Nick Eldridge lives alone in a tiny house on the bank of a trout stream in western Colorado.  While he enjoys material success as a nature writer, his memories are drawn back to his senior year of high school, to the girl Ceilidh O’Connor.

It’s been almost 30 years since Nick has last seen or heard from Ceilidh, but not a day’s gone by without her entering his mind. 

One day a blizzard strikes, screaming down from Canada.  A car has gone in the ditch on the highway a mile from Nick’s house, and out of the howling wind, a distant figure from the past comes to Nick’s door.

***

Sunday, October 11th

I woke up to the sound of the wind blowing as it had the previous thirty-six hours, but the light from the windows seemed a little brighter.  I got up and peeked out the front door.  The wind was dying down however slowly, and the sky was brightening up.  I could see across the highway now, and when I leaned out to look around to the south, I could even make out the back of Ceilidh’s car sticking up out of the ditch.  I brought in some more wood, hopping from one foot to the other on the cold boards of the porch, got the fire roaring up again, and then I went looking for Ceilidh.  She was still asleep.

I stood in the bedroom doorway for a moment, riveted to the spot.

Ceilidh was laying on her back on the old double bed I’d picked up a few years before at a garage sale in Grand Junction.  Her dark hair played out across the pillows, like a spill of some dark honey.  Her chest rose and fell, softly, as she breathed.  She was wearing some kind of black silk nightgown, and the effect was shattering.

As I watched, enthralled, she roused slightly, rolled to one side, and pulled the covers up.  I shook myself, and turned away, closing the door softly.  I felt all the old feeling; my heart pounded like a jackhammer in my chest.

“Oh, crap.”

I caught a quick shower and put on some water for tea.  By the time the kettle started to whistle, I heard noises from the bedroom.  A moment later, just as I was pouring hot water into the pot, Ceilidh came into the kitchen, wrapped up once more in my old robe.

“Good morning,” she said, brushing my cheek with her lips.

“Sleep well?” I asked.

“Pretty good.  The wind’s dying down, don’t you think?”

“Yes, I had a look outdoors.  I can see all the way down to the creek now.  In fact, I can see your car.  If things brighten up, I’ll get the tractor out and see if we can’t get it out of the ditch this afternoon.”  And then you’ll drive away out of my life again.

“Are the phones working yet?”

“No,” I answered.  I hadn’t tried the phone, but I had looked at the computer.  The Internet connection was down, and I still use a phone line for that connection.

“That’s OK,” she said, sitting down across the table from me.  “I’m not in that big a hurry.  Won’t it take another day or so for them to get the roads cleared?”

“The radio says the road crews will be out late this afternoon,” I said.  “That is, if the storm moves off to the east the way it’s supposed to.  It will be morning before the passes are open again, though.”

“And it’s a four-hour drive from here to Vail, right?”

“In good weather, yes,” I answered.  “Right now, better figure on six.”

“So, it looks like you’re stuck with me at least another day, Nick.”  She smiled at me, making me feel all weak and watery.

“I guess so.”

“Good,” she said, sipping her tea.  “That will give us a chance to talk some more.”

We didn’t talk much more for a while.  We had some toast, and Ceilidh went off to take a shower, emerging in jeans and a white sweater.  She sat on the couch with my Summer on Hardscrabble Mountain, paging slowly through the book as I spent a little time at my desk catching up on some correspondence.

It was strange how comfortable the silence was, as the morning passed with only the sound of my computer keyboard tapping and Ceilidh turning pages.  It was as though, in silence, we regained a measure of the intimacy that we’d left in that small town in Minnesota all those years ago.  I felt like I had my best friend back again.

But for how long?  The question nagged at me.

I was finishing up answering letters and thinking about lunch when Ceilidh finally spoke up.

“I think I understand you a little better now, Nick Eldridge.”

“You always did, Kaye.”

“No, I don’t mean the high school Nick Eldridge.”  She held up Summer on Hardscrabble Mountain.  “I mean the guy who writes as Owen Bradley.  Today’s Nick Eldridge.”

“Is that right?”  I had to smile.

“Yes, that’s right.”  She stood up, walking to the window.

“And what have you figured out about the new, improved Nick?”

She stood, looking out the back window of the cabin to the dim form of the mountain, just now beginning to be visible through the snow.

“You haven’t changed as much as you think you have, Nick.  You’re still that shy kid in lots of ways.”

More than you know, I thought, but kept it to myself.

She turned away from the window to smile at me again.

“You put everything of yourself into your writing.  You always were a generous soul, Nick.  There wasn’t anything you wouldn’t do for a friend.”

