The Cold: Chapter 1
My heart is beating fast.
I wait alone in a room. There are newspapers on the wall and a big leather sofa in the corner.
I sit on a small, uncomfortable chair by the door.
Waiting for that door to open.
“Ms. Ari Brooks?” a woman says while she opens the door with her cherry red nails. “Mr. Jones… did not come to the office today. Can you come back tomorrow for an interview?” The receptionist stepped through the door. She looks annoyed, but she politely smiles.
How can this happen to me again?
“Actually,” says the receptionist, “Many of our staff are not here today. It’s January, so maybe they are sick or have the flu…”
“I understand,” I say. “Please ask Mr. Jones to call me when he feels better.” I try to smile, but I want to cry.
I leave the newspaper office and get on the bus. I want to buy a car, but I don’t have any money. I am 22 years old, but I live with my parents. I graduated from college with a degree in journalism, but I can’t find a job.
My sadness becomes anger. Why didn’t Mr. Jones contact me to reschedule the interview? Even if he is sick, he can still send a short email.
This is not the first time. My interviewer last week did not come either.
People can be so rude.
The bus ride home is quiet. The only other person on the bus is an elderly woman with a cowboy hat. She gets on the bus at one stop and gets off at the next.
This newspaper company was my last interview appointment. I applied to twenty companies, got rejected by eighteen, and got an interview for two. Both interviewers had to “reschedule” for an unknown reason. This one didn’t even come to the interview.
I look out the window of the bus. In Clayton, there is a small city and a lot of farmland. Cows stand close to each other in the field beside the highway. It is hard to count them in the snow, and their black spots look like many watching eyes.
Screech!
The bus stops suddenly, and my black bag flies off the seat. Many cars behind us honk their horns angrily. A woman next to us rolls down her window and takes out her cell phone, recording a video of the bus driver and yelling horrible things.
The bus driver, a man with a large belly and a small gray moustache, does not respond to the woman. He rushes down the bus steps and runs to the side of the road.
The bus driver is tapping something on the ground and shouting. He calls for help and takes off his jacket, laying it over something I cannot see.
The angry woman from before runs over and begins to make a phone call. She squats on the ground and covers her eyes while talking to the person on the phone.
I wonder if there was a car accident. Is there a dead animal or a dead person on the side of the road? The woman is crying now. She hands her phone to the bus driver, who continues talking to the person on the phone.
Thinking it is probably a person who died in some accident, I stand up and walk to the front of the bus to see what happened.
Most people do not want to see a dead body. I don’t want to see it either. But if I want to be a successful journalist, I need to get used to seeing terrible things sometimes. It is our job to tell the world about these terrible things, hoping that the world can learn how to be more careful.
As I get closer to the front of the bus, I see a head of blond hair next to where the bus driver is standing. A man, in his late forties. His face is paler than his hair. He looks like he was in the cold for a long time. Did no one notice him until now?
I stand up on the bus seat to see more of the accident. Was he riding a motorcycle? Was there a helmet or a bike on the side of the road?
From his pale face, a pale neck appears. Then pale shoulders. Then a pale chest. The rest is covered by the bus driver’s jacket. Two blue-white feet stick straight out from the jacket.
This man died naked.
Sirens cry in the distance. Soon, two police cars and an ambulance show up. A police officer interviews the bus driver and the woman with the cell phone. Another officer takes pictures of the body on a camera. She calls to the other officer and points to a tree next to the road.
Among the tree roots that stretch out from the tree and disappear into the snow-covered ground, two legs appear from behind the tree. Like the other body, the legs are naked, and they do not move. Unlike the other body, both legs are dark purple.
Chapter 2>
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