The wind whistles steadily past like a train. Past the garage where I sit in the dark with a cold cup of yesterday’s coffee, smoking a cigarette I thought I’d given up. I look out at the back yard, brushed with snow and painted by moonlight. There’s a dark patch of pachysandra that grows by the thin line of trees that separates our yard from the neighbors. I’d planted sprigs there a decade ago and it’s happily spread itself into a crowd. A deer weaves between the spaces of bright snow and dark night, nose into the wind, and I wonder if I should follow.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology