J e r r y s p I n e L l I

176 

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25 . “Claudia . . .” 
The lights from front windows and the lights at 
the street corners help. It is as if they are looking 
too. The snowflakes in the light remind him of 
moths. In the darkness between the lights he can-
not see the snow fall. He cannot hear it. He sticks 
out his tongue to catch a flake. 
In the darkness he calls out in a whisper: 
“Claudia . . . Claudia . . .” 
Why he whispers he doesn’t know. 
Maybe it’s because he doesn’t want to disturb 
the night any more than necessary. 
Maybe it’s so she won’t hear him, in case she’s 
having fun. 
“Claudia . . .” 
The snow is getting deep. It’s over his ankles. 
He wades through it as he waded through the 
surf at the beach. 
177 

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It is hard to see between the lights. He whis-
pers into the dark corners. 
“Claudia . . .” 
The black canyon of housefronts looms over 
him. Night into night. 
“Claudia . . .” 
He crisscrosses the street, searching both 
sides, trying to miss nothing, stitching the side-
walks together. 
The falling snow covers everything, makes 
everything white and soft and humpy. It’s a 
guessing game. What was that? What was that? 
He thinks she is under the snow. He thinks she is 
playing a game, waiting to be found. He can 
almost hear her giggle, searchers so close but not 
knowing. Or she is asleep. A little girl bear cub 
asleep under the snow. Every hump he thinks is 
her. He pokes with his boot, flinches in expecta-
tion of her exploding up from the snow, like a 
flushed bird, laughing. But it’s only a sled left 
outside, a junked TV, a plastic bag of trash. 
“Claudia . . .” 
Then he thinks, no, she’s not still, she’s moving, 
178 

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she’s running, rolling in the snow, celebrating. 
She’s unleashed! It’s snowing! Unmoving is the 
last thing she would be. 
Every now and then he looks back. The spin-
ning lights are far away now, a fallen spaceship. He 
loves the distant spinning light. It is his leash. He 
wishes Claudia had not wanted to be quite so free. 
A new light turns the corner ahead. A rum-
bling. It’s a plow, scooping snow like a finger 
through cake icing. The plow rumbles toward 
him, its headlights trembling. For the first time 
in his life he does not reach for a snowball. As the 
plow passes him an alarming thought occurs: 
What if she’s in the street! He calls out: “Stop!” 
But the plow rumbles on past and up the street. 
Two more blocks and he looks back again. 
Suddenly he no longer feels he is about to find 
her any second. All he feels is the silence. He can-
not believe how silently the snow falls. He cannot 
believe she could have come this far. He takes 
one last look at the distant spinning lights. He 
turns at the corner. He will go down a block and 
work his way back toward the light. 
179 

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Halfway along the block he comes to an alley, 
and it hits him. 
Alley! 
The unnamed, unmapped, car-free second 
streets of the town. Who says she went out the 
front door into the street, where everyone looks, 
where every light shines? Who says she didn’t 
bolt out the back door and into the alley? He 
thinks of the days of his own life spent in the 
town’s alleyways. He feels it, he knows it: This is 
where she is. 
He looks into the blackness. There are no 
lights here. It is as black as the cellar with the 
kitchen door shut. This is night’s cellar, where 
night falls to. He takes a step. Another. The light 
from the nearest streetlamp follows him, loses him.