Semi-Daily Scribbles

The boy woke up and a blizzard raged outside his tarpaulin window. Sleet pummeled the sheet metal siding of his home.

Must be a dream, must be a dream. I can't have done this. Not in my sleep!

The boy was fully awake now, shivering like he'd never shivered before. In fact, he couldn't recall ever being cold. His winter nightmare had become a very real predicament. The boy had only shorts and a t-shirt. And his too large sandals the lady across the ravine gave him after her husband died. Not exactly the proper arctic wardrobe.

Do people wear sandals in the snow?

The boy got up from the floor. He was shocked at how much colder the air was a mere inch or two above where he slept. He laid back down on the scratchy mat. He rubbed his eyes and blew snot through his right nostril. The slime landed on a frozen beetle in the corner of the shack he referred to as his room. Then he saw the bright red eyes stare down at him from the corrugated ceiling. Bulging and bloodshot, those eyes were in the boy's dream, along with mountains of powdery snow. The boy tried desperately to remember what he'd wished for as he drifted off to sleep the night before.

A bath in lavender water, like when I was a baby.