"Why does it feel like everyone is evacuating?" Brandon asked nervously as a steady stream of headlights was cascading down from the mountains as we drove solemn deep into the cliffs. It was dark, not black, but the light was hidden by the rocks and any minute it felt like the curtain would be closed on the day. The long drive had taken its toll on all of us and Domenic was hugging the wheel close and his eyes were being tugged at by two black bags.
"I don't know, maybe because they aren't complete idiots," Domenic said frankly, too tired to lighten the increasingly smothering night.
"Do we even know where we are going?" The road turned sharply and Domenic slowed to ten miles an hour. The cliffs hung above us like a canopy and a river tore through the crevice angrily - I shivered.
"I'd say up." The road continued to wind and switchbacks brought us ever higher and after each corner I held my breath just to find another cliff and another crevice and another corner. Another breath, another cliff, another crevice, another corner. It is hard to say what I was expecting but a notion began seizing my chest that I just wanted to know something. It all seemed so unreal I wanted it to end and I wanted to know exactly what was happening. It was then the snow started.
We didn't say anything to each other. I could feel gravity pulling on my chest urging us to not climb any higher. I looked behind us and saw tail lights. We should probably turn around, I thought.
"Jesus it's cold," said Joeb as he stuck his hand out the window.
I smiled meakly, "At least we are dressed for it."
"This will be fun." Brandon had been sitting in the back and I had not noticed how loose he had remained. Actually, everyone seemed to be accepting the situation and I was able to relax and it was then we reached seven thousand feet and the entrance to Estes National Park.
"I can't see a thing." The snow was attacking the car almost intentionally and the headlights barely pierced the night ahead. We pulled up to an empty ranger kiosk and there was a sign that warned of weather and below it a map with some suggestions of where to camp. Domenic rolled down his window and snow began whipping in the car and he quickly grabbed a map and closed the window silencing the howling night.
"What do we do?"
"What does the map say?"
"It looks like we can take a left here then four miles down there are places to pull off and camp. This weather is bad, man. I don't know how I feel about this."
We were all nervous and waiting for someone to admit that we were not prepared for a night in the snow, but nobody would say anything.
Domenic pressed the gas and I heard the tires spin in the snow desperately grabbing at the road. They caught and we lurched forward and I could hear the transmission wine and my stomach rolled a little.
As we entered deeper into the night my nerves became dull - which could possibly be explained by the cold. There was something hiding in the night, and we all felt we were on the verge of some kind of discovery. We had food, clothing, the car was warm and we were far from home. I looked at Joeb and he nodded and I knew we were really doing it and the night became sharp. I felt a tingle in my fingers and I realized my face was nearly pressed against the windshield and then without much warning Domenic stopped the car and got out. He disappeared in the night and I could hear his laughter over like an echo and then we were all standing in the snow and it was cold and I could feel it in my spine and the air was clean in my lungs. Snow was falling fast and accumulating on the ground. Domenic popped open the tailgate door on the station wagon and brandon took a spade and began clearing out an area for a tent. We worked in silence and in the cold. The snow was soft. It didn't fall like it had when we were driving - like it was attacking us, but instead it landed on our heads and our arms and it was a cooling sensation which was relaxing. Joeb was staking the tent in the ground and I laid a tarp down on the already damp canvas bottom. We quickly tossed our sleeping bags and pillows in the tent to keep them from getting wet and the rain cover looked like it would be sufficient for the snow. It had been a long day, and when Brandon and Domenic had also set up a tent we all climbed back in the car and changed out of our wet clothes. As we sat there catching our breath the snow lightened and we could see very clearly because of the reflection of the moon on the snow. There was only a few inches on the ground but the intensity of the storm had ignited something old inside us.
Brandon had been quiet all day. I looked at him now and he was peering out the window at the mountains now visible in the light of the night. He was smiling and the he looked content in the shadows of the night. The snow stopped completely and we all got out of the car and just walked around the camp for a little while, until I saw Brandon reach down in the snow and form it with his palms. I knew what was coming so I ducked behind the car, but Domenic, mesmorized by the moon, stood exposed to the airborn snowball and it hit him in the side of the face. I laughed violently and began forming one of my own, and popped up from behind the car and hit Brandon in the back of the head. It was a blur after that, our laughter and panting echoing over the cliffs and exploding across the earth. Brandon was tackled by Joeb and his face was pressed in the snow. Domenic was running towards me and he slipped and fell down a small hill. I was laughing so hard I couldn't breathe. We were soaking wet again but it felt like it should.
I can remember one night when I was younger a storm rolled in unexpectedly. The moments before the storm started felt electric, like there was energy pulsing through everything outside in the grey afternoon. The wind picked up, and the trees whispered to each other as if to prepare for the looming storm - and then the snow started, quietly and small at first. The heat of the asphalt instantly melting the first brave flakes that dared settle on its surface. The threat of the storm was so powerful they had already cancelled school the next day. I convinced my parents to let me go to Timmy's and when I got there the flakes were like feathers, falling with force and overpowering the earth. Margaret had plugged in a halogen lamp in the bathroom and placed it in the window. It lit up the whole yard. We were climbing up the hill and sledding down until eventually the whole neighborhood was there. Margaret stood outside in boots and her bathrobe, smoking a cigarette and watching us regress in the night. She didn't say anything, and at one point after I was thrown from the caravan of sleds and tubes flying down the hill I sat in the snow and I watched her. She looked empty. She was just there and that was it. I saw her dip her stunted cigarette in the snow and light another. She was staring at me but I could tell she couldn't see me. Or maybe she could. Maybe that was the point. I sat in the snow until it soaked through my clothes and I was cold. I was just looking at her. The snow had covered her shoulders and her hair and she started to transform until she retreated out of the light into the night. I don't know where she went but when she came back she was calling for Timmy and they both disappeared inside the house. Some of the kids sled for a while but the snow had let up and the intensity of the night had vanished, so I walked home wet and shivering in the cold. Nothing else happened that night except my mother was baking cookies when I was home. The storm was finished and we went back to school and it felt like nothing had even happened at all. I suppose nothing has ever happened - or everything has too many times to change anything. That night was different than this one. I'm not sure if it was because of who I am or who I was, but everything is different now. Everything has changed.
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