Six Below

“Are you sure your parents don’t know you snuck out?” Kane asked. “Quite sure, don’t worry ‘bout them. What’s this for?” I asked, motioning toward the five gallon bucket of warm water sitting on my side of the floorboard of his “antique” F-350. “You’ll see soon enough, for now just make sure none of it spills. I’m going to need as much as I can get.” “Okay…” I closed my legs around the bucket to keep it from sloshing around while he flew down the gravel road, seemingly purposefully, hitting every pothole he could. I looked out the window at the late night stars; I loved how the countryside seemed to have an infinitesimal amount of stars, due to the fact that there was very little light pollution. I always loved looking for constellations in the sky jumping from Orion to the Big Dipper to Fornax and finishing on Draco. They were all so motionless and glittery, but my science teacher told me that the light we see from the stars is millions of years old; all of the lights that we see are long dead… just like the wishes we make. It was disappointing really, but at the same time no wish I ever made on the stars really seemed to come true, slowly, I came to realize that he was right. I still liked to look at them, though, they reminded me of the all the wishes I did make as a kid, and how much my life has changed since. “Are you praying to the stars again?” Kane interrupted my train of thought; he always made fun of me when I stared at the stars. “No, just looking. Nothing better to do except watch the water slosh around.” I answered sarcastically. “Nothing to talk about is there? There never is, I’m just a space-filler believe me I know you only keep me around to hook you up with these parties, you know they aren’t your friends, they just pretend to be, because of who you are.” “What do you mean?” “You know what I mean, you’re so much better than me at everything, even though before you moved here I was the best; I was the MVP on the football team; I was top of the class; I was Class President, and not to mention I was the one everyone sat with at lunch. I lost all of my reputation when you moved here, everyone just liked you more, I never understood how, though. “Kane…What are you talking about?” “You know exactly what I’m talking about! You took everything from me when you moved here! Why can’t you just go back where you came from?” “It wasn’t my fault I moved here. I didn’t know you felt that way. I’m just doing my part to make this place better and I don’t like it here anymore than you like me being here, apparently. Why didn’t you tell me you felt like this, I thought we were friends…?” “We are… I just… I don’t know. I hate how I lost it all to you when you came here. I don’t like feeling like a lost dog, following you around. I used to be the king of our school and when you came along I was demoted, it just… sucks.” “I’m sorry, if I had it my way I never would have moved here.” With that we both went silent; I couldn’t tell if he was truly angry or just a little upset. After a few minutes I realized the road wasn’t familiar. During our argument, I must have failed to notice where he was headed. “I thought we were going to Sam’s for her birthday?” “We are she just moved it… she’s having it in a pasture, we’re almost there.” “It’s -6 outside, why are we having it in a pasture? Is she trying to kill us?” “Maybe…we will only be there for a little bit don’t worry, she just wanted all of us to meet in one spot, so we could follow her to her house. She didn’t want to have to give directions to a shit-ton of people.” “Oh, Okay.” Something seemed wrong, he changed his story twice, but then again, this night was just weird all together. I just wanted to go home. Within a few minutes Kane announced our arrival, told me to bundle up because he couldn’t get his truck down where we were meeting. He got out, unlocked the gate, and pulled into the pasture, told me to grab the bucket and said we would trade it off when our arms got tired. He grabbed the flashlight, waited on me to get situated, and we headed down the grassy path into the woods. “I don’t understand why we didn’t just stay back there and meet, and why was no one else’s car there?” “It’s all Sam’s idea, you know how she gets, and I don’t know we must be the first ones here… good for us.” “No, not good, it’s flipping cold out here.” “Oh, stop whining we won’t be out here long, it’ll only get colder anyways.” “Can we trade now? My arms are getting tired.” “Sure, we are about halfway there either way.” I set the bucket down and he handed me the flashlight. With that, we set off down the path again. “Almost there.” Kane said after a few minutes. We came out of the woods and into a clearing; there was a small pond and flat grassy area on the other side of the pitiful body of water. “We’re meeting over there.” He pointed at the grassy area, particularly at the logs that were laid out. We headed toward the clearing I was lighting the way, Kane had the bucket, and I couldn’t help myself I had to get close to the pond and look out over the brackish water, it didn’t look very deep, but I was pretty sure that if someone swam in it that the moment they set foot on the bottom the mud would suck them in. “Hold on, my arms are getting tired.” Kane said and set the bucket down. “Come on, we don’t have much farther to go.” “Easy for you to say. Why don’t you carry the bucket the rest of the way?” “Okay, fine by me.” I handed him the flashlight and turned to get the bucket. Suddenly, I felt a blunt pain in the back of my neck and heard a soft heavy noise echo inside my skull when I bent over. I fell face first into the pond with a vignette forming at the edges of my vision. I was temporarily numb and disoriented, but as soon as the ice hit my face and I heard it crack, I scrambled back up the bank. When I finally clawed my way back to the bank, Kane was there standing above me. He had the bucket in one hand and the flashlight in the other. He looked at me in a pitiful way for a few second then overturned the bucket of warm water onto my head. I immediately collapsed back onto the ice, slowly losing feeling all over my body; I could almost see the blue pigment replacing my skin in the starlight. I fell back and laid flat hearing the ice crack and melt around my frozen body. I looked back toward the bank and saw Kane standing with the flashlight and, now empty, bucket in hand. So cold “You took my life, consider this your rent, but with interest.” I thought he looked like he was crying, but before I could be sure he turned and walked out of sight. So cold As the last of the ice under me broke away from my body, looked skyward at my stars, all of them, all their light, dead, just like my wish, the only one I ever had. I just wanted to be successful. So Cold I plunged in and the ice rested back into place above me as I floated in the freezing water. I continued to look skyward through the ice the stars looked so much more beautiful this way. So Cold “I’m sorry.” I whispered and my vision went black as I choked on my own icy words. Credit To – M.T. Swift