“And?”

“And you’re still doing it.  Your writing works because you’re writing about something you love, and you’re writing as though you were telling it to your best friend.  Your heart just flows out onto these pages, do you know that?”

“That’s pretty much it,” I answered.

“And yet, it’s a one-way street for you, Nick.  You pour all this love you have out into the pages, but nobody’s returning the favor.”

“That’s not quite true,” I told her.  “The mountains are always there for me.  The meadows, the aspens, the dark timber, it’s always there when I need it to be.”

“And you’ve never felt the need for a person in your life?  Someone special to share all this love with?”

“Not for a long time now, Kaye.”  Not for twenty-eight years.

“I’m glad we ran into each other again, Nick.”

We stood for a moment, looking into each other’s eyes.  The sparkling in her green eyes was familiar enough.  I’d seen it often enough, way back then.  I didn’t know what it meant then.  I was afraid I did, now.

“You know, I think we might be able to get your car out now.”  I was beginning to sweat.  Ceilidh looked out the window again, at the slowly clearing sky.

“OK, let’s give it a try.”

We bundled up – it was still around zero outside – and I got the old tractor out.  Ceilidh sat perched on the fender as we chugged down the driveway, using the snowplow blade to clear the snowdrifts.

The Lexus was buried worse than I’d thought.  We shoveled snow for at least two hours, trying to clear the wheels.  Finally, I got a log chain fastened to the car’s rear axle, covering myself in snow in the process.  I hooked the other end to the drawbar on the rear of the old Ford tractor, and we were finally ready.

“OK, start the engine and watch the chain.  When you see me take up the slack, put it in reverse and give her just a little gas, just enough to keep the wheels turning.  Keep the front wheels straight, and I’ll try to pull you right out onto the highway the way you went in.  As soon as you’re all the way up on the highway, we’ll stop so I can unhook you.”

Amazingly, it worked.  I stuck the tractor in low gear and pulled gently, and in a few moments the Lexus slowly began to move, wheels slipping and spinning, easing slowly out of the ditch, backing finally on up to the highway.  I put the tractor in neutral and dropped the blade on the pavement.

“OK, back up a few feet,” I called.  Ceilidh’s mitten-clad hand waved out the window, and the Lexus eased back a little.  I climbed under and unhooked the chain.  I bundled the heavy chain back into the toolbox behind the tractor’s seat and walked up to the car.

“Drive right on up to the house,” I told Ceilidh, “Park right in front.  I’ll follow you up the drive and put the tractor back in the shed.”

She was waiting for me when I came around the corner from the shed.  A snowball hit me right in the chest, followed by Ceilidh’s triumphant shout.

“Oh, it’s like that, is it?”  I grabbed a handful of snow, flinging it after her retreating, laughing form.   I let out an old Prairie Ridge High battle cry, “Boo-yah!” and raced after her.

We ran back and forth for the rest of the afternoon, throwing snowballs and laughing.  At least growing up in Minnesota gets you used to snow and cold at an early age, and a good thing, too, because we were both covered with snow by the time the sky began to grow dark.  I finally caught her as she ran into a drift at the edge of the aspen grove behind the house, and we both ended up falling into the snow, rolling over a few times, laughing.

She lay in the snow, her green eyes glowing.  “OK, Nick,” she mock-scolded me.  “Now my jacket’s full of snow, and I’m freezing, and it’s getting dark.  You’re going to have to build that fire up.”  She blushed suddenly, perhaps realizing her unintentional double meaning.

“Beats shopping in Vail, doesn’t it?”  I asked, helping her to her feet.

We went inside, bearing armloads of firewood, the last of the pile I’d stacked up on Saturday morning.  After we both changed into dry clothes, I built the fire up to a roaring blaze that radiated heat into the tiny living room while Ceilidh bustled about in the kitchen, heating up some canned soup for our supper.  We drank our chicken soup from mugs as we sat on the floor in front of the fireplace.  A faint steam rose from Ceilidh’s snow-dampened hair.

“I suppose you’ll be able to be on your way again in the morning,” I finally said.  “The road crews will be out all night now that it’s clearing up.  They’ll have the passes open by morning.”

“Yeah – so much for my little vacation at Vail,” Ceilidh laughed.  “That’s OK – I wouldn’t have missed this reunion for anything.”

“Me either.”

She leaned against me, her hair warm and fragrant against my shoulder.

“I wish we were still seventeen,” she sighed.

“Why?  A chance to do some things differently?”

