Snowfall Fields

Snowfall Fields

Cold white snow against my back as I lay in a snowy field. My black jacket protecting me from the cold only slightly, my jeans, not so much. I spread my arms out as I lay, large flakes fall continuously. The sun shining off the snow, blinding. A hint of wind gusted snow up from the piles all around me and onto my face, down my jacket. I lay motionless, staring at the sky as the clouds were faint wisps over the pale blue background. I could lay in the temporary frozen tundra for hours. I felt the wind bite at my uncovered flesh as I inhaled the crisp air. I closed my eyes only momentarily and when I pried them open again. The sky was dark, stars in clusters all over like multiple holes in a blanket. The moon hovered graciously overhead as I stared, rubbing my eyes. I removed my cellphone from my frozen clothing and turned it on. The illusion of warmth inside my body from drinking. The bottle hidden inside my jacket. I stared at the illuminating light from my phone. Multiple missed calls and text messages but none from my father whom I was momentarily living with. I read some of the texts, some asking if I was ok and where I was, others asking if I wanted to ‘hang out’. I deleted most texts, except one from a close friend. I responded short.

“I’m in the snow.” I replied, waiting for a text back. I took the bottle from my jacket and took a couple shots, by the time I was done my third, she responded.

“What the hell? I’ve been looking for you all damn day! Where are you?!” I could tell how frustrated she was so I just put my phone back in my pocket, taking a few more shots and putting it in my jacket again and laying back with heavy eyelids. My breath relaxed to a slow pace until I felt something touch my leg, I ignored it at first, thinking my body was just twitching. I felt it again, it grasped tighter around my ankle. I shot up and looked down at my body and noticed nothing, I felt my phone go off again. Ignored. The breeze picked up and its teeth was more vicious to my skin, covered and uncovered. Snow happened to creep up the cuffs of my jeans and jacket as I moved. I picked up a fist of snow and crumpled it into a ball, I moved it to my mouth and put it past my dry lips and on to my weak tongue as I bit a chunk from the body of the snowball. This big empty field of soft snow, burning my skin with frost. My body tingled from the temperatures, the cold on the outside and the warmth on the inside. I stood up and walked with frozen joints. Ice my hair and slight beard, luckily I was also wearing a toque, not that it did much but it was better than nothing. My phone started to go off again in a different vibration, indicating a phone call. I ignored, my stiff fingers kept jammed in my coat pockets as I walked uphill. My feet dragging, as I looked back, it seemed like a zombie trialed through behind me. I turned back around, ignored the slight pain of my skin. My tired blue eyes gazed over the hill as I got to the top, I looked around, confused, I turned around and looked about the scenery. Usually there’s an apartment building just over the hill a few feet but it wasn’t there. Nothing was here except me and the cold. Nothing else existed but the snow that covered every inch of the ground, the few trees cluttered in a line at the bottom of the hill, the hill, and myself. Everything else was just a continuation of a snowfall field. I took out my phone that hadn’t vibrated for a while now and as I looked at it, I took a mitt off to call my friend back. The moment my stiff thumb reached the first number, my phone melted. As the remains dripped from my covered palm, it turned to snow. I put my glove back on and pulled the bottle from my pants, tucked away to hold it. I grabbed it by the neck and removed the cap, accidentally dropping the cap. I pressed the opening to my liquored lips and started to chug. After a while, the bitterness disappeared and all I could taste was snow, water. I looked down to see that I only had the neck of the bottle in my hand, the rest then melted away. I dropped the neck of the bottle and took a step backwards and just to my luck, I caught my foot on a snow covered rock. I tumbled down the hill, hearing my body slam against the ground countless times until I reached the bottom. I lay there on the snow, my body heavy and surging with pain. Limbs feeling broken, my body warm but frozen. Frost crisp and sharp as I inhale, lungs feeling punctured with icicles. I rolled onto my side from my stomach, looking at the dent in the snow where my face impacted, and finding red snow. I felt my mouth, everything numb, I hadn’t noticed that my teeth pushed through the tip of my tongue, my bottom lip and had ripped off a bit of my cheek. My mouth covered with a river of red. I hoisted myself to my feet and almost fell over again, having sprained my foot and perhaps tore a ligament in my knee. I turned to look up the hill as wind exhaled harshly, blowing snow down the hill towards me like a tsunami. I turned to cover myself as it pushed against my backside, almost knocking me over again. I faced away from the hill, towards the cluster of trees that seemed a small amount from a distance. I felt a strange calling, looking into the clot of trees. I hadn’t looked back to the hill, I put a hand on the nearest tree as I took a step into nature. For a moment, everything, even the recent pain was numbed. I crept deeper and deeper, not seeing an end to these gloriously tall beings.  Snow covered everything like an empty canvas as I got deeper. I limped through, the sound of snow under my feet decreased as I reached a brick pathway. It seemed as if someone was just here and brushed the snow away. I followed the stones on the ground as it lead me to a small paved circle with a bench and a pond in the middle. My feet moved on its own as they carried me to the bench, sitting for a moment of time. I sat back, resting my numbed limbs again. Blood still dripped from my mouth, I hadn’t realised until I felt the buttons on my jacket. Covered in the iced blood that glued my jacket together, I removed the gored glove and walked to the pond, kneeling beside it. I took my gloved hand and smashed through the thin layer of ice, washing my dirtied glove with the pure, cold water. I took it and tried to scrub off the blood from my jacket, it was barely working. Another soft whisper of wind crept up behind me as I continued, I felt a presence behind me, pressed to my back. I forgot how to move as it grabbed my shoulder.

