Whiteout Page 3
Once inside Badencourt, they never left each other’s side, moving through the rooms and the crowd hand-in-hand or arm-in-arm or, for a little while, with Becca on Zach’s shoulders. They moved from room to room, greeting and congratulating friends and strangers alike, toasting the team and the university, laughing at the unlikely scenes they stumbled on—coed body-painting in the school’s red and gold colors, quarters drinking matches with red-dyed beer, and line-dancing to the school’s fight song. Zach and Becca absorbed every wacky scene, made it their own, counted it as gift.
And then, with the party winding down and more than three-quarters of the participants asleep or passed out in random aggregations like flotsam washed up on a beach, they left without fanfare or farewells and stepped out into the night.
The campus was once again deserted and largely still, with the quiet only occasionally interrupted by a wolf howl or a firecracker’s pop. It was still snowing, with six inches on the ground and deeper drifts. Fresh and wind-blown snow had partially filled the tracks and trenches and body prints from the earlier party, making those marks seem shadows from a dream.
Zach and Becca walked through the Quad and around the Chapel and along the buried walk to the dark and snow-flooded path through the trees to the parking lot. Artificial light faded the farther they got from the Quad and was gone entirely by the time they entered the thin woods between the Chapel and the lot. Yet it was not dark. The reflective snow and the low clouds and diffuse light from somewhere cast the woods in a silver-gray glow. They emerged from the woods and discovered their car as a hump of snow in the otherwise empty white plain of the parking lot. They brushed the snow off the car with their hands and arms, pushed it aside with their feet and legs. It was light snow and easy to clear away.
They climbed inside the car—Zach in the driver’s seat—and sat for a moment in the cold, dry, close silence. The whole rich night and all its wonders washed over them like a wave. One might’ve guessed they’d be exhausted, but neither was. In fact, neither was ready to let the night end, regardless if the rest of the proximate world was asleep or on the way there.
Becca said, “I need to get some dry clothes from my apartment. You think you can get us there?”
Zach laughed, delighted to have a cause and purpose. “With our Japanese jeep? No problem.” He started the car, turned on the headlights, and followed their arc of light toward the main road.
The driving conditions wouldn’t exactly qualify as no problem, but they weren’t a big problem either. Zach drove slowly but steadily in low gear—never coming to a full stop, never applying the brakes, gliding through stop signs and traffic lights, not making any sudden turns or swerves. The car’s tires spun a few times, especially in the deeper drifts, and slid off the road on one curve; but Zach always managed to compensate and keep the car moving forward.
The road to Becca’s apartment went past the hospital and was partially plowed. They shared this four-lane road with a few police cars and ambulances with chains on their tires. Everyone was driving slowly and carefully, and they saw no accidents or abandoned cars along the way.
In the parking lot in front of Becca’s dark apartment, she faced Zach and said, “Caroline may be asleep.”
“Or with Michael.”
Becca nodded. “Either way, maybe I should go in by myself. I won’t have to turn on a light.”
“I’ll keep the car warm.”
She disappeared into the night.
Zach switched off the ignition and sat there in the dark with the cooling engine clicking and tiny streams of melting snow etching lines on the windshield against the silver night. For one of the few times in his life—perhaps the only time when immersed in an important moment—Zach did not consciously reflect on his present circumstance or the past events that had placed him here or the options for the future going forward. He knew only that Becca’d been here and that she would return. He waited in blank contentment, could’ve waited forever.
Becca returned in under fifteen minutes. She had on dry boots, a clean pair of jeans, and a dark blue down vest over a burgundy sweatshirt. She’d also found a white knit stocking cap and a pair of matching mittens buried in her closet. She slid into the passenger seat and closed the door.
“A new woman,” Zach said.
She leaned over and kissed him. “Just a dryer version of the former one.”
Zach started the car. “Caroline home?”
Becca nodded.
“Alone?”
“Couldn’t tell.”
“Too close?”
Becca hit him with her mittened hand. “Too dark, Mr. Voyeur.”
“Just concerned for her well-being.” He put the car in gear and crept forward.
“No doubt.”
Their Japanese jeep started sliding to one side where the parking lot sloped up to the road. Before Zach could stop and back up to try again, the car had slid off the pavement and into a deep drift. He tried rocking the car back and forth, in forward then reverse, but to no avail. For the first time that night, they were stuck, and with no one around to help them out.
Becca frowned.
“Don’t worry, Bec. We’ll get out. But you’ll have to drive while I push.”
“You sure? I can push.”
Zach shook his head. “You’re dry. I’m stronger. Let me be the macho man.”
He got out of the car on his side, away from the worst of the drift. Becca slid into the driver’s seat past the shift knob. Before shutting the door, he leaned back in and kissed her. “Just make sure you’re not in reverse when you let the clutch out. Otherwise you might end up with a Zach pancake.”
“Snow-covered?”
“With a cherry on top.” He closed the door.
Becca put the car in first gear and waited for Zach’s signal to let the clutch out.
Behind the car, Zach dug his feet into the snow till they touched the frozen ground, found the best footing available, put his hands under the bumper, and leaned against the back of the car. “Ready,” he shouted.
Becca popped the clutch and pressed the gas pedal to the floor. The front tires spun furiously, throwing loose snow along the sides of the car and up into the air. Zach pushed and released, pushed and released, rocking the car back and forth until the front tires had finally spun their way through the snow and reached the dirt below. The car suddenly lurched forward and Zach sprawled face down into what remained of the drift. Becca yanked the wheel to the left to avoid another snow drift on the far side of the drive. The car went into a slow motion double loop as it descended down the drive, finally coming to rest in the middle of the parking lot.
Becca jumped out of the car and ran over to Zach. “You O.K.?”
Zach was standing in the snowdrift, brushing snow and bits of grass and dirt thrown up by the racing tires from his brown bomber jacket. He grinned. “Never better. Nice driving, Richard Petty.”
Becca pushed him playfully.
He fell backward into the snow.
She jumped on top of him. They were almost completely buried in the light snow. They could’ve stayed there forever—so joyful were they in each other and in the combination they formed—except it was cold. They stood, brushed each other off, and returned to the car. Zach, using a little more speed and the proper angle of approach, guided the car up the slope and into the road with no sliding this t
ime.
The few vehicles that had been on the main road earlier were gone now, and they had all four lanes to themselves. They passed the entrance to the hospital (with no signs of life there either) and were driving along a stretch with no buildings or businesses when they spotted a heavy-set woman stumbling in the deep snow mounded on the edge of their side of the road. Zach slowed down. They could see that she had on slip-on canvas shoes with no socks. She was dressed in light-weight knit slacks and a thin windbreaker with its hood pulled over her head.
Zach stopped alongside her and Becca rolled down the window. “Can we give you a ride somewhere?”
The woman’s round face was flushed. She breathed heavily and sweat beaded on her brow despite the cold and her light clothing. She huffed a minute before speaking. “I’ll be O.K.,” she wheezed. “I’m walking back to the hotel.”
The only hotel on this road was more than a quarter mile away. She’d never make it—not in her condition in these conditions. Becca said, “Get in. We’ll drive you. It’s too nasty to be out tonight.”
The woman looked ahead along the deserted road, the view hazy in the blowing snow, then faced them. “You don’t mind?”
“Not at all,” Becca said, then opened the door and slid over to make room, ended up sitting half on the car’s console and half in Zach’s lap. She leaned her face into Zach’s ear and whispered, “You don’t mind, do you?”
“I don’t mind.” He kissed