Things Wake Up

© 2002 Barry Hollander
All rights reserved.

She stirred again the dead fire, cold and gray as the morning. It had been warm under her quilt, the couch pulled close to the fireplace, at least until the coals faded. An ice storm had snapped limbs, dropped trees on power lines, cut off electricity. You could hear the trees still: the occasional crack of a pine as it surrendered to its burden, the dull thud as the limb fell, the tinkle of ice that chased it to the ground.

No matter. She'd manage. There was the old gas stove with enough fuel to warm a can of this, a can of that. Yes, she'd manage just fine, if she would just remember to bank the fire correctly.

She gave the ash a final stir and stood, knees complaining at the effort.

Her kindling and wood waited out the back door. She put the matches in her pocket rather than leaving them on the floor. Some habits died hard, even though her own children were long grown and gone.

Needles from the cold air pricked her lungs. Three steps down, her hand gripping the wobbly black metal railing, she stopped to look at a different world, the sky the color of dirty cotton and the air heavy with the promise of more sleet. Margaret tugged at the tarp and admired the stack of oak, as neat as soldiers standing at attention. All as it should be, except for the kindling box.

"Where in the world?"

Normally it sat on top, the twigs and bark she used to coax a fire to life. Had she dropped it? No. She remembered using some of the dry twigs and shavings to start a fire when the power first went out, and then a few more the next morning. The box should be on top of the pile.

Should be.

She leaned for a better angle, felt the rail tremble. No box. In the distance she heard a tree limb snap. All she needed was some dry twigs, that and maybe a few pine cones. She loved to listen to the crackling cones as they flared to life, hot and orange. It reminded her of being a young girl, tossing cones in the fire while her own grandma told strange and wonderful stories to push away the long afternoon gloom.

She sighed. Basket in hand, she inched into the yard and felt grass crunch under her feet like flat, green icicles. She came to a heavy limb dropped by the storm, its twigs too new, too green. Indeed, the entire area near the house seemed picked clean of useful kindling, so she stepped carefully toward a stand of pines, the trees hunched over like great giants hauling backpacks of ice.

Along the way she found a twig here, a twig there, not enough for a fire.

One old pine dominated the stand of trees, its trunk scarred with beetle holes. She leaned against the trunk to steal a moment's rest, felt the rough bark through her layers of clothing. The kindling box lay nearby, pine needles half covering it.

"How in the world did you get out here?"

Surely the wind had howled, but not so much that a wood box half full of kindling would end up here. An animal, she decided. Mischief by a raccoon. She stooped to lift the box, heard an odd sound from above, like chewing or buzzing, the unmistakable crack of a tree limb. Then nothing at all.

Fire, warm and orange, the smell of old wool. Her grandma's voice. Stories: her grandma was telling stories, the wonderful scary tales that would always made Ma frown and try to hush Grandma, pushing a cup of tea in the woman's hand, turning the television to some loud game show.

Margaret blinked. She wasn't warm; there was no fire. Cold seeped into her bones. She lay on the wet ground, a tree limb as thick as her leg resting nearby. She sat up, but her vision blurred and she fell flat. Above, the sky darkened, either from an approaching storm or the end of the day. She couldn't tell which.

"Help," she called. "Help me! Anyone?"

She listened and felt stupid, standing under a tree at exactly the wrong time. No one would be outside. The day was done, the excitement of the ice storm long gone. A freshening wind pushed through the pines, the tinkle of light frozen rain falling on the needles above. She felt the lump on her head, big and getting bigger. No blood, at least.

Forget the kindling, she decided. Get inside.

She stood, wobbled, trees and sky blurring into a single portrait of gray, fell again at the base of the large pine. She stared up along the trunk, beyond the beetle holes to a different set of holes higher up. What made those? she wondered. Silly, worrying about holes in a tree.

As she gathered her strength to rise, she noticed a patch of ice clinging to the trunk of the pine.

Noticed that it moved.

It separated into three smaller patches, all sliding down the trunk. She wiped her eyes. The pieces flowed into a single patch, dirty white against the wood.

"Dear lord," she said. "That limb must have given me a good knocking."

She reached out for the kindling box, happy with its familiarity. "Just catch my breath, then the house. Lord, I'll crawl if I have to."

Wind moaned and a pair of trees, leaning together, scratched one against the other. Margaret glanced around the yard, so wild now. So different. Her grandma always said that things change in big weather. Ice was just ice, she'd say, tornadoes just ugly wind running in circles, but north Alabama didn't get much of either. "You get big weather, the kind you're not used to, and things wake up," she said. "Like bugs that show up every seven years for no good reason other than to eat everything in sight. Remember that, girl. Things wake up."

