Aftershocks: a Novel by Shirley Linkhart

Author:Shirley Linkhart [Linkhart, Shirley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781618421548
Publisher: BookBaby

Chapter Twenty-Three

Day Three

When Georgia opened her eyes and looked at her watch, she knew it was too bright to be only six-thirty. Such intense light could only mean one thing. She stretched to pull the door open. Snow, layered deep against it, fell into the room.

“Shit!”

After crawling from her sleeping bag, she poked her head outside and groaned at the thick blanket of snow. A lace doily of dollar-size flakes covered her head. She pulled the door shut, dusted the snow from her hair and climbed back into her bed—like a groundhog who’d seen its shadow and wanted no part of it.

Defeated and demoralized, she hugged herself as tears seeped from her eyes.

At eight o’clock, she awoke again, this time from a dream of golden autumn. For a few moments, as she lay in her warm bed, smelling the wood smoke, she imagined a cold morning on a camping trip with Ski. Any moment he’d bring her wake-up coffee. He’d tease about her being a slug-a-bed and a sissy about the cold.

From warm thoughts of the past, her mind, pulled by mother love, plunged to the dark place that festered in her heart. Where did Callie sleep last night? Was she trapped somewhere in one of Portland’s fierce ice storms? Scared? Of course she’s scared. A vivid picture of her beloved girl, eyes afloat with tears, lower lip trembling, chewing on her hair flashed into Georgia’s mind.

She shook her head.

Stop! Worry won’t help her. Just stop.

Still dressed from her midnight spying, she threw off the covers and rummaged in her clothes’ basket for her leather boots. The wound on her ankle had reddened beyond the bandage, but she couldn’t go out in a foot of snow in her loafers. She flinched as she tightened the laces, and by the time she’d put on the other boot, the pain had subsided.

A peek outside told her it was still snowing. What was she going to use to keep dry? The wool blanket? She still had the garbage can lid, which she’d used as an umbrella. That would do until she could locate the plastic bags to make another poncho.

She mentally readied herself to face the snow—to be strong, not to whine or whimper about the cold.

This mess will not get me down.

Holding the big lid above her head, she giant-stepped across the yard toward the fire where Turk was tending his pans of snow.

“Morning, Georgia. You sleep okay?”

“You mean did I hear your company come in at midnight?”

“Sorry. Hoped you’d slept through that.”

“Did they leave?” She asked the question to cover the fact she’d heard their conversation.

“They’ll be a big help with the truck.” He poured the small amount of the snowmelt into the teakettle. “Mind if I fix them some coffee? And meat?”

Give them my food? Her first thought was hell no. You can’t take it with you, Georgia Anne.

“I put out hamburger last night, too. They can eat that,” she said.

“I’ll try to rig up a shelter here by the fire … you can sit.

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