Only the Dead by Vidar Sundstøl Read Free Book Online Page B

hard-packed snow. The sounds don’t travel even a few feet in this forest. But I still carry them inside me. There I can think about the old words from back home.
    I hear the water but I can’t see it. I have to be careful about setting down one foot in front of the other. Then I fall. I land hard on my side and lie still. I lie there looking up through the tall fir trees. It hurts bad. Way overhead I catch a glimpse of a star. Did I break something? I mustn’t injure myself now. There can’t be more than a few hours left. From the boat shed it’s supposed to be a straight path up to the log cabin where my uncle and Nanette live. But here I lie, with my ribs hurting. The trees don’t look like trees. They disappear up there among the stars. And on the other side of the stars they keep growing to form another forest. There the sky is blue and sunlight glitters on the lake. Tiny glints of sun flash across the surface of the water, almost like sparks from a fire. A fire in the middle of the night. I hear a snap every time a spark flies out into the darkness. Those dry, sharp snaps echo inside my skull. It’s more beautiful than anything I’ve ever seen before. It’s red and green and white and yellow. And it crackles as if somebody had tossed tiny pebbles into my mouth.
    I try spitting. My mouth is full of those pebbles. It’s almost impossible to spit them out. But then I realize that they’re not really stones. I open my eyes and see that I’ve fallen asleep with my mouth pressed against the crusted snow. As I prop myself up, I tear the skin right off my lips. I scream loudly and put my hand over my mouth. Blood warms my hand. I scream again because it hurts so bad. My lips are still lying on the snow, frozen to the ice. I can’t see them, but I know they’re lying there somewhere. I get to my feet, hunching forward to cradle the part that hurts. I feel warm blood running down my chin and neck. My lips are gone. They’re lying in the snow among the fir trees. My whole face is stinging with frost. I went into the woods in order to cross the creek, and then I fell. That’s what happened. And I fell asleep. Dreamed about another forest, up in the sky. Good Lord, I don’t want to die! Not now. Only a few more hours and then it will be over. Then I will have arrived in America at last. I try to shout the word “America!” But with my bleeding mouth it comes out like the lowing of a cow.
    I hear the creek again. The sound is more muted. Could it be that the water is running underneath the ice? It’s only a few yards away, but it’s so dark here. I set one foot in front of the other, moving slowly, one step at a time. The ground is uneven, and it hurts to walk. But then I see the creek! The moonlight reaches all the way down through the trees at this spot. A big patch of light. The snow sinks down into the creek bed and then rises up again on the other side. I can’t see any open water at all. But I know that I don’t dare trudge down into it. If I fall through the snow and into the water, I’m done for. But in the middle I see what looks like a skull sticking up. It must be a rock in the middle of the creek. It would be easy enough to jump across here in the daylight. I’d just need to land on the rock with my right foot, and then I could leap across to the other side.
    It’s worse in the moonlight. Then you can’t really see how high or low anything is. But there’s no way to go around. I’ll have to gamble everything on landing on that rock with my right foot. First I have to make sure my knapsack is strapped properly on my back. I try to forget about what’s hurting me. Because it really does hurt. Both my face and my side. But I need to forget about that. Right now all that matters is the creek. Me and the creek. I walk all the way over to the edge, or what I think is the edge, and try to judge the distance, but that’s hard to do in the moonlight. Then I take off from my left foot, launching myself