September 2009

by Heather S. Ingmar

He peeled back the dirt and felt the cool touch of the air on his skull. Tom shuddered, bones clacking like bare tree limbs; he couldn’t stand the cold. He’d been cold too long, and that was that. Enough.

A woman screamed not far off. Tom peered with eyeless sight between the gravestones, searching for the source of the noise and saw them: a large man dragging a woman up the gravel road.

“Boy, have I got plans for you,” the man said, grinning. He showed too many teeth, like a predator. The woman scratched, bit, and tore at the parts of him she could reach.

“Over my dead body,” she growled.

“That can be arranged.”

Tom watched him haul her — tripping, stumbling, pulling her through the mud — across the worn cemetery paths. Then, he began to dig, shaking with pain as the chill air washed over his bones. He hated the dirt, hated being cold, but by God, he’d break himself in pieces before he’d come crawling back to it! Dirt skated between his thin fingers, and he worked harder, uncovering his ribs, pelvis, femurs, the white of himself a beacon in the dark earth. He was free then, and it was all he could handle to pick himself off the grass. But standing gave him strength and moving made the cold-ache a little less, a little less.