“You can’t wash away the past…” A voice spoke softly into my ear, I turned around to see a silhouette of snow standing " no " it was hovering. She reached her hand down for me to grab. I was hesitant, but I grabbed her hand. My hand turned black with frost as it bit up my flesh, changing its colour to death. I tried to get my hand away, but with every tug, she just gripped tighter. When her grasp weakened by choice, I fell backwards into the pond. Breaking through the ice that was once thin, was now thick. A piece of ice stuck out of my lower side, blood curved out of my body and grabbed onto the ice, slipping off slightly. I tried to get up, holding myside, the blade of ice between my four fingers. As I got myself into a knelt position. I heard ice crack beneath me. Moss and plants in the pond, water to my ankles. I stood up slowly and cautiously, but it kept cracking. Blood kissing the ice sticking from my side, I held tighter, I dragged a foot with caution to the edge, trying to bring the other foot along with it. Trying to do so caused the ice to shatter beneath me. I was sucked in just as quickly as a tornado inhales its surroundings.

I felt myself floating, numbed, and content. My body felt lifeless, even though I was still alive. My breath seemed faint, my pulse was slower than usual. I opened my eyes, feeling hard material against my skin. I looked down, seeing myself in a tub. Steaming water grasped my bare body. The blood from my mouth transferred to cuts on my wrists and thighs. The water was translucent, mists of red blurred the bottom of the tub. I got up, carried my drained body from the blood bath and wrapped a towel around my waist. The floors creaked with each step, I walked past a large mirror to see my reflection but the mirror was steamed up only where my face was supposed to show. I took my body out of the room, red fluid dripped down my finger tips and down my legs as I walked. I started down the stairs to be accompanied by my own lonesome, or so I thought. I moved to the door, leaving bloody foot prints behind. I opened the door to be acquainted by a gust of wind that knocked me over, throwing my towel off and away from me. I lay naked on the floor of the cabin as a dark silhouette stood in the threshold. It wandered towards me in little zig zags. I hadn’t bothered to cover myself, the cuts on my body still bled.

“You want pain?” Its voice deep and mysterious, it echoed in my head.

 “No…” I muttered in reply.

“Then why do you harm yourself…” Its voice more asking a rhetorical question.

“To get the pain out…” the blood on my body dried to my skin, irritatingly.

“Do you think that helps…?” Sounding knowledgeable and aggressive.

“For me, it helps me feel better about things.” I started to get up but the demon slammed his foot on the ground, shaking the cabin like an earthquake.

“It’s all for you, all about you. Do you ever think about how your family feels when you try to hurt yourself?” I just kind of stared at him. He turned away and left the cabin. I got up and looked around, I noticed that the cuts on my body turned to scars. I walked my bare body to the front door, placing a foot outside the threshold. I exhaled, my breath visible like a large cloud of smoke. I heard creaking behind me as I walked out further. I turned to notice the cabin as just a stage prop of the front of the cabin, it began tilting towards me. I watched as it came down upon me.

Tucked into a ball, my hands held my head and the back of my neck. I opened my eyes to see the surroundings changed to a creek, sitting on a wooden canoe. The water pushed and pulled as I paddled to the nearest shoreline. I removed myself from the rickety canoe and stepped onto ice particles attached to the dirt, cracking as I took strides cautiously forward. I found myself fully clothed in winter attire with a hunting rifle on my back and shells in a little bag on my side. I followed the creek. I walked softly on the frozen leaves and hard snow. I left the rifle to hang from my back, needing both hands to warily cross patches of ice every now and again. I brought myself to a water fall, the creek spilling over with surprizing ease. I watched as I got closer to the cliff. I looked down, a circle of water that spilled over with crystal clear water, my legs trembled at the distance from me to the splash.

“Gavin!” A woman’s voice playfully shouted from below. My eyes scanned the area below to find the girl I’d always dreamed of. The girl that made my heart flutter and my stomach twist into a thousand knots. My palms grew sweaty, she shouted my name again. I didn’t want to jump but she told me to, saying she already had.

