Once, when they were on the beach, they had seen a plane like this one, high and silver and loud out over the water, and as they watched it, suddenly the engine stopped and in the sudden silence the plane tumbled wing over tail over wing toward the water, but then before anyone could even fill the space after a gasp, the engine choked to life and the plane caught itself, soared upward. She is remembering this moment, the horror and thrill of it, when suddenly, from behind, a shadow falls across her face. She tilts her head back and sees an unfamiliar pair of eyes peering over the top of her snow fort; abruptly, she gets onto her knees and turns around, and suddenly she is face-to-face over the top layer of bricks with Thomas Dunlap.

At first startled, she is quickly embarrassed and surprised at once; surprised to be intruded upon by someone so unexpected, and embarrassed first to think of her behavior yesterday, and then by her reaction to seeing Thomas Dunlap here right now—or, better, her lack of reaction. The two of them stare at each other over her wall of snow, Isabelle’s mind racing. She has never encountered a deaf person so intimately. She’s seen people signing before, and been aware that they were deaf, but she has never been face-to-face, one-on-one, with anyone who can’t hear. Unsure of what to do, what to say, for a moment she desperately wishes that Thomas Dunlap were not deaf.

Finally, after what is probably a shorter time than it seems, Thomas waves. Isabelle waves back. To her relief, it is as easy as that.

II

Wilson looks at his old pickup parked at the edge of the driveway where just weeks ago it had still been warm enough to work on. Now the thing sits up to its wheels in snow so deep that in the back of the pickup it stands taller than the sides that hold it in. He should have cleaned out the garage after all, Wilson thinks, if only enough to make room for the truck, which left outside certainly won’t make it through the winter—not this winter, anyway. In only a week there has been more snow than in the past two winters combined. He could clean the garage out still, he thinks; but then he’d have to dig the pickup out of the snow, and he suspects that the engine wouldn’t turn over, that the battery would be dead. He tightens his lips in resignation; the truck is old, he thinks, and it’s had a good life; he will let nature take its course.

He hears Isabelle’s footsteps coming down the stairs behind him; she is running, and Wilson knows the steps are icy.