Margaret reached for the limb that had knocked her down, hoping to use it as a crutch, found it too heavy and let it drop. A smooth end, not jagged as you'd expect. Looking up, she was sure the ice patch had crept closer.

"Go away," she said, then shook her head. Foolish, talking to ice.

The air grew colder and she smelled something different, like when an animal got caught under the house and died. She tried to crawl, arms managing only to sweep pine straw close. She curled around the kindling box as if it were a pillow and looked across at her house, so far away. She needed warmth, needed a blanket, a fire.

A fire.

One of the three patches slid to the ground and touched the end of her shoe.

Cold. In her bones. Up her leg.

She kicked, but the patch had backed up the tree and joined the others.

"A fire," she said out loud this time. "Build a fire."

She scraped pine straw into a ball, built above it a steeple of dry twigs and bark, anything she could find, swept as much kindling near as she could manage and then fumbled for the matches.

A hungry cold breath filled the air. She looked at the patches, remembered a story her grandma once told, of how after a hard snow she had gotten lost in the woods, found a creek and followed it.

"That's when I saw them, child."

"Who, grandma?"

"Them. White things, skipping in the snow, white with hard black eyes. Skipping around some poor animal. Fur and blood stained the snow. I ran, made it to the open pasture, got over the fence. Felt something cold near me, and an awful smell. But I was fast, the fastest around. Could outrun my brothers. I made it home."

Margaret shivered at the memory, hand shaking as she ruined two matches trying to strike a light, the ends flopping over uselessly.

On the third try, the match flared to life.

She eased it into her kindling. Don't blow, she told herself over and over. Flames licked at the dry twigs, snapping and popping, the smell of smoke sweet in her nose. She fought the urge to push her fingers in the fire. Patience. It was a good fire. Small, but good. Finally she risked a few puffs, breathing more life into the blaze.

She blew hard. The flame disappeared.

Cold gripped her chest. Her grandma had taught her years ago about fire. "Treat it like you do people," she had said. "With respect. But never surrender to the magic."

"Magic? A fire?"

"All things have magic. That storm outside, the fire in front of you. People. It don't matter. Those flames will hypnotize you, make you think you're in charge. Next thing you know your pants are on fire." She had stopped and smiled, lost in memory. "Same thing with weather like this, when things come out that normally stay asleep."

Her own fire crept back to life.

Almost dark, the sky a deep gray blue, clouds heavy with rain or sleet. Firelight made the ice patches above look almost lovely. Glistening, cold and lovely—

"No," she said. "That won't do."

She reached out, grabbed a handful of straw, cones, small twigs, tossed it all onto her struggling fire.

Everything turned black and cold.

She couldn't see. Her eyes had been accustomed to the flame; now the fire smoldered under its sudden blanket. The air felt different, like before a thunderstorm.

She looked for the ice, saw only darkness and smoke. It could be next to her. On the ground.

Cold. Her ankle. She sobbed, gave a half-hearted kick, felt ice covering her feet and legs.

Then her fire exploded.

Flames caught up with the thick straw. She shoved her frozen foot to the fire, not caring about the flames. Something moved, scrambled through the straw. The ice in her bones melted. She pulled a smoking shoe from the fire.

Flames licked at the great tree trunk as the fire spread to whatever it could find. She gave it more. Everything she could find.

The air warmed. Not just warmed. It was different. Cleaner.

A voice called from nearby.

"Hello? Mrs. Beurlein? You okay?"

Her neighbor, Steven, a young man with a wife and new baby. He leaned over the chain link fence that separated their yards, his body little more than a dark smudge in the blue-black darkness. "Are you okay? I saw the fire."

Of course she wasn't okay. As if she would be out in this weather like some maniacal witch worshiping pine trees and ice. He came with a flashlight, wanting to call for an ambulance, wanting to call her children, wanting to do just about anything.

"Leave it be," she told him. "Just help me to my house. That's all I need. Be a good boy and help me to my house."

He stamped at the fire, promising to come back later and douse it with a bucket of water and sand. With a hand he helped her to her feet and she leaned gratefully on his arm. They weaved their way toward her back door.

"Stop," she said, taking his flashlight.

"Why? You need to get inside, get warm."

"Plenty of time for that." She directed the beam at the base of the old pine, knowing he probably thought she was crazy, hit in the head and staring at trees. She didn't care.

The trunk had been scorched black several feet up, beyond where she had seen the ice patches. She traced the trunk higher, following it with the flashlight to the holes high above, sure she would see patches of ice.

"You looking for something?"

Her light traced the pine needles above, tracked the great trunk down again to the ground near its base. Three puddles, stained the base of the tree.

"No," she said. "Not now."

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