Let There Be Light

by Melissa Storm

  Once she was certain the dogs were okay, she flopped down next to the sled and peeled off the heaviest of her soaked layers. The cold wind stung but felt warmer than the water-logged parka.

  The thick body of Lenny dropped onto her with a thud. She couldn’t even feel the impact of the nearly eighty-pound dog against her chest. The fire continued to burn low, but the rest of the dogs crowded around her, warming her and licking her and taking care of her like she’d done for them.

  She must’ve fallen asleep in the warm embrace of the sled team because when her eyes opened next, the fire had dulled to embers, and the colorful wonder of the Aurora Borealis stretched into the stars. Was this God’s way of telling her she would be okay, or was she instead being welcomed through Heaven’s gates?

  As long as she was alive—however long that might be—she would fight. Although sharp pain stung at her feet, she needed to force herself up and stoke the fire to a blaze once more.

  Sleep threatened to overtake her, but she needed to find the energy to keep going. Somewhere. Somehow. If they stayed here, they would all die. Even unhooked, the dogs would stay at her side until the last of them succumbed to winter’s cold embrace.

  It wouldn’t be much longer now…

  Scarlett didn’t remember closing her eyes to sleep, but when she opened them again, a blinding white light forced them shut once again. Her retinas stung, and her arms and legs felt like dead weights tying her to the earth.

  She’d thought that the pain ceased in death, that she’d be weightless and free enough to stand on a cloud. The dogs barked and whimpered, some of them rising to their feet. She felt the movement all around her but couldn’t see. It was either pitch black or blinding white, and neither gave her sight.

  Floating now. Up toward Heaven, rising like an abductee toward the light. And then the dogs’ yips and yipes became words.

  “Scarlett? Scarlett! I need you to stay with me!”

  Lenny? she thought or said. She didn’t know which.

  “Lenny’s here. He’s the one who helped me find you. It’s going to be okay, Scarlett. I’ve got you now.”

  Jesus? She chanced opening her eyes again and when she did, she was greeted by a pair of mismatched eyes—one blue and the other amber mixed with green.

  Henry!

  She had so many questions to ask, but no strength to ask them. Not yet.

  How had he found her? Why had he stopped his race to help her? Didn’t he hate her? Hadn’t she hurt him beyond redemption?

  “Stay with me, Scarlett,” he said, wrapping her in a dry blanket and holding her in his arms as he moved around his sled. He raised a cup to her lips and made her drink. The hot liquid lit a fire in her belly, warming her from the inside out. Slowly, she was regaining her strength.

  “We need to get you to the hospital, but I don’t want to move you until I’m sure you can handle the journey back to the next checkpoint in Safety.”

  “How?” she asked, finally strong enough to put voice to her words.

  “Are you starting to feel better?” he asked with so much hope in his voice. “I’m going to get you some dry boots and socks from my pack.”

  “How did you find me?” she asked again.

  Henry talked to her while he rummaged through the belongings on his sled. “When I made it to Safety, I made sure to check in on your progress like I’d done for most of the race. I wasn’t always on your heels, but I was close enough that I would place as well. When the officials at Safety said you hadn’t checked in yet, I knew something was wrong. I waited a bit before I took off back towards White Mountain. There was a break in the weather just long enough for me to hear your team down here.”

  He returned to her side and worked her boots and socks off, replacing them with the oversized pair in his hands. He finished his story with a smile. “Then I saw Lenny, and he led me to you.”

  But something about his story didn’t make sense. “You turned around and went backward?”

  “Yes, I had to. I knew something was wrong. I just felt it. And I knew it would be easier for me to find you on the sled. Easier to retrace your steps.”

  “But the race, the bucket list, all that money,” she argued.

  “I told you before and you didn’t believe me. Money isn’t everything. Some things are so much more important.” He dropped a heat pack into each of her boots and then hugged her tight to his chest again.

  “But, but, you hate me. I’ve been so awful to you. Said all those horrible things.”

