Winter Longing by Tricia Mills Read Free Book Online

Through some miracle, I made it to the podium without collapsing. I looked out at all the faces I’d known my entire life and choked back a sob. I opened the paper I held and smoothed it atop the podium.
    “Spencer wanted to do two things in life—fly and write. He wanted to fly around the world and write about what he saw from the air.” I swallowed past the giant lump in my throat and gripped the sides of the podium more tightly. “ ‘The Ribbon,’ by Spencer Isaacs.” I cleared my throat and began to read.
    “ ‘The river, silver and shining, undulates like a ribbon in the breeze. It breathes its foggy breath and winks at me as the sun kisses its surface. It caresses the fish below its glassy surface and tempts the birds of every stripe to taste of it.’ ”
    By the time I finished the passage, I knew everyone in the room would never look at the Naknek the same way again. Spencer had taken something we all saw every day and made it magical—the way he was for me.
    It took me a moment to unclasp my fingers from where they’d been holding me upright and for my brain to tell my legs to move. By the time I reached my seat, I was utterly exhausted.
    The sound of someone else’s tears made me glance around the room. Beyond Spencer’s Aunt Barbara, I spotted Jesse. He was watching me. I quickly returned my attention to the front of the sanctuary, where the choir began singing “Come to Jesus.”
    I bit my quivering lip as the lyrics assaulted me. Lindsay gripped my left hand, and I blinked back the tears that wanted so desperately to break free. I stared at the flowers and photo, and my anguish finally spilled down my cheeks, along my neck, and into the top of my black dress.
    When the choir sang, “And with your final heartbeat, kiss the world good-bye,” I squeezed Lindsay’s hand even harder. I felt her shaking with restrained sorrow.
    God, help me through this.
    The smell of fried chicken assaulted me as we approached the potluck spread provided by the ladies of the church, and I had to swallow hard to keep from being sick.
    “He was such a good boy,” I heard the minister’s mother say to Mr. Henning, the school principal.
    The potluck proved to be too much. I had to get out of the building, away from all these sad people, before I suffocated. I mumbled that I was going to get a slice of pie and headed for the far tables laden with desserts. Why was there so much food? How could people eat at a time like this?
    I walked past the desserts, into the hall, and through the back door.
    I started to fall apart well before I got home. By the time I rushed through the front door of our normally comforting log house, I was ripping at the buttons of my dress. I couldn’t get it off fast enough. It felt like it was sucking the life out of me, hiding it in the midnight weave of the fabric.
    I tossed the dress on my bed and threw the black hose in the trash can. I screamed as I took one of the dark heels and threw it with as much force as I could at the wall, puncturing Keira Knightley’s face on my Pride and Prejudice poster.
    I pulled on a pair of sweatpants and an old Tundra School T-shirt and collapsed into my corner chair. I stared at the black funeral dress. Rage bubbled inside me until I leaped from the chair and grabbed the dress. I fumbled in the nightstand drawer, searching for the box of matches I used to light candles.
    I nearly tripped down the stairs in my haste to get to the backyard, to make this damned dress go away forever. Several feet away from the house, I dropped to the ground and lit a match. Twice, matches sparked, then died before I could bring them to the dress’s hem. The third only caused a bit of a stinking smolder.
    “Damn it! Why won’t you burn?” Tears streamed down my face.
    “Winter.”
    I spun to see Jesse standing a few feet away.
    “What are you doing?”
    I surged to my feet. “Go away! You don’t belong here. This isn’t for you.” I returned to striking and cursing