The Cold Kiss

by John Rector

  “What kind of disputes?”

  “Whatever’s asked of me.”

  “Is it boring?” Sara asked.

  “Can be.”

  We let the subject drop and a couple minutes pass, then Sara looked back at Syl and said, “What about us running into each other out here? That was luck, wasn’t it?

  “Depends on how you look at it.”

  “I look at it like we’re five hundred dollars richer, and you have a ride to Omaha.”

  Syl laughed. “You might have me on that one. And who knows, maybe you’re right. Maybe it does all come down to luck, good and bad. I don’t know for sure, one way or the other.”

  His voice sounded tired, and he coughed again. This time it came from deep in his chest and shook his entire body.

  When he stopped, Sara said, “Syl, are you sure about not seeing a doctor?”

  “Positive.” He took a white handkerchief from his pocket and wiped at his mouth, then he leaned back against one of the black garbage bags we’d used to pack Sara’s clothes. “I think I just need some rest. If you don’t mind, I’m going to try and get some sleep.”

  “All right,” Sara said. “But if you change your mind about the doctor—”

  “I’ll let you know.”

  Sara watched him settle in, then she turned and looked at me. I saw the concern in her eyes.

  After a few minutes, I looked at Syl in the mirror and saw his eyes were closed. I thought he was asleep, but then he spoke.

  “Nate, did you tell anyone about this trip?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Does anyone know where you’re going?”

  “Not really,” I said. “A few people know we’re getting married, but not when or where. I figured we’d tell them afterward.”

  “What about your cousin in Reno?”

  “We planned on surprising him.”

  “How about you, Sara? Your parents know you’re out here?”

  She shook her head. “It’s our secret.”

  “Why do you want to know?” I asked.

  Syl didn’t answer, and when I looked back at him in the mirror, his eyes were closed.

  When I was positive he was asleep, I touched Sara’s leg and motioned toward the backseat. “He’s out.”

  She turned to look. “He must’ve been exhausted.”

  “Let’s hope he sleeps the entire way. Talk about easy money.”

  “Don’t you think he needs a doctor?”

  “He says he doesn’t.”

  Sara paused. “You don’t think he has something contagious, do you?”

  I hadn’t thought about it until just then, and the idea stopped me for a moment. Then I decided it didn’t make any difference. If he was contagious, it was too late to do anything about it now.

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “Just don’t kiss him.”

  Sara rolled her eyes and mouthed the word “gross.”

  I smiled then reached over and squeezed her leg. She put her hand on mine then leaned back and closed her eyes. Her skin was soft and warm, and after a while, she was asleep.

  I drove on in silence and snowfall.

  5

  We’d gone almost seventy miles when it became clear we weren’t going to make it to Omaha. The road was completely covered and the falling snow shattered in the headlights, making it impossible to see. I had to slow down to school zone speeds to make sure I didn’t take us into one of the drainage ditches running alongside the highway.

  It’d been almost twenty miles since I’d seen another car, and I felt a sense of emptiness that I couldn’t shake.

  We were completely alone.

  At one point we passed under a single streetlight glowing yellow on the side of the road. I had no idea why it was out there in the middle of nothing. There were no houses or crossroads, just that one lonely light covered in a swarm of snow.

  Occasionally, I’d see huge drifts off to the side. After the third or fourth one, it occurred to me that there could be cars buried under them, possibly with people inside.

  The thought was enough to make me sit up and focus on my driving and the road ahead. If I didn’t pay attention, and we went off the road and got stuck, we could die.

  Sara and Syl were both asleep. I leaned forward and turned on the radio for background noise, but we were too far out and there was no signal. I searched the dial and finally found a static-filled voice talking about the weather and the coming storm.

  It was the last thing I wanted to hear.

  If I needed to know how bad the storm was, all I had to do was look around. If it was worse than what I saw outside the car, I didn’t want to know.

  I turned the radio off.

  A few more miles slid by, then I saw a sign for a motel up ahead. I thought it might be a good place to stop and wait. There was no telling what else we’d find out here, or how much farther we’d be able to go in the storm.

  It was time to take what we could get.

  I glanced up at Syl in the mirror, and at first I thought his eyes were open, staring at me. It was hard to tell in the dark, and I watched him until I was sure they were closed.

  When I looked back, the road had curved.

  I turned the wheel, sharp, and felt the back end of the car slip sideways into a snowdrift. I spun the wheel the other way and the car fishtailed from side to side, then straightened and we were back on the road.

  My heart was beating heavy in my chest, and once I was sure we were safe, I did my best to calm down.

  Sara opened her eyes.

  “What was that?”

  “What was what?”

  She sat up, slow, then leaned forward and looked out at the dark sky swirling above us like smoke in a jar.

  “This looks really bad.”

  “We’re okay,” I said. “Just slow moving.”

  I could feel my hands shake, and I squeezed the steering wheel as tight as I could to keep them steady.

  In the backseat, Syl made a choking sound and I glanced up at him in the rearview. Even in the near-dark of the car, his skin shone pale and wet.

