Freeze Tag by Cooney Caroline B

Author:Cooney, Caroline B. [Cooney, Caroline B.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781453267646
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2012-08-06T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

“ONLY,” SAID WEST, “IF you bring Meghan back, too.”

His voice swirled in the dark. It did not seem like a voice at all, but like a wind, a separate wind. A dervish, perhaps.

Meghan lay frozen, stiff against the seats and the dashboard and the broken handles. Snow falling through the open door of the truck rested on her face. She could not feel its touch but she knew its weight. It was drifting around the hollows of her cheeks and eyes. Soon she would not be visible, she would be one with the rest of the blanketed world.

A statue forgotten until spring.

“No,” said Lannie. Her voice was no longer rich with hurtful desire. It was a statement voice, a voice for making lists and issuing decrees.

No.

It was a forever “No.” A “No” which would not change, which could not be bought, or compromised, or threatened. It was a real “No.”

She was not going to undo Meghan Moore.

I am frozen, thought Meghan.

It was queer the way her thoughts could continue, and yet on some level they, too, were frozen. She did not feel great emotion: there was no terrible grief that her young life had stopped short. There was no terrifying worry about whatever was to come — a new life, a death, or simply the still snowy continuance of this condition. There was simply observation and attention.

It’s like being a tree, Meghan thought. I’m here. I have my branches. I have my roots. But my sap no longer runs. I weep not. I laugh not. I simply wait. And if the seasons change, I live again, and if the seasons do not, I die.

She was surprised to feel no fear. She had been so fearful of Lannie before. Perhaps fear, too, froze. Or perhaps there had never been anything to be afraid of.

West shook his head. “Then it’s off, Lannie.”

What’s off? thought Meghan. What did I miss, being a tree?

She could see very little now. The snow lay right on her open eyes. There was only a yellow hole in the black of the night. It was the nightlight shining out of Tuesday’s bedroom window.

Nightlight, thought Meghan. What a pretty thought. The real night, this night, this night I am going to have forever — it has no lights.

She would be in the dark very soon.

The dark always. The dark completely. The dark forever.

“I don’t want Meghan back,” explained Lannie. “I like her frozen. She’s fun to freeze. She knows it’s coming, you see. It’s much more fun when they see it coming, and they know what’s going to happen.” Lannie chuckled. “I like it when they get scared and you can see it in their eyes.”

Yes, thought Meghan. I was scared enough for her. I screamed loud enough to bring armies, but armies didn’t come. The snow soaked up my scream. The snow and West’s embrace. I screamed into his chest. I don’t know if he screamed or not. We stopped moving so fast.

“Now my mother,” continued Lannie, “she didn’t know.

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