A cool wind blows (Open)

I liked winter better than the rest of the seasons. The bitter cold and drifts of snow provided plenty of space to walk and think, out of reach from the rest of the men and women that worked the trees. Miss Eleanor liked only to sit by the fire and whimper over her dead idiot son (my father) after the accident that had taken his life last year. She’d not yet regained her signature sense of control over my mother, sister, and I, and I was ever watchful for it to return. Better for me to walk out through the snow, far and away from home, than to incite and blood between her and me.

There was something serene about the howl of wind and blasts of snow. It wasn’t cold, at least, not with the animal furs over the front of my body, and the deerskin pants my mother had given to me in the fall. Heavy boots were a staple of district seven, didn’t matter the time of the year. A heavy scarf wrapped around my face and covered my nose, leaving only my forehead and cheeks for the wind to ravage. And truth be told, I like the cold, numbing the rest of my body. Folks could keep the heat of the summer, I’d take a good, cold afternoon in winter any day.

White and gray collected through the trees, now leafless and covered in ice. We spent less time cutting and more time marking, now, as the wood was a bit more temperamental in the cold. I took up extra work in my cousin’s shop carving and whittling, which meant I was always on the hunt for bits of wood that could be turned into this and that. Today I’d planned on finding a good log or two to toss into my back pack, and maybe spend the evening getting some initial cuts in. I spent a good hour tracing and retracing my steps, hoping to find something worthwhile, though I reckon a lot had been picked over for firewood.

I tilted my head at the sound of huffing through the snow. I wasn’t keen so much on meeting other folk out on a stroll, especially if it was a set of men marking trees they weren’t supposed to cut. There were always a few that took from land that didn’t belong to them, and they didn’t tend to like witnesses around. But this time it’s a girl – a shock of red hair, trudging through the snow. I peel away the scarf from in front of my mouth and clear my throat.

“’Scuse me. You’re heading through some logger territory, Ma’am.” It wasn’t that she couldn’t be allowed, but better that she knew to watch herself. “Just thought you might want to know, some of these men don’t take so kind, and others aren’t supposed to be her themselves.” Men were typically the root of problems around here. “Name’s Fargo Tate. You thinking you might want to walk a ways with me? I’m by myself, too.”