An AXE copter hovered twenty feet above me. It was the copter her father had been fearfully searching for when he kept looking back. Hawk was beside the pilot waving at me feverishly, with evident relief that I’d finally noticed them. The sound of the motors was completely lost in the fury of the avalanche.
A rope ladder dropped down to me. I jumped on, but instead of climbing, waved the pilot forward. Hawk waved me to come up. I shook my head and pointed at Vera. I couldn’t hear Hawk cursing, but I could read his lips. He tapped the pilot on the shoulder and, reluctantly, moved toward the approaching snow.
I skimmed seven feet off the ground. We gained ground fast on Vera but she had a good head-start, and when she saw me on the ladder she ran all the harder. She didn’t seem to see the avalanche at all. The white wave roared down at her. We would reach her, though, I was sure of it.
Before the snow rolled a wave of turbulent air. The copter bucked and dove. Hawk tried to wave me up again. I hung from the ladder and reached out my hand. We were almost to Vera and so was a tidal wave of snow twenty feet high and moving just as fast. Vera suddenly looked very small, a dark figure against a rolling white background. I yelled until my throat was hoarse. Under the bucking copter, the ladder jumped and twisted.
At the last moment, she seemed to see the avalanche. She froze in terror. We dipped down, rocking in the wind of the avalanche, and I reached out as far as I could. Vera stood on the shaking ground, inches from my grasp, hate warring with fear in her eyes. The snow poured down.
Her hand shot out and grasped mine. At once, the copter lifted, desperately trying to rise above the cascading snow. The avalanche hit with all its force, rising to Vera’s waist. She said something I couldn’t hear. But the hate was gone from her face and so was the fear. There was only acceptance.
Then she was gone, tom away as the trees had been torn down. The snow wave covered her. The avalanche kept moving and building, killing and covering what it killed. Just as King said it would.
Stiffly, I climbed up into the copter. From there I watched the avalanche roll to its violent end. Hawk and I couldn’t talk above the noise, which was just as well.
Finally, the avalanche was over. The valley was still, very white and, from a great height, very pretty. I opened my fist. My fingers were smeared with blood and in my palm was an antique cameo ring.
“Hers?” Hawk asked. When I nodded, he said, “You must have been holding her pretty hard.”
“I was.” I opened the false top. Inside was white powder.
“What’s that, Nick?”
I didn’t have to taste it to know.
“Her suicide if she ever needed it. Heroin. An overdose of snow.”
The copter wheeled and headed for Snowman.
“She never needed it,” Hawk said.