Chapter 4 - The Iron Bridge
The darkness grew absolute as the storm reached its peak. The storm was later named the worst early-season blizzard in Wisconsin history, knocking out power lines for sixty miles and stranding hundreds of motorists. But on the isolated stretch of route heading toward the town of Blackwood, Caleb was the only soul moving.
His body was failing. His ribs, bruised from his third fall against a guardrail, throbbed with every ragged inhalation. By the tenth fall, he had lost the ability to stand smoothly. He had to crawl to a fence post or a snow-drift wall, drag himself up inch by inch, and lock his knees before taking another step forward.
Maisie’s voice was fading. She no longer cried. Her head rested heavily against his left shoulder, her breathing dangerously slow.
“Maisie,” Caleb rasped, his cracked lips bleeding into the ice on his chin. “Sing that song. The one you were humming in the car.”
No answer. Only the whistle of the wind.
“Maisie!” he yelled, panic giving his frozen muscles a sharp jolt of adrenaline. He reached back, gently shaking her leg. “Maisie, talk to me!”
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“…Twinkle… twinkle…” her faint, slurred voice murmured against his neck.
“That’s it. Keep going,” Caleb sobbed, the tears freezing instantly into hard crystals on his eyelashes. He stumbled forward, his legs moving on pure instinct. He was at fall fourteen now. His knees were purple, his clothes stiffened into an icy armor. He was no longer a boy running from his past; he was a lifeline carrying a child across an abyss.