“If you don’t jump, someone is going to push you!” Her voice echoed, then she giggled. I turned around to the rustling of the bare tree tops clapping branches. I saw nothing so I turned back around, the crystal clear water turned deep red, the grey illuminating light changed to red as if the sun was bleeding underneath the overly clouded sky. I felt planted, literally, like my feet had roots coming out of them. I looked down, watching roots crawl to my feet and latching on.  I reached around to my little bag and searched for something to set me free, finding a knife. I sat down, the roots pushed through my boots and slithered under my skin. I placed the knife against a root and started to cut, slicing deep with one stroke of the blade, I screamed. It felt like I was cutting off a finger, blood pushed from the root like a diced vein. I stopped breathing for a moment. I gained clarity, courage. I took the knife and sliced through all the roots to my foot, then the next. But before I knew it, my body was tangled with endless roots. The scent of dirt, blood and vanilla perfume filled the air as my body was being pulled into the ground like I was in quicksand. Reaching a constricted arm into the air, trying to breathe, trying to scream. I was pulled under.

“Gavin, you should’ve jumped.” Her voice whispered, lingered as it was the last thing I heard besides the sound of dirt shifting and roots tangling.  I moved my body, finding myself in yet another different area. A house, old and abandoned. I could tell just by the writing on the walls, the spray paint. The peeling paint, the floor caving in. Floorboards ripped out, poking up. I found myself laying upon a moss patch, randomly in the house. It felt like a bed, it looked like a bar of soap with the thumb print in the middle for grip. It smelt like dirt and maple. Maple, that’s weird. I got up, still in my winter attire. The rifle still held around my back. My head pounding, like a bunch of tiny men jackhammering through my skull, piercing parts of my brain. I held my head as I sat up, a painting upside down.

“Looks like a family portrait…” I groaned at my headache. I felt the need to turn it up right to respect the dead, it seemed plausible, so I got to my feet and walked to the portrait. I gripped the frame and turned it upwards. The ground shook, the sound of cement rubbing against cement tingled my ears as I turned around. A strange creature stood from the new doorway. It’s back towards me. Its legs looking burnt and skinny, its spine showing. Once it turned around, I noticed it had no eyes but a giant, gritted teeth. I looked for its arms, it started to struggle. I observed closely from my distance and realized it was wearing a straightjacket out of its own skin. It made little screeches, its vocal chords sounding off key as if its throat was hit bluntly or something. I decided to keep my distance. I tried to walk into the doorway closest to me, it being open, I could see a kitchen. I walked on my tippy toes, keeping my eyes focused on the creature, twitching and seizing, trying to get out of its own straightjacket. I grabbed the rifle from my back and turned the safety off, I wanted to make sure it was loaded but I didn’t want to make too much noise. That goal was unaccomplished due to the floor creaking, it faced me and screeched loud, running towards me. Its knees facing inward significantly as its legs spread to run. I held up the rifle and aimed for is head, missing the shot from it bouncing as it ran. I aimed at its chest and pulled the trigger, just a few feet away from me. It stood there, twitching then fell back. Seizing on the ground, I looked for something to use to kill it. I looked by where the moss bed was to find a machete. I grabbed it and rushed to the creature, I took its head off and let it roll around the floor as its jaw kept opening and closing. The rifle on my back again, holding the machete in my right hand. I walked through the threshold to the kitchen. Everything was so dark, I needed a light of some sort. As I walked into the kitchen, there were knives impaled into the fridge door. The light switch beside the oven, the oven open. I walked to it and looked in, finding a box. I got it out and tried to open it. I hit it against the counter and it popped open, a folded note and a necklace came out. I picked up the note and unfolded it.

Dear Lucy,

          I bought you this necklace to finally confess my feelings for you. I don’t

         know how you’re going to react, it will be good in my eyes. I win either

        way this ends. Don’t reject me. Just a warning. I know you’re going to

        warn Stewart about me if you haven’t already, that’s fine. What he

        doesn’t realize is that you’re mine, you’ve always been mine.

       Since the night we shared, even to now. You’re married and I’m still

       here. Waiting. Always waiting.

  

           Love,

                Winston.

 

I took the old and tattered note and stuffed it into my pocket, I don’t know why I did, and I just did. I picked up the necklace and noticed it had a little latch on it. I opened it and looked on the inside, seeing a picture of a man staring to the right where the picture of the woman was, looking sad with her head down. The woman from the family portrait. I took the necklace with me as I exited the kitchen, finding stairs, I headed up. At the top of the stairs, I heard a woman crying. I couldn’t figure out what to do so I kept the machete close. I walked up more and went through the first door on my left. A bathroom, lovely. I needed to go anyways. As I was urinating, I noticed writing on the mirror above the sink. Reading:

Your family,

   you..

      then me.

