Termination Dust Read online

  She stopped. “Hold on, Buster,” she told her brother when he started to fidget. She checked to make sure his blanket was still wrapped tightly around his shoulders and then glanced up at the sky again. So that way was probably north … But what did that tell her? She was so turned around she couldn’t figure out which way she’d been walking, if she’d been walking in a single direction after all. While living at Chuck’s trailer, the sun would rise above these woods, so did that mean she was supposed to head west to get back to the highway?

  It was her best guess, but there were at least a dozen unknowns that kept her feet firmly planted where they were. What if the trail hadn’t been as straight as she thought? What if turning around now meant landing straight back at Chuck’s trailer? And since the Alaskan sun always rose at an angle and never due east, what did that mean for her calculations?

  Not to mention the fact that she was only fifty percent sure that she’d figured out north correctly in the first place.

  The temperature had dropped significantly when the last traces of sunlight disappeared, certainly not as bad as they’d get in the dead of winter, but this escape could have never happened in the dead of winter. It had to be now.

  She held her brother close, borrowing a little of his warmth and refusing to accept that she might be lost. God wouldn’t allow that to happen. He’d gotten her this far, which meant he wanted her to escape from Chuck’s awful violence as much as she did. Which meant she would find her way to safety. The Lord would help her.

  Wouldn’t he?

  She sank down with her back against a tree and held her brother close. “Let’s just rest for a minute here.” She wanted to unwrap Pip and cozy up beside him under the blanket, but it was so cold out she didn’t want him to lose all that warmth he’d stored up in his little portable burrow.

  “You doing okay?” She didn’t wait for an answer. She knew it wouldn’t come.

  “Ma.”

  She paused. “What?” Kimmie was cold, but she was certain she wasn’t imagining things. She stared into her brother’s face. “What did you say?” She held her breath, waiting.

  Nothing.

  “Were you talking about Mommy?” Kimmie prodded, refusing to admit the sound might have been a random vocalization.

  Pip stared at her blankly. He was tired. He should have been in a warm bed sleeping, not tramping through the woods. She pulled his blanket more tightly around his shoulders. “Do you miss Mommy?” she asked. Up until she said those words, she’d thought she’d been doing fine, but mentioning their mother brought a massive lump to her dry throat. She needed water. Pip must too, but there wasn’t anything they could do until they got out of these woods.

  Which meant she couldn’t sit here wondering if her brother, whom everyone had considered nonverbal for the first three years of his life, had just spoken his first word or not.

  She had to keep going. The more they moved, the more heat they would generate and the closer they’d get to the trooper’s station.

  The closer they’d get to safety.

  Hopefully.

  She stood up, glancing in all directions to make sure she was still on the same path she’d been on when she decided to stop. She couldn’t be entirely sure that this would be the way to lead them to the trooper’s station or not, but there was only one way to find out.

  “Come on, Buster.” She tried to make her voice sound as cheerful as possible. “Let’s go see what’s down this trail.”

  CHAPTER 25

  If Kimmie had been able to plan her escape better, she would have left earlier in the month, before the termination dust fell, before the nights grew so frozen. Thankfully, it was clear out, and the moon kept the woods illuminated, but without the cloud covering, the night was bitter cold. She and her brother had no protection but a light windbreaker and one tattered blanket, and they were lost.

  Kimmie was certain of it. She’d long lost track of the time, but it seemed to her that by now the moon was already on its way down in the sky. Which meant she’d been walking for several hours along the path she thought should have led her back to the Glenn Highway, and she had no idea where they were.

  “Let’s stop here for a minute, Buster.”

  Pip hadn’t made any sounds for quite a while, no whining or whimpering. He’d stumbled a few times until Kimmie started to worry he was falling asleep while he walked. She tried carrying him but had to put him down every few minutes.

  This wasn’t going to work.

  She was sweating beneath her jacket, even though her exposed face and hands burned with cold. She couldn’t keep this up. It was too much for her. She was too tired.

