“Help! Help
me!” AJ tried to scream, but his voice
came out muffled, and snow entered his mouth as he did so, choking him. He was surrounded in the cold wet snow, and
his whole body tingle with the bitter coldness of it. It was darkness beneath the snow, and he
couldn’t even figure out which direction was up, so that he could dig his way
out.
AJ struggled to breathe, but the snow was so compacted
around him that there was little oxygen available. Also, it pushed tightly against his chest,
giving him little room to expand his lungs.
His chest ached as he gasped and choked, craving the oxygen his life
depended on.
He gasped and screamed weakly and clawed around through the
snow, but as he ran out of air, he ran out of strength as well. His heart pounded frantically in his ears,
and his brain felt numb. His body
trembled and shook with panic as he tried to get in one last breath, but he
couldn’t. He saw red, then black, and
then he saw no more…
“No!” AJ screamed, jerking up.
He panted, gasping for air.
Looking around, he realized he was not buried in the snow, but lying on
the deck of Nick’s boat, safe and warm.
He glanced up at the sky. He
remembered it had been bright and sunny before, but now the sky had filled with
dark clouds, making the atmosphere more gloomy, fitting his emotions perfectly.
“AJ? You okay?” a voice asked. AJ looked up, startled, to find Howie
standing next to him, concern evident in his kind, brown eyes.
“I… I’m fine,” AJ said, still breathing hard from the horrific
dream, which reminded him so much of what had happened to him, and what could
have happened to him, the year before.
“Just a bad dream.”
“Thought so,” Howie said understandingly. “What about?”
AJ figured Howie already knew, but he told him anyway. “It was about the avalanche. I was buried under the snow, just like I was
then, only this time, you didn’t find me in time, and I suffocated. It was horrible.” He shivered at the memory of it, both the
dream and the real experience of it.
Howie patted AJ’s bare back.
“Don’t worry, buddy,” he said.
“We all still have nightmares about the whole experience.”
“I know,” AJ said, nodding.
He knew he wasn’t the only one having dreams like that one. He had heard accounts of dreams by all four
of the others, all of them reliving different parts of the horrible
tragedy. “Will we ever get over it and
stop having these dreams, D?” he asked.
“I don’t know, Bone,” Howie replied sadly. “I hope so, but these things take time.”
“How much time?” AJ wondered aloud. “It’s been a whole year. Shouldn’t we be able to just move on?”
“AJ, we all could have died out there, and Nick and Brian almost did. Of course we’re having trouble getting over
it,” Howie reasoned.
“Yeah, I guess so,” AJ said, nodding. He wished it wouldn’t be that way
though. They had been through so much
pain, not just physically, but emotionally.
It would be so much better if they could just forget the whole thing and
never have to relive that pain again.
But that was not possible.
***