  Henry laughed softly and placed a dry kiss on the top of her head. “No, I don’t hate you. I have loved you since the first time I ever laid eyes on you, Scarlett. All our bickering, all that hate, it wasn’t hate at all. I just want to be near you. I just want to see you happy. If I have to lose the race to protect that, then I will.”

  “But your family?”

  “Will disown me probably, but it won’t matter if I have you. Please tell me we can start again. Please give me the chance to show you the real Henry Mitchell, III.”

  Scarlett said nothing. A part of her was so confused by this declaration and sacrifice by her star-crossed rival, yet another part had always known, had never stopped feeling for him. Could that feeling be love?

  “You can’t give it all up for me, Henry,” she whispered at last. “I’m nobody.”

  “You’re everybody to me. You’re the first one who saw me—me—not my money or my name. You saw me once, and I’m hoping you can again. The race isn’t important. The money isn’t important. This, this is what matters.” He kissed her head again. “I’ll scratch. We both will. We’ll go straight to the hospital, and I’ll stay by your side until you no longer want me there.”

  Scarlett had a life-changing decision to make in that moment, and even without thinking it over, she knew exactly what she wanted, what she needed.

  “No,” she said, and Henry’s sob rung out into the air.

  “I understand.” Henry openly cried as he spoke to her now. “At least I’ll have tried, and I’d still do it all over again, too. Saving you now is the best thing I’ve ever done, but I plan to do so much more good with my life now, too. I’ll make you proud to have known me.”

  “No, I don’t think you do understand.” Scarlett pulled out of his warm arms to look at him face to face. “We’re not going to scratch. We’re going to finish this race. Together.”

  “But you need a doctor,” he argued, worry setting into his handsome features. Even now, even when he thought she had rejected him, he still wanted to be sure that she would come out of this okay.

  “And I have one, at least a future doctor.” She smiled at him, hoping he would understand, hoping he would take her words to heart. After all, words had power. “I’m feeling much stronger now. I’ll go to the hospital after, but Henry, we are so close. We need to finish this.”

  “And what… What about us?” He asked the question as if he were afraid to find the answer.

  “Well, you were right,” she whispered in nervous anticipation of what came next.

  His brows furrowed in confusion and his mouth fell open, but no words escaped it.

  Scarlett leaned in closer and said, “I did want to kiss you that first night, and many times since. Oh, Henry, when I hated you, I loved you.” She only took a quick moment to admire the blissful expression that lit up his face. Because she couldn’t wait another second when it had already been such a long year. Finally—finally!—she pressed her lips to his in a life-changing, life-giving kiss. At last fire and ice were one, both stronger together.

  “I won’t let you down. I’ll make everything right,” Henry promised, happiness dancing in his eyes.

  “First, we finish. Then hospital. Then whatever comes next.” Scarlett rose to shaky feet, determined and faithful.

  “Together?” Henry asked, rising to join her.

  “Together.”

  “Okay. Let’s get you to Safety.”

  The irony that the next checkpoint was n
amed Safety did not escape Scarlett, nor did the sacrifice Henry had made simply for the chance that she would love him in return. She would give him everything, though she had nothing much to offer. He, on the other hand, had forfeited riches, reputation, and possibly the love of his family—all because he considered her the ultimate prize.

  After securing her weakest dogs in the two sleds’ baskets, Henry helped balance the remaining members of Scarlett’s team. And as they continued on, he refused to leave her side, which meant sticking to larger swaths of land as the finished their journey.

  At Safety, they dropped some of Scarlett’s dogs, leaving her team at just eight now, matching Henry’s team which had been winnowed down during the earlier parts of the race. Henry tried a few times to get Scarlett to just finish the race out on his sled, but she remained adamant about needing to finish for herself.

  Twenty-two miles later, they reached Nome together, hands clasped between their sleds as at last they crossed the burled arch, completing the race that had changed both their lives and brought them to each other. The race that gave their lives a new light of hope.

