The Children's Blizzard

by Melanie Benjamin

  Or was he still at home, still warm and safe, sitting with Anna, laughing with his children? Had he ever, in all those feverish weeks, spared a thought for Raina once she left his house? Now she doubted that. Before, she would have passionately believed that his every waking moment was spent thinking only of her. But something had shifted in her today. Maybe it started that night, when he so quickly turned from her to Anna. Anna, her hair burning bright around her shoulders, her white nightgown, embroidered extravagantly with pale blue flowers. Anna, a butcher knife in her hand.

  Gunner had not tried to overpower his wife; he’d quivered and crouched with fright, not stood tall with defiance. He’d knelt before Anna, coaxing her back down the stairs, until the knife fell to the floor with a clatter, and Gunner scooped Anna up in his arms, took her to their bedroom, and shut the door behind them. Leaving Raina alone in the attic, her mind still buzzing with all the unwanted thoughts and emotions he’d forced upon her. He’d invaded her bedroom, dared to kneel by her cot, rest his hands on her shoulders, whisper his plans in her ear. Tease her desires by telling her they were going to leave. Not asking her. Telling her.

  Because to him, she was just a silly girl to whom he could do whatever he wanted. Because to him, she was a plaything. There was nothing noble in his devotion. It was vanity—she was a mirror, reassuring him that he was a man who could make a young girl lose her head. A reminder that as a man, he could take whatever he wanted.

  The taste in her mouth was bitter, sour.

  Suddenly she felt a tug; the apron string around her waist was taut. She stopped.

  Tor was standing next to her, little Sofia in his arms, the other children, tied to them both, in a curved line between them. Only Sofia’s eyes were visible; Tor had taken his own scarf and wrapped it about her head. Tor’s face was red and raw, his ears a purplish hue. But his eyes were earnest and true. And worried.

  “Miss Olsen, the little ones can’t go much farther. Rosa and Eva and Albert are barely upright.”

  Raina glanced at Arvid, right behind her, manfully trying to conceal how wretched his breathing was, but his lips were nearly blue. She nodded.

  “I know, we need to find shelter. How far do you think we are from your homestead?”

  “If we can pick up the pace a little, I think we’re not too far. We have to be careful of that creek, it’s not deep but it wouldn’t do to get wetter than we are. But I think we’re only a few rods away.”

  “Right. Can you carry Rosa, too? Untie Eva and bring her up to me. I’ll see if I can carry them both.”

  “Miss Olsen, I can walk,” little Enid whispered, and Raina almost cried. She shook her head.

  “No, dear, I don’t think you can, but you’re so brave, Enid! Such a brave girl!”

  “Miss Olsen,” Tor began, but Raina placed her hand on his arm.

  “Raina,” she said, looking into his eyes. He’d earned the right to call her by her name. Whatever happened after this, the two of them couldn’t go back to being teacher and pupil. They were equal, now.

  Tor might have blushed, had his face not already been burned by the freezing wind and snow. He did look embarrassed.

  “R-Raina. I don’t know that you can carry them both.”

  “I can. So can you.” And that was all there was to say; Tor trudged back to the end of the line, untied Eva, and half carried, half dragged the child up to Raina. Raina smiled at her, whispered into her ear, “We’re almost there, we don’t have far to go.” And then she—with Enid still on her back, the girl’s arms tightly around her neck—bent down and lifted Eva up.

  Raina snuggled the child in her arms. Then she shifted her around until she could find the right balance, and started moving again.

  It was much harder to stay upright with both girls clinging to her, but there was the added benefit of their body heat, such as it was; she wasn’t as cold, at least her torso wasn’t. Her feet still felt like blocks of ice, and her fingers were losing feeling.

  She walked and the children trudged behind her. One more step. Another. Someone in the middle fell over, she felt the tug at her waist, a jumble of cries, then whoever it was scrambled back up, and the bunch of them inched forward, forward, forward.

