Page 337 of Steamy Ever After

And, I’m hot!

Sweat slicks down my back. It drips between my breasts. Perspiration saturates the band of my bra and chafes my skin.

As thankful as I am for the coat, I unzip it and let it flap in the gusting wind. I’d take the damn coat off, except my guide would disapprove.

Despite the fact my body is a toaster oven, the same cannot be said of my face. The frigid temperatures prick at my cheeks and numb the tip of my nose. I rub my nose repeatedly, even hold my hands in front of my face like a shield, trying to warm the tender tip.

And my ears!

They burned like fire when the flurries kicked. Now, I can’t feel my ears at all.

Which is bad.

Very bad.

I fall back on my wilderness medicine courses in residency and medical school, pulling up everything I know about exposure to extreme cold.

Numbness means the skin and cartilage of my ears is frozen or in the process of freezing. My medical mind dredges up facts differentiating frostnip from frostbite.

If I hold my hands over my ears, my nose burns. If I hold my hands over my nose, my ears burn. In deciding which disfigurement I’d rather live with, it’s hard to decide. I settle on keeping my nose and sacrificing my ears. At least I can cover those with a hat.

Lifting the hood of his coat helps somewhat to restore circulation to my numb ears. Blood rushes in, bringing warmth to the nearly frozen tissue with a fiery burn of sensation. But the hood traps in my body heat as well, making me sweat even more.

I was cold while walking on the road. My movement was barely enough to keep my body temperature from plunging to dangerous levels. Now, I’m wishing for an air conditioner.

And whoever my savior is, his powerful legs devour the ground. I spend the first ten-minutes jog-stepping to keep pace. Finally, I decide he needs to match my pace, not the other way around.

We cross a pasture, and it takes a few minutes before he realizes how far behind I fall. I struggle through a knee-high drifting of snow while he waits, saying nothing.

His brooding silence irritates me, but I’m content to not engage in unnecessary conversation.

The moment I catch up, I expect a short reprieve. That doesn’t happen. He continues his trek, slowing down out of consideration for my much shorter stride, but never stopping for a break. I curse him silently behind his back.

The gaiters are amazing. Despite plunging mid-calf, and in some cases, up to my knees in snow, the waterproof fabric keeps my lower legs free from snow and prevents it from sneaking into my shoes. Nevertheless, snow cakes the top of my sneakers and melts through. My feet are wet, cold, and numb. They feel ten pounds too heavy, and I struggle with every step.

Several times, I ask how much farther. His response, “Just a little more,” turns sour after my fifth or sixth demand.

We hike in silence, broken only by the crunching of our shoes over virgin snow and the occasional gusting of the wind. After that first keening wail, we hear nothing else from that distant wolf pack.

And then, it happens.

When I lose all hope of ever making it to anything resembling civilization, he crests a steep rise and stops.

I climb after him, slipping more times than not, wondering why he doesn’t offer his hand. At the top of the hill, I see a miracle.

A tiny house sits in the valley below. Light spills out of its windows to splash onto the virgin snow, promising warmth inside. I clasp my hands and bring them to my mouth. A few hundred yards and I can strip out of all these layers, and maybe, just maybe, I’ll be warm again.

He points down the slope to a barbed-wire fence.

“We have to crawl over the wire. I would’ve taken us to the gate, but that’s not for another mile to the west. Be careful, and don’t snag yourself on the barbs. It’ll leave a scar, and you’ll need a tetanus shot.”

I know all about painful tetanus shots. Not that I need to worry. All my immunizations are up to date. Besides, the barbs have to penetrate seven, no eight, layers of fabric before piercing my skin.

“And we’ll have to be careful crossing the field,” he continues. “I don’t think the llamas are out. Bert keeps them in the barn in weather like this.”

I expect sheep or cattle, but llamas? Livestock scares the crap out of me. Cows are placid creatures, but I don’t trust something that weighs close to a ton. Sheep are basically overstuffed dogs. They’re stupid as shit, and didn’t I read somewhere that they bite? Maybe that was about llamas.

As for llamas, I know nothing about them except they’re the dorkiest animals I’ve ever seen.

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