“Yes, Nick.  At the least, I’d like a chance to do one thing differently.  At least a chance to tell someone how I felt about him, way back then.”

“I know what you mean.”

“I thought you would.”

“Oh, hell, Ceilidh,” I confessed.  “There hasn’t been a day gone by that I haven’t thought about you.  You wanted to know why I’m up here all by myself?  Hell, I’ve had relationships.  I lived with a girl for a year in Boulder, even.  But it just never worked.”

She took my hand.  “Why not?”

“Because I never met anyone who I felt about the way I felt about you, Kaye.  The way I guess I still do.”

“The picture on your desk,” she said.

“Yes, the picture on my desk.  There’s more than just the love I put in my books, Kaye, more than the love I have for the mountains.  I could tell people about that.  I never had anyone I could talk about my best friend, about how much I loved her.”

“You just did, Nick.”

“Yes, I just did.  But that’s all there is ever going to be to it.  Kaye, you’re going to leave in the morning,” I husked.  “There’s a place in here,” I tapped my chest, “that will always be yours, Kaye.  But tomorrow morning, you’re going to get in your new Lexus, and go back to St. Paul, to Ryan, to your kids, and your practice.  And I’ll stay here, in my mountain cabin, writing my books.”

“But not until morning.”  She stood up, pulling me to my feet.  “Nick, I think we’ve waited long enough, don’t you?”

“Long enough?”  It took me a moment to understand.

“Long enough,” she repeated, and led me to the bedroom.

 

Monday, October 12th

I woke up that next morning to find her gone, only the faint scent of her on the sheets.  My framed print of her high school senior picture lay on the pillow she’d used, with a note on the letterhead of Ceilidh Ross, MD of St. Paul.  Her neat, flowing handwriting had changed hardly at all since high school.  My vision misted as I read her message.

“Nick,” the note said.

“I’ve always loved you.  I always will.  Someday, please let someone write something for you.

Goodbye – love always,

Ceilidh.”

I went to the door and looked out to see the tire tracks in the snow where the Lexus had gone down my drive and turned north onto the highway, towards I-70 and Vail.  Someone has written something for me, Ceilidh.  My best friend finally wrote me something that took her twenty-eight years, but it was worth the wait.

I folded up the note, tucked it under her photo in the frame, and placed her portrait back on my desk.  I realized, suddenly, that for the first time since I’d moved in, the little cabin seemed empty.  For the first time in the adult life that I’d spent mostly alone, I was lonely.

After the snow

In the months that followed, I thought of many things, entertained many notions.  I thought of getting in my old green Bronco and heading for St. Paul.  I thought of calling her, at her home, at her office, just to hear her voice.  But I didn’t do any of those things.  I just buried myself in my work, getting through the rest of the fall and winter as I usually did.  Working, a bit of snowshoeing on nice days, a trip to town once a month for canned goods.

Spring came, as it always did, and summer, and in July I decided to pack my gear and head up into the Holy Cross Wilderness.  I drove out to a trailhead up the road from Edwards, and spent a day hiking into Rainbow Lake, where I’d camped many times before.  One sunny day found me perched on a ridgeline, sitting on a granite outcrop eating a strip of elk jerky, watching chipmunks play and thinking, as I often did, of Ceilidh.

The afternoon slipped past as I sat on the ridge, and the sun dropped behind me, shadows marching up the face of the mountain across from me as the light faded.  I sat there until dark, thinking, watching the endless cycle of light turning to shadow, thinking how the light would come back in the morning, striking down into the valley below me through the firs on the mountain to the east.  I thought about how fall would bring the snows again, how Rainbow Lake would freeze over, and how this valley would lie frozen until the sun came back in the spring.

Everything has a cycle, a season, I thought to myself.  Everything has its time.  Ceilidh and I had our time, all those years ago.  We left some things unsaid, and it’s good that we got to say them, at last. 

But that snow has melted.  It’s time my own spring finally came.

A boy never really forgets that first love.  I’ll never forget Ceilidh – not the best friend from school, not the three days in the storm.  But now I realized what happened that last night, the acknowledgement that what we had between us wasn’t of the future, or even the present, but of the past.  We were tying the last loop in a knot we’d begun thirty years before – and now that loop was closed.

Now I realized that after almost thirty years, it was finally time to move forward.  For the first time since that October night, I smiled, as a million stars began to wink on overhead.  I laughed once, feeling suddenly free, and got up to pick my way down the ridge to my camp.

When I got back home four days later, I took Ceilidh’s portrait, wrapped it carefully in tissue, and packed it away.