  How much longer? How long could they take it? Children were crying behind her; she wanted to tell them not to, to conserve their energy, their body fluids, but she couldn’t stop now. She didn’t even dare pause to take the roll call; if she stopped, she wouldn’t be able to go on. Enid and Eva were quiet, too quiet; they did occasionally stir, but she could almost feel their heartbeats slowing, like clocks winding down. They were fragile, delicate. Bodies were sturdy things—hadn’t Papa always said that? But he was wrong. Bodies were no match for this ferociousness, it wouldn’t stop. There were no breaks at all in the snow dancing up from the ground to meet the snow plummeting from the sky. If only it would stop, just for a moment, so she could see something, anything. If only God would make it—

  Stop.

  For a miraculous moment, everything stilled; the winds paused, as if the heavens had taken a collective breath. It would be let out again in an instant, Raina knew, so she paused, and desperately looked about her; nothing was familiar. She didn’t see anything of note, just the grey landscape, and she was about to burst into tears of frustration when she heard a shout behind her.

  “There!” It was Tor; there was pure joy in his voice. “There—see, Miss Olsen! To the right! We’re almost there!”

  Squinting to her right, Raina looked and looked, and finally she saw it—a light. Faint, barely yellow, but a light, and then she could make out the greyish blob surrounding it, and she knew it was a house. Then she saw that there were more lights, lights in every window.

  “That’s our house! There! So close—we can make it now!”

  She would have sworn it was miles away but then her eyes adjusted further, and she realized they were practically upon it. But they had been heading slightly to the left, south of it; if they’d continued on in that direction they would have missed it entirely. It was a miracle, pure and simple. A miracle that the clouds had parted to show them the way.

  Raina had just enough time to see the footbridge over the little creek; she turned slightly, aimed right at it, and started forward just as the clouds descended once more, obscuring the house, the bridge; they were enshrouded again. But now she knew she was headed in the right direction, and all she had to do was take about thirty steps and she’d be at the footbridge. She counted them, aloud—one, two, three.

  She was at twenty-one when her foot hit the edge of the rough wooden planks. She stopped, felt bodies running into one another behind her, heard Arvid wheeze in surprise. Turning, she shouted back at Tor, although she couldn’t see him; in the span of twenty-one steps the storm had descended with fury, more terrible than before.

  “The bridge!” she shouted at the top of her lungs. “We’re at the bridge!”

  Carefully, she knelt, settling Eva on the ground; the little girl’s eyelashes were glued together with sticky ice, so Raina gently tried to melt the ice with her own frozen thumb until she realized she was rubbing the child’s cheeks raw. But Eva was finally able to open her eyes; she looked dazed, stupid. Raina tugged at Enid’s arms, and the child slid down off of her. “See the footbridge, Enid?”

  Enid, her face pinched with fatigue, nodded.

  “We have to cross it, and you get to be the first! I’ll let you children cross first in case it can’t hold up for us all, and then somehow I’ll get over and we’ll race to Tor’s house, where I bet there will be cookies and a hot fire! Don’t you want to be the first one there?”

  Enid nodded, but looked terrified. With so much chaos swirling about, this bridge—it barely deserved the name, for in the summertime the children could leap over the creek, skip across the planks, it would be a lark, a game. But now it seemed a bridge t
o eternity itself; the far side was missing, the destination appearing to vanish into the angry heavens.

  “Go slowly, Enid. Just put one foot in front of the other.”

  Enid took a big breath, and she put one tiny foot on the edge of the board; a gust of wind nearly pushed her over but Raina grabbed her just in time, snatching the little girl back. These little ones couldn’t do it, they wouldn’t make it. She and Tor would have to carry each of them across.

  Raina untied the apron string from her waist, shouted for the others to do the same. Tor came huffing up, Sofia clinging to his back, Rosa in his arms. He set the girls down.

  “How far is it once we get over the bridge?” Raina asked, struggling for breath. All of a sudden, she felt as if she couldn’t get enough oxygen inside her lungs; she was dizzy in an already-swirling landscape. She reached out for something to steady her, and Tor grabbed her arms so she didn’t topple over.