  It was a race they hadn’t won—in fact, they’d finished dead last—but they’d now won so much more. And they’d done it all together.

  Scarlett saw Lauren waiting for her just beyond the Burled Arch. As soon as she’d stepped off from her sled, Scarlett’s friend rushed over to grab her in her arms.

  “I was so worried about you. When you didn’t come in… I thought. Oh, Scar. Don’t you ever scare me like that again!” she cried, kissing her friend’s cheeks in an almost maternal way.

  Lauren turned on Henry next. “And you!” she shouted before taking him into her arms, too. “You saved my Scarlett. That makes everything else water under the bridge as far as I’m concerned.”

  Scarlett shivered. “D-d-don’t say water, please.”

  “Oh, oh! We need to get you to the hospital. Are you still in shock? What happened? Tell me everything.” She put an arm around each of them and guided them toward the nearest building. “You, Henry, tell me everything. Scarlett, just rest up, save your voice.”

  “I’ll be fine, Lauren. The dogs kept me warm until Henry found me. My feet still feel like giant blocks of ice, but I’m fine now.”

  At the hospital, the doctor informed Scarlett that she was lucky to be alive.

  “Don’t I know it?” she answered, thanking God once again for how things had turned out. It had taken a disaster to finally bring her and Henry together. Why hadn’t she listened to His still small voice before He’d needed to shout?

  She did lose a toe to frostbite, but it was a small price to pay for the adventure she’d had. “Big deal. So I won’t wear open-toed shoes,” she’d told a very concerned Lauren. “My racing days are over anyway.”

  “What will you do next?” Lauren and Henry said almost in unison.

  “Go to the awards banquet to support my friend. It’s not too late, is it?”

  “Don’t you want to enjoy some time out of the spotlight for a change?” Henry asked from his seat beside her in the hospital room.

  “Heck no!” she cried. “This is the only Iditarod I’ll ever run, and I want to make sure I’m there for the grand finale.”

  The night of the banquet, she wore the same purple, jeweled dress she’d had on when she’d first met Henry at the previous year’s ball. Henry placed a matching silk hankie in his suit pocket to coordinate with her gown and officially declare their newfound couplehood. They arrived together, arm in arm, smiling exhausted smiles but refusing to miss out on the evening by giving an endless series of interviews.

  “Henry, is it true you failed the challenge?” a reporter asked.

  “I won the only one that matters,” he answered, giving Scarlett a quick kiss on the cheek. She could picture the headlines now: Would-be billionaire trades it all in for love!

  “Do you have any regrets?”

  “Just that you’re keeping me from this lovely evening. Could we maybe talk later?”

  Surprisingly, the press backed off… Only to be replaced by a different mob, and this one was far less happy to see them.

  “It’s not just your life you’re playing with,” an elegantly styled woman hissed. “We needed that money, too.”

  “So you’ll buy a smaller mansion on the coast,” Henry told his aunt with a shrug.

  “How could you?” another family member asked as he shook his head in a more relaxed disappointment.

  “Some things are more important than money,” Henry answered before dipping Scarlett and giving her a full, dramatic kiss.

  When they both came up for air, they saw his family departing with swift, agitated movements.

  “Henry, I’m so sorry,” she said, not knowing what other words of comfort she could offer in that moment. Just as he’d predicted, his family seemed to have disowned him, leaving him both penniless and nameless in the process.

  Henry smiled at her and kissed the top of her head, even though he had to stand on tiptoe to do it. “I don’t care. Honestly, it’s a relief. Now we can actually enjoy the evening.”

  And so they made their way through the room full of mushers, many of whom wanted a word with Scarlett, Henry, or both. Previously, Scarlett would've been starstruck or just in awe of all the mushers she'd followed for the past several years. But now, she was in a room of friends and colleagues. She belonged to this crowd, and it welcomed her with open arms.

  Lauren, who had finished in fifth place and set a new record for top finishing time by a female musher, had also needed to work hard to make her way through the crowd of congratulatory well-wishers.

  At last they made it to their table and sat down together.

