Blood On The Snow: Part Three
Jack
We plan to leave today. Lizzie wants to leave as soon as possible. She wants to be back before Christmas. We’re taking a week off school. We won’t miss anything. It’s the holidays next week. I made her promise that if we haven’t found him in a week, we’ll turn back. She’s not happy, but she agrees, we can’t leave the twins for Christmas.
I told my mother we were going to look for him. She tried to stop me of course, but, like Lizzie, she seems to think James is still out there somewhere, and wants him found. Maybe she’s bored of looking after the twins yeah right. She loves those kids like they’re hers. They practically are. She’ll look after them while we’re gone.
We all leave at normal time. They’ve been staying at ours since her father went missing just over a week ago. We’ve got everything together. Tent, sleeping bags, food, oh for goodness sake! This is crazy we can’t survive out there! We can’t carry enough food for a week, let alone two! How are we going to carry all that stuff for days through the woods? We can’t go into the woods full stop!
No-one goes there unless a) they’re crazy, b) they’re hiding, or c) they want to die. Lizzie seems to think her father is in category b). Which is fine. As long as this crazy search doesn’t put us in category c).
When we get to the bus stop in the main village, we put the twins on the bus with my mother. She’s taking them to school. I look at Lizzie as she waves goodbye. She looks like she’s trying not to cry as she waves goodbye to Ella and Marcus as the bus leaves. She doesn’t want them to see her break down. She doesn’t want them to know she’s upset. I know her too well.
We walk back to the house and grab our bags. I’ve got the tent and most of the food, she has the sleeping bags and her “necessities” bag (all hygiene stuff, baby wipes and hand gel and some tissues. Honestly why can’t she just have a rinse in the river or something?) and a change of clothes for both of us, and some water bottles. The bags are huge. We bought them at the hiking shop in the village on Friday. The tent is a work of art, really light, and springs open really easily. It’s quite small though, just a two-man tent. It was quite cheap, but might be a bit cold. The food is quite heavy though, all tinned rubbish. I’m not looking forward to eating it, it looks disgusting. Oh well. It’s the best we can do.
We reach the edge of the woods, and I can see she’s scared. She’s shaking slightly, though that might just be from the cold. The snow is still on the ground, but the sky is blue and clear.
Lizzie
I stare into the darkness of the trees. I’m glad I brought my torch with me, we’ll probably need it. Those trees are making it pretty dark in there. I turn and look back at the house I’ve lived in all my life. It looks lonely and forlorn without my father.
I haven’t really gone inside since he went missing. We’ve been staying at Jack’s. His mother’s so good to us. I did go in once, but just to get some clothes for myself and the twins, and some other necessities. I had thought that some of the things had moved from where I left them the morning he disappeared, but could that be wishful thinking? I hadn’t wanted to look inside my father’s room, because, despite the fact that the police had done a pretty thorough inspection of the place, I still felt like there could be a body falling out of the wardrobe, propped up behind the door. That’s stupid, I had thought, my hand resting on the doorknob, you know he’s alive. You wouldn’t be going to look for him otherwise. But I still couldn’t make myself go in.
I stood staring at the house, a tear dribbling down my cheek, until Jack asked quietly, “You sure you want to do this?”
I nearly say no, and ask to go back, but I can’t do that now. I need to do this. I have to do this. I turn away from the house for the last time. “Let’s go.” I say. We walk forwards into the darkness. Immediately I almost trip over a stray log. Jack grabs my arm, stopping me from falling. “Careful,” he says, a hint of a smile in his voice, “It’ll get easier when we find the path.”
“There’s a path? How’d you know?”
“I came in here once a few years ago, for a dare,” he says, with a little laugh.
He’s a few metres ahead of me, much better at this hiking thing than me, despite the fact he has about five kilos of food in his backpack. “I had to stay in for ten minutes. I decided to have an explore, and about two minutes in, I found YES!” He’s stopped walking, and as I catch up with him, I see he’s found a path, of sorts. “We’d better follow this for a bit. Then at least if we need to turn back, we know where we are.” We start to walk down the path. I’m already slightly breathless. I’ve walked to the bus stop every day, but never across uneven ground with a huge backpack on my back! I hope it doesn’t kill me.
“I brought a map of the woods.” Jack says conversationally. “It’s not a very good one. I’ve got a compass as well. We can track the route we’ve taken, so we don’t get too lost, and can retrace our steps if we turn back. I’ve done it in Geography and D of E”
“OK.” I say. We walk further down the path, and lapse into silence, as we wade deeper into the woods.
News Categories Creative Writing
Organisations Cardiff Duke of Edinburgh's Award
Info Family & Relationships Separation and Loss
IMAGE: Winterwald by cosmo flash
1 Comment – Postiwch sylw
Tansi
Rhoddwyd sylw 65 mis yn ôl - 15th December 2010 - 16:40pm
thats going really good. im really enjoying this!