The writing was messy, it took me a minute or so to read it correctly. I found a key in the sink with a bloody finger print on it. I took it, walking out of the bathroom, I went to the room right across. Jiggling the door that was locked, I unlocked it only moments later. Pushing the door open slowly, peeking in. It was pitch black, I took a step in and heard shuffling deeper into the room. I was tempted to just back out and exit the room as quick as possible but I felt the need to be in there. My eyes adjusted to the darkness slightly and as I walked deeper into the room, my feet shuffling carefully, without noise. I looked back, the door already so far from me. I suddenly felt something touch the side of my head, everything went silent as my fear took over. I started swinging the machete mercilessly in the air. After a while, a row of candles around the room light. I watched, holding the bloody machete with a death grip. When I turned around, I noticed I had cut the foot off a man who had hung himself. I looked down to see his foot. I backed up quickly and as I did, the floor creaked loudly. I fell through the floor, darkness swallowed me whole. I fell so far down that I could no longer see the light from the hole I fell through. I closed my eyes, all I could hear was my breath and my heartbeat. It was so fast that it felt like it was trying to jump out of my chest with every pulse, every beat. After moments of waiting, I felt my body slowly drop on cushiony bed or some type of material. I sprawled out as my eyes wouldn’t open just yet. My body felt numb, like I cut off circulation and my limbs were ‘asleep’. I struggled to move as every maneuver stung, like the feeling of static or ‘pins and needles’. I eventually opened my eyes and as I looked up, I saw a ceiling fan. The one from my room. I quickly rolled over and vomited onto the hardwood flooring. It took me a while to notice, but I vomited blood. I left it there as I got up from my bed, wearing a long sleeve shirt and sweatpants with socks. I walked out of my room and headed upstairs, seeing no one. I figured I was finally out of this little hell, but not seeing my mum when I woke up really made me feel like I was still stuck. I looked out of the front window to see her vehicle gone. I sighed of relief as I poured myself a glass of water, as I started drinking it, its taste bitter to my taste buds. Alcohol. What I was drinking when I was in snowfall fields. I put the cup down and stood there confused. I slammed my fists down on the table, begging for this to be over. That I’m sorry for what I’ve done to cause me this. Tears dripped from my eyes and splashed onto the table. Suddenly, I heard crying. It sounded like my mother. I looked around to try and follow her voice but I couldn’t find it. I walked outside to see my stepdad sitting on a chair, smoking and talking to her. The crying got a little louder, he tried to reassure her, tell her that I’m fine and that everything will be ok. The fact that I was standing right in front of him and I wasn’t visible said otherwise. Was I dead? He suddenly looked at me with an odd angry look as he got off the phone with my mum.

 

“Gavin, dear Gavin. Do you know where you are?” I stood there, weary and tired. I ignored him and turned around. “You cannot leave, Gavin. You’re in my world. You’re in my hands.” The voice exited my stepdads body and followed me as my own shadow. I just kept walking. My body numb, lifeless. I walked everywhere. From my dad’s house, my aunties house, and back-and-forth. I walked to the river, walking across the Broadway Bridge, I climbed atop the edge and sat, looking down. Cars zooming by, people walking, jogging, biking. It’s funny, living in a small area like Saskatoon and seeing more faces than you’ve expected. Maybe I do see the same faces every now and again, but they look unfamiliar. Strangers, you don’t know what to expect. They could have the kindest soul or one of pure hatred and anger. I kept my gaze at the river, the water splashing against itself. Currents swirling it around itself. I leapt off. The feel of the air against every inch of my skin lingered until the water consumed me. My eyes opened underwater, just being an apparition, nothing can hurt me anymore. I looked around under the murky water. Debris swam passed me, through me. When I broke through the top of the water, I heard sirens. Ambulance, police, firetrucks. The whole nine-yards. My eyes scanned the scenery, I saw something floating right in front of me. It was cold, heavy and seemed lifeless. I tried to move it, but I went through. Realizing it was a person. People came and got the body from the river. I blinked and found myself in the hospital sitting next to the body, hearing a woman crying. It was my mother, and the boy in the bed was me. I started to remember. Remember the day I took a bunch of pills, swallowed it with alcohol right before I jumped off the bridge. I stared at my comatose body, lying motionless on a hospital bed with my mum crying into her palms. I stood over myself, brushing my ghostly hand against my real body and closed my eyes as a tear droplet splattered upon my own cheek. I then felt the strange sensation of warmth. It surged throughout my body and when I opened my eyes again, I could feel the tubes down my throat. I could feel the IV, the bed, I could feel again. I was awake, I was alive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Snowfall Fields

Danny Rae Vanghel

Tuesday, November 3^rd, 2015

Author's Note

I hope you enjoyed it, if you think anyone would be interested in reading this, please share. If I've messed up along the lines of grammar or punctuation, please don't correct me. I think it's fine how it is. If I find anything, I'll go back and fix it. Thank you.