  "Quite the experience, isn't it?" Henry said to them both as they watched the emcee cross the stage.

  "Yeah. I'm just in shock,” Scarlett whispered. “I didn't know so many people were rooting for me."

  Lauren kept her voice at full volume, however. "People love an underdog story. Heh, heh? Get it?” She held a hand over her mouth to silence her laughs.

  “People love you,” Henry said, squeezing Scarlett’s hand under the table. “And how could they not?”

  They kept their hands clasped in each other’s as they watched the winning mushers collect their awards. They clapped and cheered, especially when Lauren accepted her prize, and with it, a hefty purse of prize money.

  It all made Scarlett wonder what would be next for her. She’d already decided that this would be her last race, and she’d been fired from her job at the library. So what next? Yes, she got the guy, but they were both broke and unemployed, which meant…

  Henry interrupted her then by bringing his face close to her ear and whispering, "I can tell you're thinking really hard about something right now, but look alive. It's almost time for our award."

  Scarlett blinked hard at him, but the vision didn’t change. “Our award?" she asked.

  He kissed her on her forehead and kept his lips there as he growled, “C’mon, bookworm, you can't tell me you don't know about the Red Lantern Award. The prize for finishing last?"

  Scarlett still felt foggy and was having a hard time following. ”A participation trophy?"

  Henry laughed kind-heartedly at her confusion. “Not exactly. I mean, it started off as a gag gift, but mushers soon started to see it as a badge of honor. Overcoming all obstacles and still finishing the race. That sound like anyone you know?"

  Sure enough, in the next moment the announcer boomed, “And the winner of the Red Lantern Award this year… We have a tie between Henry Mitchell, III and Scarlett Cole!”

  Scarlett blushed as she and Henry took to the stage and claimed the Red Lantern, their own little light for overcoming the big darkness.

  Somewhere deep down, she felt the pride Henry had mentioned. There were several mushers that never made it to Nome. Some lost bits of themselves to frostbite like she had, and some had to drop so many dogs they couldn't complete the race. But s
he had set out to run the Last Great Race and—by golly—she'd finished it.

  The evening came to a close, and Scarlett felt nostalgic for this time in her life already, knowing it had now officially ended. It was time for the next great thing, the next adventure. After a few more interviews and lots of goodbyes, she and Henry made their way toward the exit, ready to call it a night.

  “Henry, could I have a quick word?” a man Scarlett hadn’t seen before said as he approached them both.

  “Thaddeus, of course! I’m sure my family has already had several with you.” Henry shook the other man’s hand. His smile seemed to suggest that this was a welcome interruption. “Scarlett, this is my attorney. Well, my granddad’s anyway.”

  Thaddeus adjusted his cufflinks and chuckled. “Yes, your family did have a lot to say, but they missed something important by leaving early.”

  Henry raised an eyebrow in disbelief. “Oh, and what’s that?”

  “Well, according to the stipulations of the will, you didn’t need to place in the top ten to complete this bucket list item. You only needed to place.”

  Henry looked confused as he tried to follow the lawyer’s logic, but Scarlett understood it perfectly.

  “And he did by winning the Red Lantern!” she shouted.

  “Yes, he did,” Thaddeus said with a grin. “I always knew you could do it. The estate is yours.” He reached out to shake Henry’s hand again, and then to shake Scarlett’s as well. “You’re a wealthy man, Henry Mitchell, III.”

  “Yes, I am,” Henry answered, smiling over at Scarlett. “Yes, I most certainly am.”

  One year later

  The months passed, and Henry and Scarlett retired from racing together. At first they’d agreed to give interviews discussing their newfound love and the completion of Henry’s Billionaire Bucket List. Soon, though, they began to shrink from the public eye.

  Scarlett learned that she’d rather report the news for herself. She started out as a freelancer, but soon had a full-time gig between writing stories about the sport and its players as well as beginning her own adventure novel. She’d read great stories, she’d lived great stories, and now she would write them to share with others.