’
The cadence slams into my ears and invades my body before I can brace. A finger – in my mouth. That same unbearable slowness. Heat spreads through me, split almost instantly by the cold memory of what else his hands are capable of.
He shifts my hand, his palm closing over the back of mine for half a second too long. The engine answers with a low, contained growl.
And fear kicks in.
‘Brake,’ he adds, guiding my finger to the lever on the left handlebar. ‘Pull to slow. Not all at once unless you fancy being airborne.’
‘This is a bad idea.’ It shakes out of me.
His chin comes to rest beside my shoulder, the angle familiar in all its terror, as if measuring what I can take.
Last night flashes through my eyes. I close them to wait it out until it’s gone. My palms are already damp inside the gloves. I flex my fingers around the grips and discover I’ve been holding my breath. Every muscle goes rigid, bracing for what came next last time.
‘No gears to worry about.’ He nudges two fingers resting over the brake on the other side.
My heart stutters, but I don’t dare feel relieved.
‘The transmission does that part for you. You give it power, it decides how much of it you deserve.’ His thumb strokes once over my knuckles as if by accident.
His voice has dipped to that low growl he sometimes adopts when he’s close to me.
God, yesterday he had me pinned inside a choice that wasn’t one. Today, he plays the patient teacher again, waiting until my grip loosens. That does terrible things to the part of my mind that wants clean categories, clear boundaries. Monster. Man. Threat. Shelter.
My body, though?
No respect for any of those categories.
‘Punch the throttle and the track can break loose or dig us in. Smooth is what you want.’
Punch. Break. Smooth.
‘Right…’ I stammer, looking from one handle to the other. ‘No pressure. Why are we doing this, again?’
He leans forward, pressing slightly into me. ‘Survival. Your feet stay planted on the running boards,’ he says, touching my knee and pointing at the metal beneath our boots. ‘Knees soft. Weight low. Turn with the bars and move your weight with them. Don’t fight it with your arms.’
He waits a beat, like he wants me to say yes, sir.
‘Aren’t you afraid I’ll run away?’
He hums, but it comes out as a growl. ‘Run?’ The murmur is low, but I hear it. ‘Don’t tease me.’
‘What?’ I twist towards him, but he manoeuvres me back into position before I can make sense of it.
‘When I tell you—’ he continues as if he hadn’t dropped a threat. Or a taunt. ‘Ease the throttle in. Don’t fight the machine. Let it take the tension before you ask it for more.’ His words fall against my ear. ‘Like loosening your grip on a book without meaning to let go.’
I scoff. ‘Of course you would make that comparison.’
His mouth quirks against the fabric on my neck in the faintest suggestion of a smile.
‘Well then. Let’s avoid the trees. That way.’ He points ahead and pulls his goggles down.
I mirror him.
‘Oh my God…’ I murmur.
‘It’s going to be fine.’
‘We’re going to die.’
‘At least it’s sunny.’
I glance ahead, the low winter sky already painted in oranges, pinks and blues. And then I remember I’d forgotten to take my fucking phone.
I’m the stupidest captive alive.
Alive…
Well… not for long.
The snowmobile shoots forward. My throat produces a sound I refuse to acknowledge as mine as we surge over the packed snow.
I force one breath through my nose. Then another. Thumb steady. Arms loose. Eyes ahead. His instructions arrange themselves into something usable.
It’s like riding a bike.
If the bike wanted to kill me.
The track bites and the world snaps into motion.
Snow blurs beneath us, the engine’s vibration climbs straight up my spine.
The cold air knifes through the gaps around my protective layers just as we skim past the smokehouse.
It’s behind us in a heartbeat – gone – swallowed by distance as the terrain opens before us.
The plain stretches out, unbroken and luminous, and Elias shifts with me.
Then his hand closes over mine and nudges my thumb deeper into the throttle.
We surge faster. My insides pitch. Adrenaline detonates in my chest, clashing with the memory of yesterday’s chase.
The machine climbs over a low drift, and we lift enough to make my lungs forget how to work, then land with a jolt that makes my teeth click.
Elias’ body shakes against mine with the impact, solid heat bursts between our layers, and my hands clamp harder around the bars as the machine charges onwards.
It carves a line across the open white as I steer in a wide arc around it.
I feel it again, Elias’ chest moving. A rough and unrestrained sound vibrates through his throat and into my back.
Is he…?
Laughing?
My gut is still somewhere behind us, but a laugh of my own presses against the back of my teeth. I try to bite it down, but it comes anyway.
In the short time I’ve been here, Elias has taught me many things about myself. Good and bad.
And the bad, I’ve realised, also comes with its own kind of thrill.