A Slowly Fading Sound

Yesterday the weatherman claimed there was a ten percent change of precipitation. Yesterday he predicted a sunny day, with few scattered clouds. He said there would be a high temperature of fifty degrees. Tonight, the weatherman has been fired.

         Tonight it will start to snow. There will be two feet of snow within the hour. The roads will ice over.

         A man curses rear wheel drive. The voices coming from the stereo are a tinny, slowly fading sound.

         Tonight his veins have iced over and his skin is stretched taut over his white cold grip of the steering wheel. There is a temperature gauge in the car that reads four degrees fahrenheit. He clicks his brights on and gazes hard into the dark abyss ahead, which is cloaked in an endless blanket of tumbling, swirling snowflakes.

         He picks up his cell phone from the passenger seat and speed dials home, wanting to hear her voice.

         “Hey, where are you?” his wife answers.

         “I can’t tell exactly,” he replies. “I’m trying to get home but I don’t know how long it’s going to be.”

         “Please be careful.”

         “I will.”

         “I love you.”

         “I love you.”

         He hangs up the phone.

         In her kitchen, she returns the receiver to its cradle. Her hand lingers on it, and she stares for a moment. The boys are wrapped up in a quilt on the couch downstairs in the dark. Toy Story flickers on the television screen. She adjusts the thermostat. The kids gasp and squeal as the lights shut off and the hum of the house powers down into silence.

         The snow thickens outside the windshield. He does not know where the road ends and the shoulder begins. His grip tightens on the wheel.

         When the road curves he does not see it coming. He heads for a guard rail, yells and quickly throws the steering wheel around. The car spins and broadsides the guard rail. It flies up, knocking the guard rail over as it rolls over the side. It rolls itself right, then upside down again, then right; then it settles, upside down, at the bottom of a deep ditch. The engine sputters and dies.

         His forehead is cut and bleeding. His seat belt is holding him upside down. He is unconscious and his legs are pinned between his seat and the dashboard, which has compacted during the fall.

         When he awakens he does not feel any pain. His feet are cold, and his fingers shake. He reaches down to his lap and feels something sticky. He places both of his hands on one of his legs and pulls. He cries out and lets go.

         He turns his head and gazes out the window. The snow drifts are like ghosts in the dark. He looks up towards the road. He cannot see anything. There is no light in any direction.

         He looks around, feeling the ceiling-now-floor. He twists around until pain pulls him back.

         At home, the boys are huddled together under blankets in the basement.

         He flicks his headlights on. Shards of light cut through the darkness. Snow is piling up. A couple of hours of this, and his car will be buried. He flashes his lights off and on again, hoping that if he flickers the lights some passerby will see him there.

         When a soft female voice comes in through the dark, he thinks he is hallucinating.

         “Hello?” he says aloud. His voice sounds foreign, floating outside of him.

         “Sir, I’ve received notification that your vehicle has been in an accident. I’m sending emergency services to your location.” Her voice is monotonous and she sounds tired.

         “My car is upside down.”

         “Are you hurt?”

         “I’m bleeding.”

         “You’re bleeding? Where are you bleeding?”

         “In my car.” He is confused. “My... my legs. I can’t feel my feet.”

         “Sir, help is on the way. Try to remain calm. I’m going to stay on the line with you.”

         “I can’t feel my legs and... and I’m really tired... I think I hit my head.”

         “Sir, you need to stay awake. Do you understand?”

         “Do you know where I am?” he asks.

         “You drove off the side of rural highway 63. Emergency services are trying to get to you.”

         He stares forward into the darkness.

         “Are you there?”

         “I don’t want to die,” he says.

         “Sir, I need you to calm down and everything will be fine.”

         “Can you connect me to my family?” he asks. She says she can and that she will stay on the line while he talks to them.

         The phone rings. His wife clicks on. “Hello?”

         “Hey.”

         “Where are you? I thought you were on your way. I’m worried about you. The kids are terrified.”

         “I’m fine, I’m fine. There was just a minor accident. They’re coming to get me because the car can’t make it, but I’m okay.”

         She starts to cry.

         “Listen to me. I’m on my way home and everything is going to be fine. Don’t worry.”

         “Okay, okay.” She sniffles.

         “Hey.” Silence. “I love you.”

         “I love you.”

         “Can I talk to them?”

         “Yeah. Here.” He hears her telling them that Daddy wants to talk to them. First the youngest. Still not adept at using the phone, he breathes into the receiver, waiting for his father to speak.

         “Hey tiger.”

         “Hi Dad.”

         “You gonna have an awesome birthday tomorrow?”

         “Yeah.” He is quiet.

         “Make sure you get a really great wish.”

         “Yeah... I’m really hoping for a light-saber... I mean really hoping Dad.”

         “Well you can’t tell me or else it won’t come true. I’ll pretend I never heard it.”

         “Okay, Dad.”

         “I love you.”

         “I love you too, Dad.”

         “Put your brother on the phone for me, buddy.”

         He hands the phone over.

         “Hey there, trouble.”

         “Hey, Dad. When are you coming home?”

         “I’m on my way. It’s just going to take a little longer. I’ll be there soon.”

         “The power’s out. It’s kinda freaky.”

         “Make sure you wrap up really good with lots of blankets.”

         “I wish you would just come home now. Dad.”

         “I know. You make sure to take good care of your mom and brother while I’m gone, okay? You’re going to have to be man of the house for a little while. Just till I get home.”

         “Sure, Dad. I love you.”

         “I love you too, buddy.”

         He hangs up the phone.

         “Are you still there?” he asks the operator.

         “Yes, sir. I’m still here. How are you feeling?”

         “I’m fucking cold.”

         There is silence. “They will make it at some point, sir. It’s only a matter of time. The snow is heavy where you are.”

         “I am not sure how much time... cold. It’s cold.”

         “I understand.”

         “My little boy is five tomorrow. He wants a light-saber.”

         “I heard.”

         He pauses. “I’m never going to see them.”

         “They’re getting to you as fast as they can.”

         "I’m tired."

         "Stay with me, sir. They’re getting through the snow."

         "I don't think... anymore... there was, is blood. I can’t-- I don’t, know. What? Did you say?"

         “Take a deep breath and continue speaking to me," she says, eerie calm.

         "I’m dead." He is delirious.

         “What?” she responds. "Push that away. Get rid of it." Her voice is firm.

         "Dead man..." His voice is quiet and labored.

         “Keep talking, sir. Sing a song." Sing a song, a song not of death.

         He takes a deep, rasping breath. "Oh say can you see..."

         Flashlight beams seek him out across the snow. Voices are singing at him from a corner world of his mind.

         "By the dawn's early light... what so proudly we hailed..."

         "Sir, emergency services are at your location."

         "At the twilight's last..."

         "You know the words. Keep singing, sir."

         He does not.

         “Sir.”

         She says this as men are digging through the snow. They find his car and open the door but they are quiet and slow as they cut the seat belt.

         “Sir.” She repeats this twice more.

         She clicks off the line. Pulls her headset from her ears, lays it on her desk. Covers her mouth with her hand. The sound waves from his last whispered line still sing softly in the deep empty space of her ear, and a part of her falls away.