  They both stood that way, gasping for breath, linked together, for a moment that was both too brief and too long; there was not a second to be spared. The storm—the withering cold, the gravelly, icy snow, the exertion it had taken to get this far—was taking its toll on them all. Especially the children.

  “It’s about twenty yards,” Tor said. “But we have to be careful; there’s a gap between the barn and the house and if we miss either of them, we’re back out on the prairie.”

  “I saw the lights in all the windows, back there. Hopefully we’ll be able to see them again once we’re closer. But we have to carry the little ones across the bridge, they’re just too weak to do it on their own.”

  Tor nodded, picked up Sofia, who flung her arms about his neck and buried her face in his shoulder. “I’ll go first.”

  He started across the bridge, one foot carefully feeling for the board. It was only about five feet across but once he got in the middle, an enormous gust pummeled him and he began to sway; Raina cried out.

  But he bent his head down and remained upright; through the curtain of weather, Raina could just barely see that he scooted toward the end of the bridge and quickly set Sofia down on the other side, instructing her to remain where she was, not to move an inch. Then he was back across the bridge, reaching for Rosa, who shook her head and started to cry.

  “No, no, no!” she screamed, and the poor thing was so tired, so disoriented, she tried to fight Tor off. But the young man patiently picked her up anyway and started back over the bridge on wobbly legs. Raina held her breath, but a taunting gust of wind blew up more snow that obscured him; she couldn’t see if he made it, she could only wait. It seemed to her she didn’t breathe at all until he was back. His eyes were tearing up and he had to keep rubbing them so they wouldn’t freeze. His ears—uncovered since he’d given his scarf to Sofia—were dangerously purple, and Raina worried that there would be permanent damage. He was reaching out to get Enid when Raina stopped him; he had to rest.

  “I’ll take her,” she said, and she picked up the child, who latched her arms about Raina’s neck.

  Suddenly Raina was aware of her skirts; heavy with snow and ice, they felt like an anchor about her legs. On the prairie, on solid ground, she’d rejoiced in their protection. But with one foot on the edge of a piece of wood ten inches wide, hovering above a pit of deadly snow and ice, even if it was only about three feet below, she panicked. She wanted to give the girl back to Tor but she had to do her part, she had to pull through with him; he couldn’t do it all.

  “Papa, Papa, I need you,” she whispered. Because it was Papa who had always encouraged her to try harder, work harder, run faster, test her muscles to the limit; Mama might say he pushed her, pushed both girls, too hard, and maybe he had. But only out of necessity.

  What she would do to have him here now, coaxing her, smiling down at her with his proud eyes, never for a moment entertaining the notion that she might not succeed. She could never let him down. Neither she nor Gerda could; it was a pact they’d made when they were smaller. They could never let their papa down.

  So Raina took the first step onto the bridge; she tensed against the onslaught of the wind, the girl in her arms stirred enough to surprise her off her balance, and she tottered for a moment. Her skirts wrapped around her ankles in a sodden, frigid clump. But she fought them, took the next step, eyes open as far as they could be in the punishing wind, desperate to see something, anything, to help her stay balanced, stay on the right path.

  Another step. Another. She heard sobbing right in front of her, and she knew the other girls were there, waiting miserably as Tor had told them; she was almost upon them. And then one more step, and she was bending down to deposit Enid when she heard a muffled cry, and a squishy thump, below.

  In the creek. Someone had fallen in the creek.

  “Enid? Sofia? Rosa?”

  “It’s Rosa,” Sofia cried. “She fell down!”

  “Tor! Tor?” Raina shouted, but she didn’t know if he could hear her.

  “Teacher, Teacher!” Rosa cried weakly, then she sobbed.

  “Stay right there, Rosa! Don’t move, I’m coming for you.”

  Raina pulled up her skirts, took a breath, and—praying she wouldn’t fall on top of the girl—jumped into the creek.

