Grasp
The girl had stopped feeling cold a long time ago. She'd grown numb to it, insensitive to it. That worried her; she thought she might suffer frostbite, but she touched the tip of her nose from time to time, just to be sure. It stung to the touch; the nerves there hadn't died yet, but her senses had dulled. A flashlight cast a yellow glow on a wide spot on the ground, where a man had sunk down to his waist digging. The light wasn't much, but it was enough to blind her to the rest of the forest. Outside of a few trees, the rest of the universe may as well have been a wall of ink. The air was still and quiet, and only the man's steady rhythm of digging—his shovel sinking into the snow and dirt, then the soft sound of that discarded material impacting the snow around them—broke the silence. Even her own breath was dead silent.
The girl watched him from behind a rock, not daring to look with more than one eye. When the man seemed totally engrossed in his digging, she would check her phone with a trembling hand. Her hands were so cold and dry. They didn't seem like her hands at all but like those of an ice sculpture in Antarctica—so terribly brittle that they might snap off at the slightest touch. She kept her phone as dim as possible. She put it on silent so that man wouldn't hear, but no matter how she held it, the indicator at the top wouldn't ever show more than one tiny bar out of four, and even that one bar was tenuous and deceptive. She'd sent a dozen messages by then, each with her ice sculpture fingers clumsily pressing against the digital keys. She'd made mistakes—uncharacteristic for her. She'd hoped those mistakes would convince someone of the danger she was in, but each of her messages was written in deep crimson, reaching no one. She would've had more luck shouting into the dark.
"Any luck?" a boy, her companion, whispered in her ear. They were close to each other—closer than they'd normally be. It was the only way they could talk without being overheard. The girl shook her head, and wordlessly she nodded toward his pocket, where his phone was. He shook his head, too. They were cut off, but he was in a better state than her. He was well bundled-up. He could've stayed out there another hour. She'd gone out with only a light jacket because he'd insisted. There hadn't been time. He'd known the man with the shovel would leave soon. He'd promised it would only be for a little while. She could still see the sun then.
There was a faint metallic thud. The shovel hit something—the prize the man had been after. He sped up his pace, digging around the edges of the hole instead of at the center. If they didn't get help or stop him, they'd soon run out of time.
The boy had a plan of course. He had all sorts of gadgets and doodads at his disposal. He could make a soccer ball materialize from almost nothing, but he wasn't sure he'd land a clean shot at that range. No, his plan was more cunning than that. He could mask his voice to sound like someone else. He'd make himself sound like a lost little girl, begging for help from the man with the shovel. The strange voice would lure the man with the shovel toward the rock. Then, she could shoot the man with a tranquilizing dart.
It was an ambitious plan. It was impossible. How did the boy know the man wouldn't run away? What made him think she was in any condition to shoot someone with nothing more than a single-shot dart-throwing wristwatch? It was a tiny thing. Her hands wouldn't be able to keep it still. She wasn't even sure she could press a button, and if he thought to swap roles with her, she didn't think that would work, either. Her teeth were chattering. Playing actress in a matter of life and death could only go wrong.
"Hey," he said quietly, and he took her hands in his. His hands weren't cold at all. He had oversized wool mittens to keep him warm. If only he'd shown as much foresight when it came to her. "We can do this," he said. "Trust me."
He may have had a good track record, but the girl knew better than to trust in promises alone. She was cold and tired. Her hands were shaking.
"Stay with me now," the boy said. He took off his mittens and slipped them onto her hands. "Better now, right?"
The girl looked back at him, unsure whether to be annoyed he'd touched her without asking or amused that he could be so charming without realizing it. The mittens didn't do much—they were a small comfort against the cold—but they were a comfort. She wiggled her fingers, feeling the blood circulate through them less sluggishly. He, on the other hand, opened and closed his fists repeatedly to keep his fingers nimble.
The boy pointed for her to stay on one side of the rock. He went the other way with the undone bowtie in hand and put their plan in motion. He spoke into the bowtie and a woman's voice came out. The voice pleaded for help. It claimed not to see and babbled in fake delirium. Neither of them knew for sure whether the man would come up to help, but they hoped he would. It was cruel, in a way, to use a man's last ounce of goodness against him. He'd killed an old woman who'd been cruel to him and other children in the past. Other people might've let him be, but he'd already taken steps to cover up his deeds. He could kill again just to keep witnesses quiet. Maybe that's why he stepped out of the hole he'd dug and trudged toward the fake voice. Maybe it wasn't decency at all but a need for certainty—certainty that no one would ever know he'd buried someone there.
The boy had crept away in the dark, leading the man toward the trees. The man would pass by the rock at any moment, and all she had to do was point the the watch at him and press the button on the side. He'd fall over in a heartbeat. The girl watched for his shadow. She waited, trembling. She listened for his footsteps. He was on her left—wasn't he? She held her breath and clenched her jaw. Not a peep would come out of her, not even the chattering of teeth.
The man passed by the rock. The girl raised the watch on her wrist toward him and put her hand over the edge of the face and the side button. She pressed down.
And her finger slipped. The wool mitten was big and clumsy. She swore under her breath.
The man turned. His flashlight blinded her. Footsteps. "Run!" cried the fake woman's voice. The man's shadow lunged at her.
She stuck her hand in her mouth, bit at the end, and pulled the mitten away. She leveled the watch's sight on the glow of the flashlight, then aimed a hair higher, and shot.
The man fell against the rock and tumbled. His limp arm slapped her across the face. The girl was stunned and blinded but alive.
The boy crouched beside her. Was she hurt? Could she stand? He peppered her with a thousand questions about why she didn't fire when she had the chance. On and on he went. He even had the gall to tell her she'd bitten all the way through the wool of his glove. He'd need to get it fixed.
"Sorry," she said. "When we get back, I can fix it."
The boy rolled his eyes, and he stuffed the mittens into his pockets. "Don't worry about such a small thing. Now, come on, up you go." He offered a hand, and she took it, letting him pick her up off the snow, and as they walked back to the resort, her hand was no longer cold.
For CoAi Secret Santa 2018 - 'Mittens'