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So Cold In Alaska: Shortbread's Light Bite

Published 9 months ago

Today's Light Bite is a brand new addition to the Shortbread library. So Cold in Alaska is an unusual and yet superbly crafted story, which will have you coming back for more. 

So Cold In Alaska by Steve Douglas

Trout had been in Alaska for so long he couldn’t remember being anywhere else. He had gotten so used to the chill that warm days had faded from memory. The sun still shone, the sky was blue and cloudless, but he was in Alaska, and it is so cold in Alaska that sunbeams are icebergs.

He spent his days among the ruins of the old abbey, which, like him, had seen better days. Its stones rang with the songs of Alaska, though, and often he would place his hands on them, feeling their faint glow. Once this had been a place of praise and light, but the abbey had passed into Alaska long ago.

Sometimes Trout watched the people who walked by the river, which ran beside the abbey ruins. They were always glowing, a golden aura seeming to surround them. If they passed too close to him, he would look away, embarrassed, remembering that he was in Alaska.

Trout studied the women particularly closely, for he wanted a dark haired princess. He was beginning to think he would have to make do with Stephanie, who had hair as dark as an Alaskan cobra, but who was hardly a princess. She was still his truest love, though neither of them knew this, for they had never spoken. Stephanie was waiting for Trout to make the first move, and Trout was waiting to make sure she was in Alaska too.

There is a lot of waiting done in Alaska.

Trout thought Stephanie was beautiful. Hair as black as his own, long and straight, hanging like a curtain on each side of her pale, drawn face. Her eyes were large and dark, and gazed out sadly from a mind that must surely be in Alaska.

One day Trout was sitting against the wall of the abbey with a book, when he thought he caught her gazing at him from the river path. Between them a couple was walking, holding hands, but she was looking straight through them, towards him. The chill in her eyes was as sharp as that in his fingers, as he turned the pages of his book, ‘Walks in North Alaska’, and he knew.

Rising, he made his way towards her. The couple between them had begun making love at the side of the path, and he had to skirt the red glow that surrounded them. It made him feel colder than ever. He thought for a moment that Stephanie would be gone when he looked again, but she was not; she was watching his approach; he could see the interest in her eyes as she stood by the river, her black trousers and white blouse making her appear like a photographic negative. As he drew close his heart began to pound. He badly needed an opening line, but opening lines do not exist in Alaska, except in books. He gripped his book ever more tightly.

Her face broke into a smile as he came to face her, and she held up something he had not noticed before. It was a book, with an iceberg on the front.

“Alaska, A Social History,” he read, and they both laughed.

Her fingers were cold, but that was only to be expected. They walked hand in hand by the river. The glow surrounding the landscape was fading, and Trout wondered if perhaps the sun was going down. It would make no difference to him, naturally, for he was still in Alaska.

“It’s actually quite beautiful in Alaska,” he said to Stephanie, and she agreed.

“They’ve forgotten how wonderful it is,” she said, and he wondered who she was referring to.

“Is your book good?” he asked, to hide his discomfort.

“Yes. Would you like to borrow it?” She held the book out to him. The iceberg had gone, and the title read ‘My Heart And Alaska’.

“Thank you, but I have my own,” he said, clutching ‘Princess of Alaska’ between his icy fingers.

“Have you been in Alaska long?”

“Ever since I can remember.”

The path they were following came to an abrupt end. It had been going closer and closer to the river’s edge, and suddenly it became lost in mud and reeds. Their shoes were quite dirty. He pulled at her hand. “We can’t go any further.”

Her pale face looked sad for a moment, and she did not answer, instead pulling him several steps back the way they had come, and pointed through the trees. He squinted, because the sun was so low, and then he made out the wooden hut, made from fine Alaskan timber.

“We can stay here,” she said.

Inside the hut it was warm, which surprised him. There was a bookcase along one wall, and he studied the books, finally selecting one - ‘Alaska- The Lost Continent’. It was the only book about Alaska there, and he held it with care. The rest of the hut was plain, but he noticed that on the earth floor there was a sleeping bag made from dozens of patches, each with ‘Stephanie’ embroidered on them.

“It’s getting dark,” she said.

They undressed in silence, and got into the sleeping bag. Trout struggled to read the book about Alaska that he had just found, but the dark closed in around him, and ‘Alaska- The Lost Continent’ faded into blackness.

He drew Stephanie to him, and they were warm at last.

The next morning they rose early, and Stephanie cooked a little breakfast on a small stove Trout had not noticed before. She asked him to go out and chop some wood for her supplies, and gave him a brand new axe, especially for the job. He was reluctant, for it was warm inside the hut, but Stephanie seemed to be glowing that morning, and he wanted to please her. He gripped the axe firmly, noticing the “Made in Alaska” sign on the handle.

It was cold outside. There were many dead trees available for cutting, but Trout found it impossible to make an impression on any of them. Then he remembered he was still in Alaska, and it would surely be impossible to make a fire anyway. Smiling, he went back to the hut.

Stephanie was cross. “If we can’t have a fire here in Alaska,” she said suddenly, “then we must leave at once!” She took his hand once more, and led him outside. Her fingers were beginning to warm up. “The stove worked,” she said accusingly, and Trout felt confused. He had never cooked anything in Alaska, eating twice a day at “Cafe of Alaska” near the abbey.

Stephanie led Trout back to the river. The glow of the morning sun was upon it, and it glittered. She stopped at the path’s end once more, and turned to face him. “Time to leave. What’s your first name?”

Trout’s first name was Richard, but he didn’t know that, being in Alaska, and he answered in surprise, “I don’t know!”

Stephanie turned from him, and to his astonishment began striding into the river, heading towards the opposite bank. She looked once over her shoulder, and he saw her piercing eyes for the last time, for his feet were frozen in the mud; he was immobile. He wondered if she would drown, but no, she reached the other side quite safely. The river was not deep, and she had such long legs...

“No one stays in Alaska!” he heard her cry bitterly, before she disappeared into the woods.

Back up the river Trout could see the ruins of the abbey, and he longed to place his fingers on the stones once more. His shoes were still stuck in the mud, so he undid his laces, stepped free, and began walking barefoot along the path. His feet were cold, but it is always cold in Alaska and he didn’t notice them.

When Trout reached the abbey he saw that very little had changed. The stones, the path, and the river were all as he’d left them. The couple who had been making love, however, were playing a ball game with three children, who all bore a striking resemblance to the man. Trout wondered whether ball games were allowed so close to the abbey, but decided that in Alaska ball games were not very important.

One of the children threw the ball so hard it flew high in the air towards him. Instinctively he reached out and caught it, but it was so hot that it burned his fingers and he dropped it immediately. The children looked at him, and he looked at the ball, lying there on the ground, surrounded by a red glow.

He felt extraordinarily stupid as he realised that none of these people were in Alaska, and he began to run towards the abbey, and sanctuary. When he reached his favourite position by the wall he was surprised to find a book lying there, the book he thought he had left in Stephanie’s hut. “Welcome to Alaska” he read; it seemed to be welcoming him home.

He did not feel at home, however. There is no home in Alaska. The chill got colder and colder, and Trout’s eyes began to sting, causing the words on the cover to blur. He felt something strange on his cheeks and put his hand up to investigate. His face was marked with icicles that broke off as he touched them.

Trout shivered and crushed the icicles in his hand, feeling a flicker of sadness as they turned to crystals. He stared at them in bewilderment, then remembered that he was inAlaska, and it is so cold in Alaska that sunbeams are icebergs…

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