  Sara turned around and said, “Syl, are you okay?”

  No answer.

  “I think he’s still asleep,” I said.

  Sara stared at him then unbuckled her seat belt and climbed up on her knees and reached into the back.

  “What are you doing?”

  She didn’t answer me.

  I looked over and saw her holding her hand against his forehead.

  “Don’t touch him,” I said.

  “Nate, he’s burning up.”

  I reached over and put my hand on her hip and tried to pull her away from him. I didn’t have the leverage to do much, but Sara got the hint and let herself be pulled.

  “We need to stop somewhere,” she said. “He needs a doctor.”

  “He said he didn’t want one.”

  “I know what he said, but I think he’s really sick. I mean, really sick.”

  I looked back at him again.

  His skin was so white it looked blue.

  She was probably right.

  “I saw a sign for a motel up here somewhere.”

  “As long as there’s a phone.”

  We hadn’t passed anything resembling civilization in over twenty miles, and I didn’t have a lot of hope for the motel. If we’d been on the main interstate it would’ve been easy to find a phone, even a hospital. But we weren’t. This road was a long, two-lane scar cut through fields and farmland. There was nothing out here but us.

  Sara got up on her seat again and reached into the back and shook Syl’s shoulder. “Syl?”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to wake him up.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I think he should be awake.”

  I tried to keep my eyes on the road, but I kept looking back to see if he’d wake up. He didn’t, and each time he inhaled, a muddy wet wheeze sounded from somewhere deep in his chest.

&n
bsp; I was starting to worry.

  Sara shook him again, over and over, calling his name each time. Eventually his eyes opened. When they did, they were distant and unfocused, not really seeing.

  He mumbled something, but I missed it.

  “We’re going to find you a doctor,” Sara said. “Do you understand?”

  “She’s here, isn’t she?”

  “Who?”

  He tried to sit up, but Sara stopped him.

  “Where is she?”

  “Who are you talking about?” Sara asked.

  “Lilith, she’s here.”

  Sara looked at me.

  I shrugged.

  She sat back in the passenger seat then turned toward me and tried to smile. “Well, at least he’s awake.”

  I looked in the mirror and for a second, Syl’s eyes cleared and he tried to sit up. It didn’t work, and he struggled for breath. The sound rolled out of him like a scream, and when he spoke next, his voice was harsh and strained.

  “You have my money.”

  “We’re going to find a doctor, Syl. You’ll be okay.”

  “No doctor.”

  “It’s not a choice,” Sara said. “You’re burning up and you sound—”

  “I said no fucking doctor!”

  He coughed hard, and I could hear the pain underneath. When he spoke again, it was through clenched teeth.

  “We have to keep going,” he said. “She’s following us. She knows I’m out here.”

  “Who?”

  “The whore.”

  I could tell he was fading again, so I said, “Who’s following us?”

  Syl ignored me. “You can’t have it. I won’t let you take it.”

  “Take what?” I asked. “What are you talking about?”

  Syl closed his eyes, didn’t answer.

  I looked at Sara. “What the hell is he talking about?”

  “No idea,” she said. “He’s delirious.”

  I stopped looking back and focused on the road. I could still hear him breathing and mumbling about liars and money. Every now and then he’d raise his voice and accuse us of being thieves.

  I wanted to tell him that he could have his money back, and he could walk the rest of the way to Omaha, for all I cared, but of course I didn’t.

  As far as I was concerned, we’d earned that money.

  Every cent of it.

  Sara tried to keep Syl awake, but after a while she gave up and sat back in her seat. “We have to pull over somewhere, Nate.”

  “I know it.”

  “We need a phone.”

  “I know it,” I said. “That motel is supposed to be up here somewhere.”

  I noticed she was shaking and I put my hand on her leg and squeezed. “It’s okay.”

  “Jesus, Nate, what if he dies back there?”

  “He’s not going to die.”

  I wanted to keep her mind off Syl, so I reached between the seats for the road atlas then held it out to her. “See if you can tell where we are. Maybe there’s something listed.”

  She took the atlas and turned on the overhead light. The glare made it hard to see the road, and I leaned forward against the steering wheel.

  “Did we pass Norrisville?”

  I told her we had, a long time ago.

  She read off a few other towns, and eventually we figured out where we were.

  It wasn’t good.

  We had another thirty miles to the next major turnoff and another twenty from there to the interstate. At the speed we were going, it would take hours.

  I hoped the sign for the motel had been right.

  “Oh my God, Nate.”

  “There’s nothing we can do,” I said. “Let’s just let him sleep.”

  Sara looked back at him for a long time, then turned and stared at the road ahead and didn’t say a word.

  The highway was nearly invisible behind the snow, and I was beginning to think the sign for the motel was wrong, or that we’d passed it in the storm, when I saw headlights flash along the side of the road.

  Sara saw them, too, and she sat up fast.

  “What’s that?”

  I wasn’t sure.