  CHAPTER 17

  •••••

  EACH STEP WAS A VICTORY. Had she really run, free as she had ever been, across this endless prairie? It was impossible to remember now that each tiny step took all her concentration, seemed to deplete her heart and lungs so thoroughly she had to pause and rest before she could take the next step.

  Fredrik, still clinging to her, had stopped crying; he could only keep saying, “I’m scared,” but less and less often. Sometimes, he whimpered for his mother.

  “I’m scared, too,” Anette admitted, when her brain seemed to spark back up again, just for a quick second, before it was overcome by the cloud of confusion that was growing with each moment. Once she was able to pull her thoughts, which lay like fallen stalks of corn in her mind, together just enough to say, “We just have to find the ravine, the bridge, then we’re home.”

  Fredrik, still crying, nodded.

  Then they took another step.

  At one point she became aware she was humming a song, something long forgotten—from the dugout, from her mama, from her babyhood. It had no words, it was just a simple tune, the notes rose and fell and rose and fell, and it wasn’t pretty at all. It wasn’t melodic. It was the sound a simple-minded person would make to comfort herself. And so maybe her stepfather had been right along: Maybe Anette was stupid. Sometimes she’d thought she wasn’t, really—she was just constantly weary and lonely, trapped in a body so sturdy it fooled people. A girl built for work and nothing more, and her sadness made her not care what they thought, most of the time. It made her not care about much of anything.

  Maybe she was leading Fredrik farther and farther away from home, maybe he was foolish to trust her, but he had given up. She could see that—feel it, as his hand was so limp in hers. He was only moving because he was linked to her. And she was too stupid to give up.

  Maybe it was a good thing, then, that she was so dumb. She almost laughed.

  But then she was falling, falling, Fredrik tumbling against her, knocking what little breath she still had out of her. They plunged through an ocean of snow, she was on her back looking up at churning clouds of snow that dumped their contents on top of her. Then they both stopped moving; they had reached the bottom.

  Of the ravine, she realized, too stunned, too immobilized by panic to cry out. They’d found the ravine, after all. She had been right; she had been going in the right direction—but it was a hollow victory now.

  Fredrik, next to her, began to moan as he pushed himself onto his elbow. He looked up—it was impossible to tell what was sky and what was earth, everything was one color, one substance—icy grey mixed with swirls of white. He pulle
d her into a sitting position, and they brushed the snow off their shoulders, their faces, their heads. Then he rose, looked around, tried to find a handhold to pull himself up the steep bank, but everything was coated in snow and ice. Not a blade of grass, not a stick, not a tree root showed itself. They couldn’t be at the very bottom of the ravine, with its tiny, snake-sized rivulet of creek; it was filled with the snow of all the previous storms. But they still must be a long way down. Far enough that they would be hidden from the sight of anyone looking out a window or stumbling across the prairie.

  Pushing herself up, she stood next to Fredrik. She tried to crawl back up the slope, but her hands were too numb, she had no strength; she slid backward, and still she tried. So did Fredrik; they were on their hands and knees together, two babies unable to balance on their feet, and they made it a few more inches before once again, they slid backward. There was no more strength in her, in him; she felt weak as a rag doll, and now she couldn’t feel her feet anymore as she realized she was standing in a slushy pile of icy snow up to her thighs. The snow on the prairie had been hard-packed, and they hadn’t stood still long enough to have it drift around them, but down here, protected from the wind and the stinging bullets of ice, the snowfall was more treacherous. Anette cried out, shouted for help, so did Fredrik, but their voices were hoarse and weak. The frustration that they might only be fifty yards from shelter, from the Pedersens’ house or barn, almost flattened Anette; finally, wrung out, gasping for air but shivering too violently to get a good breath in, she fell backward into the snow. Her legs refused to propel her back up.

  Fredrik fell down, too.

  But he sidled next to her, and put his arm around her, pulling her in close. And despite the cold, the dark—twilight seemed to have come in the middle of day, the clouds were so thick between earth and sun—Anette felt, in that moment, happy.