A Prairie Rose

Chapter 13

The days passed. Even when it felt like they never would, they did. 

Stray sticks laying nearby were becoming harder and harder to find. I had started snapping the branches that I could off of the nearby trees, but many of them had branches that were too high to reach, or too thick for me to break off. 

The food was slowly disappearing, too. I had taken to only eating once every other day, but I knew it was useless. I had only a few cups of flour left. Even if I could only eat once every other week, it wouldn't last me until the end of winter. 

I knew I was just pushing off the inevitable. But I continued to do it, nonetheless.  There seemed to be nothing else to do. 

Winter seemed to hit with full force- it left me realizing that I may need to take down the canvases that separated the rooms, and use them instead to seal the hole in the roof. Trouble was, I was much too small to get up on the roof, even with boxes stacked below me. I thought about using the long planks that Pa had never used to build the chimney- perhaps I could angle them just right and make a ramp. But each time, I was too frightened- the wind whipped around me too fiercely, billowing my skirts wildly so that they slapped me in the face and covered my eyes. 

Each time, I was forced back down to the ground. It was just too windy and high.

The nights were the scariest of all. The night air let in by the hole in the roof whipped the canvases to and fro, making them billow all about. And the wind pushing through the small cracks in the taller part of the log walls made a horrid whistling sound, and it was almost like Pa's spirit was there in the dark, empty cabin, just as angry and violent as he had been in life. I found myself staying awake later and later, too afraid to close my eyes, just waiting for the day that something horrific appeared in the dead of night.

And, one night, it surely seemed to- when through the complete darkness and wailing wind, a loud and persistent 'banging' sound seemed to shake the entire house. 

I bolted upright in my bed, keeping my quilt wrapped tightly around me like a shield. The banging stopped for a moment, and then started once more. I remained frozen in place, trembling horribly, and keeping as still and quiet as I could- as if that would save me.

"Please!" 

The sound of a voice made me near jump out of my skin- but it didn't sound like Pa's spirit. It was a panicked, high-pitched sound. Like a child. 

Again, the voice came. "Please, please, open the door! It's me, Hattie! Oh, please! We need help!"

It took a few moments for my racing heart to settle back into my chest- it felt as if it had plummeted straight down to my stomach upon hearing the banging on the front door. But as soon as I came to my senses, I rushed to my feet, and shoved on the front door as hard as I could- Hattie's banging had pushed it more firmly into place than I ever dared to, out of fear that I would be unable to open it again.

Hattie dodged the door and then rushed towards me, wrapping her arms around me and sobbing. Her body was so chilled that the cold bled straight through my nightgown. My heart began to pound once more. "Hattie? What's happened?"

"It's Mama!" Hattie wept. "A- a tree fell on the house. Mama's trapped, and Daddy's axe- it was near her, just by the door. We can't get to it! I need- I need-"

Already, I was whirling towards the fire- I kept Pa's axe just near the woodpile, though I was still unable to use it. It was heavy, and it took most of my strength just to heave up the side with the metal blade.

"Your Pa!" Hattie cried, turning towards the back room that used to belong to my father. "We must go wake him, we must!"

"He's not here," I said, unthinking. It was a silly thing to say, but now was not the time to think up a story. "We'll have to go alone. Go into the chest at the end of my bed and pull out the yellow coat- you'll catch your death out there. Bring me my wraps from the post of my bed, too!"