  The headlights flashed again, then we saw a car turn and disappear behind what looked like a small house. When we got closer, I saw several small buildings, all wood, and all spread out around a parking lot. It looked like a motel, but there were no lights in any of the windows and the neon sign out front was black.

  I felt my stomach sink.

  “I think it’s closed.”

  “There was a car,” Sara said. “Someone’s there.”

  I slowed down and felt the tires spin against the snow, then I turned into the parking lot.

  I could see the outline of a palm tree above the motel’s sign. The neon letters under the tree were blacked out but big enough so that I could still read them in the dark: THE OASIS INN.

  There was a main office behind the sign, and I pulled in and stopped across from the front door. A line of buildings stretched out in two directions from the main parking lot. Beyond them, just past the range of my headlights, I saw the storm-faded shapes of playground swings and slides.

  “Are they open?” Sara asked.

  I told her I didn’t know.

  No lights were on, but there was a soft amber glow coming through the windows. Someone was inside.

  “I’m going to knock,” I said.

  Sara looked back at Syl. “Just hurry, okay?”

  When I got out of the car, the wind hit hard and sucked the air out of me. I kept my head down and kicked through the snow toward the front door.

  There was a covered walkway out front that ran the length of the building. Once I got under it, I looked back and saw Sara leaning over her seat and holding her hand against Syl’s forehead.

  I didn’t like to see her touching him.

  Contagious or not, I wanted him out of my car as soon as possible. It wasn’t the kindest attitude, but right then, I didn’t care.

  What Syl needed was a hospital.

  Once we found one, he’d be someone else’s problem. Maybe they could track down Lilith, whoever she was, and get her to come and take him home.

  Either way, it wouldn’t be my problem.

  The five hundred dollars he paid us was great, but there were limits to what I’d do for money.

  6

  I tried the door, and when it didn’t open I leaned against the glass and looked inside. There were several candles set up along the front desk and in the corners of the office. They were lit and they filled the room with a soft gold light.

  I could see an open door along the far wall, and beyond it, the jagged reflection of a fire burning in a fireplace.

  I tried the door again then knocked on the glass.

  A moment later a shadow moved in the back room and a man came out into the office. He waved to me then came over and turned the lock.

  I stepped back and let the door swing open. When it did, a set of welcome bells chimed above me.

  The man in the office was small but built thick. At first I thought he was just a kid, then, when my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw the deep lines on his face and the aged green tattoos on his forearms.

  He definitely wasn’t a kid.

  “Sorry about that,” the man said. “We make it a habit of locking up after dark. We’ve got a late-night buzzer, but the damned thing ain’t working tonight.”

  He stepped away from the door and I went in. The room felt as warm as it’d looked from outside.

  “You get turned around, too?”

  “What?”

  “Highway’s closed up by Ridgemont.” He walked around the front desk. “State patrol’s not letting anyone through tonight.”

  “I didn’t see any cars out there.”

  “We’ve had one or two, but most people aren’t crazy enough to be out in this storm, especially on this road.” He waved me off. “No matter. Tonight’s a bad night for guests anyway. It’s probably fo
r the best.”

  “You got a phone?”

  “Sure, but it’s down. Phone’s out, power’s out, nothing’s working. We’ve got gas heat, thank God, otherwise—”

  “No phone?”

  “No nothing,” he said. “We got running water and warm rooms and that’s about it. I was back in the kitchen moving food into coolers so it doesn’t go bad, just in case we’re stuck like this for a while.”

  “Any idea how long?”

  He pointed to an old dial radio on a shelf behind the desk. “I got this thing running on batteries, but all it tells me is there’s more snow coming, like I needed to be told.”

  “How about a doctor? Is there one around?”

  “Not close.”

  “A hospital?”

  The expression on the man’s face told me the answer.

  “There’s no hospital around here,” he said. “There’s a clinic about forty miles north in Frieberg, but you’re not going to get there tonight, not in this storm.”

  I felt the frustration build in my chest and I could feel myself slipping. I did my best to stay calm, but when I spoke again there was an edge to my voice.

  “If there’s no doctor, what do you people do if someone breaks an arm or a leg, then what?”

  “Well, that’s never happened that I can recall,” he said. “But if it did, I suppose we’d have to get someone to give us a ride to the clinic in Frieberg, but we can’t really do that tonight, can we?” He spoke slowly, like he was talking to a small child. “You have been outside, right? You’ve seen the snow?”

  I turned away and walked back to the door and stared at my face reflecting gold in the black window. I forced myself to calm down, then I went over my options.

  There weren’t many.

  “You got someone sick out there?”

  I told him I did, and that it might be something serious.

  The man nodded. “I feel for you, but all we’ve got here is a warm place to rest.” He paused. “There’s a chance the phones might be back up tomorrow. If they are, we can call for an ambulance.”

  “Sounds like my only choice.”

  “Yes, it does.” He reached behind the counter and took out a blue notebook and a pen. “No way to get into the computer until the power’s back, so you’ll have to pay for the room later. I’ll take down some of your information now, if you don’t mind.”