  She stopped to listen. If she could just hear one car or truck heading down the Glenn, she’d know which direction to turn. She’d been straining her ears for what felt like hours, but the Glenn was hardly traveled at this time of night, especially this far past tourist season. She heard the occasional rustling of wind, which only meant she had to brace herself for another onslaught of icy chill. Her legs ached, the pain in her feet reminding her that she and her brother had been walking way longer than they should have. How far was she into the woods now? She might be a hundred yards from the Glenn and wouldn’t know it in this darkness, or she might be miles in the opposite direction.

  What would happen if they didn’t find their way out? She was too exhausted to carry Pip any farther. Each time she stopped to rest, she had to guess which way she’d most recently come from. Her mind was foggy, and even though it was convenient that Pip wasn’t complaining or acting scared, she was worried by his complacency and her own mental confusion.

  She held her brother close, and he nestled his cheek against hers. Her face was so cold she could hardly feel his skin. A moment later, his deep breathing told her he was asleep, and she wanted nothing more than to curl up beside him in their makeshift bed of spruce needles and forget herself until morning, but it was too cold. Neither of them would survive a night outside. Not if they stopped moving.

  She watched her brother sleep, wondering how long she should wait before waking him up again. He needed his rest, but then again so did she. The problem was if she stayed here too long, she might lose the motivation to ever get herself back up. Then what would happen? Winter was closing in fast. What hikers would come out this way in that kind of weather? And the trappers who ventured this deep into the woods come wintertime might not even find their bodies if they were buried in snow or devoured by scavengers.

  She tried to free herself from these oppressive fears, but they kept pressing in on her, weighing down on her chest, constricting her lungs until she felt like she could hardly breathe.

  She had tried. God was her witness how hard she had tried. And in the end, it wasn’t Chuck who did her in but this blasted cold and her own pathetic sense of direction. She thought of stories she’d heard of other unfortunate souls who met their demise in the Alaskan wilderness. Some were within a mile of the cabins or shelters or cell phone towers that might have saved them, but they had died nonetheless.

  She couldn’t let that happen to her and Pip. She had to find the energy to keep on going.

  But not yet. After a short nap, she’d find her second wind. For now, she needed to rest. Just a few minutes, then she’d wake up.

  Kimmie shut her eyes and let the heaviness and exhaustion sweep over her mind and carry her consciousness away into a merciful nothingness.

  CHAPTER 26

  She was at a birthday party in Anchorage. The kids were dressed up in pirate and princess costumes, laughing and drinking punch. Pip was sitting at the table, playing a puzzle game with two other little boys wearing eye patches and striped pants. He looked just as comfortable as the other children there, and even more amazing, he was laughing.

  Kimmie excused herself from the chattering group of moms standing around with coffee cups in hand and stepped closer to her brother.

  “My turn!” Pip exclaimed in a perfectly
clear voice. “I get to go next.”

  Kimmie felt her entire core swelling with a pride so strong she wasn’t sure her body could contain it all.

  And then the fragments of her dream came crashing down around her like so many pieces of broken glass. She was awake. She was cold. And she was terrified.

  “Pip!” she shook her brother, horrified by the feel of the stiff blanket around him. “Pip!”

  She had only meant to rest. How could she have been stupid enough to fall asleep? “Pip?”

  She threw the blanket down from Pip’s shoulder so she could search out his neck and try to find a pulse. Nausea swirled within her stomach, and her prayer came out in a terrified, pitiful plea. Help us.

  He was alive. The relief she felt was enough to warm her body and shoot her mind into action. They couldn’t stay here. And her brother couldn’t sleep any longer.

  “Come on, Pip. Let’s go.”

  He was nearly impossible to rouse, but the way he scrunched up his face in complaint at Kimmie’s vain attempts proved he was still alive. Still with her.

