Presenting the turkey to the family, Carol sits down to enjoy her hard work with her most loved ones during her favourite time of year. Tucking in, they were all thankful they were together after a long hard year for everyone involved. Carol took a moment to think, pausing to watch her family, she watched as her sons and daughters tucked into their dinners while her husband carved the meat with pride at what she’d provided for them. It was a moment of total personal validation for her, this was everything she needed.
“Oh, honey, we’re running out of wood for the fire, can you pop out and get some? Its your turn.”
Her eldest son Michael, having finished his first plate of the best food he’s ever had the pleasure of eating, rises from the table and waddles to the door. Sliding his cosy toes into the stiffened hiking boots for protection from the outside elements. Shrugging a warmed parka over his back he steps out into the back garden and the path is gone, covered in several feet of snow. In the distance a faint glow from a lamp beckons him to the wood cabin where the spare wood is kept. The snow fell silent and densely packed, the weight of the top layers pressing the lower depths into hardened drifts as Michael trudged through the waves of ice to cross the garden.
The snow had gathered around the doorway, Michael had to take a moment to clear the snow necessary to be able to pry the door open slightly and to quickly shut it behind him in order to keep the heat in and the cold out.
Gathering a heavy sack of the best logs, he shoves it out of the door and shuts it behind him as he steps back towards the house. Stumbling and falling onto the wooden porch, the snow packed onto the roof slides down in one fell swoop and throws him off onto the layers of white below, spreading the bursting sack onto him, anchoring him to the ice. Buried in snow, he lays there struggling to move as the ice compacts his legs and arms. He could feel his remaining natural arm on the left and his remaining leg on the right begin to soak and chill in the frost as he called for the family waiting for him.
“Michael should have come back by now.” Carol declares, looking to her husband for agreement.
“He loves that cabin, he’ll be back when he wants to be back.” Michael’s father Colin stokes the fire as he watches the embers dance in the updraft flowing out of the chimney into the dark night sky.
Fading from consciousness, Michael catches the faint glow of yellow as he loses sensation in his forearm and calf muscles. Watching the white fade to black, tears freeze on his cheeks as he breathes a final chilled sigh.
Several hours pass. Carol’s expectation of a log delivery from the other end of the garden wears thin as she watches the final crackles of the fire dwindle into the kindling. Standing upright, warmed by a creamy yuletide nog, she dons her own winter gear to travel out in search of her son.
Closing the back door of the house behind her, the snow picks up and pelts her with flakes larger than the stuffing balls she’d enjoyed hours ago, they stroked her face as she lifted her boots high to bring them back down into the crunch, step by step. With a gasp, she approaches the cabin to see a swell of steam rise from a circle of exposed grass and scattered logs as Michael lies on his side in the mush.
Carol grabs Michael’s own arm, reaches for the METAL arm and her hand connects with the synthetic flesh with a sizzle as she feels an intense buzzing heat sear through her palm. Recoiling in shock, she angles herself carefully so as to support his own arm and chest as she drags him up into the cabin and the welcoming warmth.
Colin remembers Carol left for the wood half an hour ago and wonders if he is missing out on some sort of dessert in the cabin that she took for her son. Slipping on his own boots and tying his dressing gown, he sprints for the cabin and slides in a large patch of mud before the step up onto the porch. Carol is on the floor, Michael in her arms wrapped in a blanket with his head resting on her shoulder, METAL arm and leg steaming.
“Call the company honey, he’s burning up.”
Colin glides over the snow in a fluid motion to call METAL as Carol nurses her son.
“Please give me a Christmas miracle this year, God, I’ll never make another request again.”
She watches as the snow begins to pile up against the door once more, sealing them in flake by flake.
The Next Chapter 