Blown

The snow, the blowing snow. From inside her truck, she feels safe. She drives faster than she ever drove before in snow like this, watches as the whiteness swirls in front of her, two little lines along the road for her tires, disappearing a little every time the wind blows. She can feel it hit her truck. She turns the radio up. In the backseat, an empty car seat. Earlier, before she dropped off the baby, his foot tapped on the back of her leg and he cheered for snowplows. When she opened the door of the truck to take him to school, she heard a plaintive siren coming from the street below. She looked up into the sky for a helicopter, watched the electric lines shaking the wind. The siren got louder. She looked at the footprints in the snow her child's shoes made, felt the warmness of his hand. Was it the only thing left warm in the world? His little hand?

She wonders about the upcoming days. -5 degrees Friday morning. If she walked out of her house that morning, would all the tears for that day freeze? How long until they thawed?

She knows her life is good. This child, perfect, she worked so hard for. A family that seemingly loves her no matter what, although she might be testing that premise soon, a partner ready to move forward, friends... so many friends who are ready to hold her up too. She drives the truck faster. She thinks about veering off and bouncing across the furrowed fields, how it would feel to drive off the road, the bumps jarring her. Maybe the bumps would jar her out of wherever she is. She is not the victim. She would drive across the frozen ground hard and fast. She would get out and try to push her hands into the earth, but it wouldn't move. The earth wouldn't give way. She would keep trying.

Later at lunch, the sun comes out behind her but she never turns to look at it. She looks at a couple, older, sitting in chairs, one reading and one on the computer. They say little to each other. At night, do they come together in bed and hold each other, bring their bodies together in a way they did with furious intensity at one point? An intensity that lifted away the weight. Or do they merely touch feet, content with corns and bunions and the heaviness of life, a stalwart to lean on. Or a kite in the sky. Which one? Which one?

She wants to go home, but she doesn't know where that is. The snow has blown over her tracks.