Fairy Tale: Winter's Bite

Chapter 7: Return to Normalcy (Part 2)

Joe slammed on the brakes and jerked the wheel to the left. The vehicle spun out of control. Then came the metallic crunch of vehicles colliding. Chris felt Joe's stumbling motion just before the crash, so he knew his brother was not lying maimed in the wreckage.

Moments later, they were falling and hit the ground in a tangle of legs, arms, heads, and bodies, their landing cushioned by the layers of the snowsuit. As quickly as possible, he helped Cassie and the children, now awake and amazingly calm, find their way out of the pocket. Joe had Modified and was getting the last of his fairy clothes on when they met up with him in the street.

They all scurried beneath a car on the side of the road and huddled behind an enormous front tire. Four black boots and flashlight beams passed over the shattered glass from the collision, not more than a few human-sized paces away.

Joe's stolen clothes lay in a mountainous heap not far from the car they were hiding beneath.

Their location wasn't what Chris would consider secure. With hand gestures, Chris and Joe began the debate of when to run. Cassie, however, didn't wait for the outcome. She was already en route to the opposite wheel, and slipped between it and the curb.

Chris and Joe froze as they watched her dart into the open from there. They turned toward the boots, which no doubt belonged to a couple of Gray Coats, and followed the beams of light with their eyes. All motion remained slow and thorough, their search focused in another direction. 

When Cassie made it underneath the next car, she signaled for them to follow. They took her route, two at a time—Chris and Morgan, then Joe and Ryan—and made it there without attracting any attention.

The next car was farther away. They had to be much more careful. But, at a glance back, Chris discovered what the Gray Coats had just discovered—the snowsuit Joe was wearing. So everyone had to move, no hesitation.

They made it to the next car, the last one before an intersection. They hugged the curb, crouched low, and rounded the corner. Then they ran as far and fast as their little lungs and limbs would allow.

Soon the brutal wind had them staggering. They paused underneath another car to catch their breaths and weigh their options.

"We can't go on like this for much longer." Joe blew a few labored breaths over his bare hands. "At our size, we'll die of hypothermia that much faster."

"Why don't we pick a house and try to secure a car," Chris suggested. "How about this one?" He jutted a thumb toward the house on their right. "It looks like there's a television on."

"Shouldn't we pick a house without lights on?" Joe asked.

"People who aren't home don't usually leave their keys lying around."

"I meant a house where people are sleeping. Not absent," Joe retorted in his I'm-not-an-idiot tone.

Cassie pointed to the beam of light sweeping over the ground nearby. "We have to make a decision."

Chris, with Morgan in his arms, peeked out from underneath the car. He darted across the sidewalk and ran up the shoveled walkway of the bungalow. The front steps looked too tall, the stairs too steep, so he took a right turn behind a snowbank.

They all met up again beside a garbage barrel. After rounding the house, the driveway took them by a basement window.

Chris paused when he dragged his hand across a familiar sort of fabric. "Hold on—that's duct tape! I think we can get in here."

He tried to peel the tape off the window, where it was sealing a crack in the glass. Joe and Cassie joined his efforts. Still, their tiny frozen fingers could not rip the weathered material.