  “Wake up, Buster,” she begged. “We’ve got to keep walking.”

  She’d been so terrified by the fear that she’d let her brother die in the middle of the night that she hadn’t looked around her at all. The aurora was out, not the glorious teals and purple lights that raced across the Glennallen skies in the dead of winter, but a dull green glow shining near the horizon.

  It was the answer to all of her cumulative prayers. The northern lights almost always ran parallel to the Glenn, which meant that if she followed them straight on, she’d find her way to the highway.

  “Let’s go, Pip.” This time she didn’t have to fake her cheer or enthusiasm. Whispering a prayer of thanks, she planted her brother on his feet then when he started to whine picked him up, strengthened by her newfound hope.

  She would get help soon. She and Pip were going to make it.

  They would be safe.

  They would be free.

  CHAPTER 27

  When Kimmie finally stumbled onto the Glenn Highway, she realized that she was miles from where she’d started her circuitous meandering through the woods. She’d never have the energy to get all the way to the trooper’s station. Not now. Not like this. But it didn’t matter. She was safe. She’d make it. She and Pip were going to be fine.

  She’d been carrying her brother, and now as the northern lights faded back to darkness, her last remnants of strength melted away to a deep, nearly paralyzing exhaustion. She was so close. She just needed to get to a phone. Some place where she could call for help.

  But where?

  If it was the summer, she’d have the light of the midnight sun to guide her, with sleepy tourists on their way to Fairbanks or Canada making their way up the Glenn. But now there was nothing. If it were the weekend, she might run into hunters coming back home with their spoils, but the night was dark and the highway deserted.

  “It’s okay,” she told herself, speaking softly as if she were giving her sleeping brother a pep talk. “We’re going to make it.”

  Walking to the trooper’s station would take her too close to her stepfather’s neighborhood. It wasn’t worth the risk of getting caught. If Chuck was out looking for her, she shouldn’t even be this close to the highway in the first place. Besides, she couldn’t make it that whole distance. Not as cold and weak as she was.

  The medical center was in the opposite direction, only a mile, maybe slightly more. It was a feasible distance to walk and still kept her away from Chuck’s place. Besides, Pip really should get checked out. But with what money? Kimmie still didn’t have her paperwork back from the state insurance she’d applied for, but it didn’t matter. The people at the Copper River Clinic weren’t going to turn her away.

  She set her brother down. “Come on, Buster. Just a tiny bit more walking.”

  He made a miserable whine that was pitiful enough to wrench her soul apart, but she was at her physical limit.

  “I can’t carry you anymore,” she tried to explain. “I just can’t. Let’s go see the nice doctor and get you taken care of, okay?”

  She was terrified of what the folks at Copper River would find when they took off his shoes. What if he had frostbite? What if they needed to amputate?

  No, she wouldn’t think like that. She and her brother could both still walk. They were just cold. The clinic probably saw patients like that on a regular basis and had fast and effective protocols all set to go. The idea of a steaming shower and layer after layer of thick electric blankets fueled her legs as she slowly plodded forward.

  Her brain was past the point of exhaustion, past the point where she felt she’d break if she didn’t get warmed up and rested soon. But she had to keep going, and she had to keep Pip awake. He had to make this last little walk. It couldn’t be more than a mile to the clinic. They were so close.

  She heard a car behind her, saw the headlights illuminating the darkness. It was still too far back to have seen her, at least she hoped it was. She grabbed Pip by the shoulders. Did she dare flag it down? Who would refuse to help a three-year-old child in the cold like this? But what if it was Chuck? What if he was coming after them? She turned but was so blinded by the headlights she had no idea what kind of vehicle was speeding toward her.

  Pip stood frozen beside her as well. “Let’s go!” she panted. “Down to the ravine.”

  She and Pip stumbled down the small hill, where she crouched with her arms around her brother until the car sped past.

  It wasn’t Chuck.

