"Another one?"
"You knew you moved to a small town, Lucas," I said with a grin. "It's not fireworks and a rock concert, but it's nice. They hold it here, at the cafe. There'll be dancing. Tons of food. More than Thanksgiving, even."
"Idyllic," he said. "The whole village is a little like a postcard, you know. Sometimes I wonder if it's going to turn out to be some kind of horror novel after all, but I can't quite see it."
I smiled. "We have our problems, but I don't think there's anything that macabre. Unless you count the Straw Bear."
"Maybe the Straw Bear didn't used to be symbolic."
"Maybe not. Then again, most places have something in their past that's best left there," I said. It never occurred to me that it wasn't the false violence of the straw bear he meant, but rather the transformation. "It's all an eternal puzzle, Lucas. But you will come to New Year's?"
"Oh, I think so. It sounds like fun," he said. "Do I have to bring something?"
"Well, no one has to. I don't think anyone would care if you didn't. We all know how far away you live. Are you going back today?"
"Yes – just screwing up my courage," he said. "I'll see you on New Year's if I'm not back sooner."
"Quite a walk back to your place," I said. "Can't someone drive you down to the end of the asphalt?"
"It's out of the way for nearly everyone. I don't mind."
"You will, halfway there with nowhere to put your bags down. Let me close the shop and I'll come with you," I said.
Lucas glanced at me, then nodded nervously, setting out some money for the meal. "You don't have to come help, you know."
"It's been a while since I strapped on my snowshoes," I said with a grin. "Business is slow. I'll make sure your heating is still working..."
"I know how to re-light a pilot now," Lucas replied, but his grin was as wide as mine. "Come on then, but I won't tip you."
I was rummaging through the storage room, where I was sure I'd stashed my snowshoes sometime last winter – and where a wrapped package for Lucas happened to be – when the door slammed and I put my head out. Lucas was loitering near the home-improvement section again; my guest was the boy, who leaned on my counter and waved at me.
"Hiya," I said. "Looking for something?"
"Saw you come in," he said. "I thought I'd say hi."
"Well, hi," I replied, pressing the package into his hands and pointing at the bags by the door. "Haven't seen you around since school let out. How'd exams go?"
"Tell him about your History test," Lucas called. The boy quietly snuck the package into the bag.
"I was really fast, I was third done in History," he said, beaming hugely at me. "And I got done first in Art."
"You had a final exam in art?" I asked, rummaging under the counter.
"Had to write an essay about our favorite piece of art," the boy said.
"What'd you choose?" I asked, looking up.
"That one," the boy pointed over my shoulder at a poster on my back wall. It had come from Chicago with me, years before: a reprint of an old propaganda piece from the forties, extolling the virtues of riding the elevated train. "Lucas says it's early modernist graphic design repopularized by ironic nostalgia."
"Did you say that in your paper?" I gave him a startled look. He shook his head.
"Don't know what it means. I just said I liked the colors and shapes."
"Well, that'll probably earn you a B at least. Aha!" I added triumphantly, as the snowshoes clattered out from behind the glass door. "Found 'em, Lucas!"
"Great!" he said. He glanced up at the boy, who radiated innocence. "We're going out to The Pines. Want to come?"
"Can't today," the boy said. "Gotta go. Merry Christmas!"
"See you at New Year!" Lucas called after him, as the door banged shut again. "Five bucks says he gets an A on his art test."
"Not a bet I'd take," I replied, as I hooked the snowshoes over my shoulder.
"He got me a Christmas present. But I think you probably know that," Lucas added with a smile.
"I had hints," I agreed. "So, are we going or what?"
Ten minutes later we were at the edge of the village, on the last few feet of asphalt before it gave way to unplowed snow, still thick on the ground beyond us. We set down the bags and began putting the snowshoes on, Lucas with more care and deliberation – he'd used them a few times, I think, but I had two full Low Ferry winters on him and I was up on the snowbank by the time he had his first shoe on. I offered him a hand up when he was ready, and we were on our way again.
"It makes me want to keep a sled," Lucas said, carrying a bag in one hand and swinging his other arm for balance, like I was. "I'm surprised more people don't have a few dogs for sledding, with weather like this."
"And do what with them the rest of the year? Horses can haul carts or carry packs in the summertime. Dog-sleds aren't all that useful on mud," I replied. "Then you've got a handful of big, energetic dogs with no outlet all summer."
"Guess so. I wonder what it's like here in the summer. I suppose you know."
"Hot," I grunted.
"Still, they'd enjoy themselves well enough in the winter, don't you think?"
"Probably," I agreed. We walked on in silence until the cottage became visible, a dirty blot on the white surrounding it. Snow had piled up against the back, between the rear wall and the incline of the hill, spilling down on either side.
"You'll come in, won't you?" he asked. "You can't come all the way out here on the snow and not at least warm up a little before you go back."
"It's going to be freezing in there," I said.
"I left wood ready in the fireplace and I didn't turn the heater all the way down. I wasn't planning on staying in town this long."
He bent and scooped some of the snow away from the kitchen door, undoing his snowshoes. Before he opened the door he turned around, and I followed his gaze.
There was a band of blackish blue forming on the horizon above the town, where the setting sun's rays no longer quite reached. We were already standing in the shadow of the hill, the rest of the meadow and the edges of the town touched with gold. You think you never remember it right, that light doesn't work that way – that the world can't look so gold or blue. But once or twice in your life you catch it, and it is.