  Stupid. What had she done? If she’d just had the courage to flag that driver down, she and Pip could be at the medical center in a minute or less. Stupid.

  She vowed that if another car came this way, she was going to stand out in the middle of the road, waving her arms until it stopped. Even if it were Chuck, it was better to live under his tyranny than watch her brother die from hypothermia.

  But no other cars came. She was on her own. Pip started crying. She guessed from the way he bounced back and forth that his feet were hurting. Was that just from walking all night, or had frostbite crept in?

  Did frostbite even hurt? Her own feet were numb. Maybe it was a good sign that Pip felt something.

  She couldn’t carry him anymore, not in her arms like she had all night, but she couldn’t watch him suffer like this either. She crouched down. “You’ll have to climb on my back,” she told him. That meant he couldn’t have the blanket wrapped so tightly around his body, but they’d have to manage as best they could. They were so close to help; it was going to be okay. They were both going to make it. They were so close now.

  CHAPTER 28

  Kimmie pressed the nighttime buzzer outside the Copper River Clinic’s emergency room and nearly collapsed while she waited for the door to open. When a young nurse in Bugs Bunny scrubs opened the door, all Kimmie could manage to say was, “We got lost.”

  Soon she was sitting in a wheelchair, heavy blankets draped over her shoulders, her feet soaking in a warm bath. Pip sat in her lap while the physician’s assistant checked his vitals.

  “I think you’re both very lucky to have made it out of those woods when you did.” He looked at her meaningfully. “Is there anyone you need to call? Anyone who’ll be worried about your safety?”

  Kimmie’s memory flashed to Taylor’s card, still secure in her pocket, and she shook her head. “No. I just wanted to make sure he was …” Her voice caught when she thought about what might have happened to Pip. “I just wanted him to come in to make sure he was all right.”

  The PA smiled. “Well, in that case I can relieve your worries. He’s clearly hypothermic, but I don’t see anything that’s going to prevent either of you from a full recovery. If you’d stayed out much longer …” He left the thought unfinished, and Kimmie was grateful. Pip had perked up once he was inside, and she didn’t want him to hear anything that would cause undo alarm.

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nbsp; The PA wanted her and Pip to stay here a few more hours. Every so often, the nurse brought in hotter water to fill her foot bath. Pip was wrapped in layers of blankets, with hot water compresses tucked around his body while he sat on Kimmie’s lap, and the nurse popped in every so often to get a new temperature reading. The PA told her that if she wanted, she and Pip could rest here until morning. She was badly in need of sleep, but she couldn’t relax yet. Not until she saw with her own eyes that Pip’s temperature was back to where it should be.

  Everything had worked itself out in the end. Everything was going to be all right.

  The PA stepped out for a minute, and Kimmie tried to figure out a way to get comfortable in her wheelchair. She didn’t need it anymore, but it was the easiest way to keep Pip comfortable while she soaked her feet. She could think of worse things to worry about than starting tomorrow with a sore and stiff back.

  She had just shut her eyes when someone knocked from outside her room. “Come in.” Her voice was so weak, she doubted even Pip heard it let alone someone in the hallway. Her door swung open, and the nurse poked her head in, frowning apologetically.

  “Someone’s here to see you.”

  Kimmie’s lungs seized up, and her heart rate soared. Chuck? How could he have found her? He had no idea where she and Pip were. What could she tell the nurse? How could she let them know not to let him in?

  “It’s a trooper,” the woman announced, and Kimmie stared at her blankly.

  A trooper?

  The door opened wider, and Taylor stepped inside. He looked far more casual out of uniform but just as confident in his dark blue jeans and crisp flannel hanging open to reveal the vee-neck T-shirt beneath. He offered a smile that looked both tired and caring. “Sounds like you’ve had quite the adventure tonight.”

  Kimmie felt herself return his smile. “That’s one way of putting it.”

  “You have a few minutes?” He ran his hand across the faint stubble on his jaw.