I C E

'Written for the Writing Contest. Prompt: "Ice water in her veins."'

"Human? Human? Human, wake up! Human, wake up!"

My Amanda. My perfect, sweet Amanda, her lips, always speaking warmly, always telling a joke, always smiling her wonderful, crooked smile, a pale blue, her round face, always rosy-red with love, always pressed against my own furry one with a giggle, always kind, so cold to the touch when I put my nose to it. My Amanda's eyes, her perfect, perfect crystal-blue eyes, were closed tight, and her body trembled with fear and cold when I pressed against her. My Amanda wasn't right; she smelled of a metallic, icy scent, so different from the sweet, delicious perfume-y scent that always wafted from her. Her arms were wrapped around my fluffy brown-and-white body, and she gave off fear scent more than a squirrel in the Park Amanda so loved to bring me to. The cold, white snow was all around us in this forest, the birch trees looming like ghosts ready to take my Amanda off to the spirit realm, away from me.

"B-B-Buddy...oh, Buddy, I'm so sorry..."

Her voice made me turn to her, pressing my furry body closer to hers to keep her warm, to preserve the love and heat that should have been with her, but quickly raced from her like rats from a sinking ship. The snow, the snow all around us, was closing in. I couldn't let that happen, I thought, as I let my pink tongue run over my Amanda's face, so pale with cold, once more. She leaned into my side, as though trying to shelter herself from the snow, and started shivering.

"I-I just wanted t-to see h-him...maybe I was wrong. M-maybe D-Dad was right. M-maybe being f-friends with Zephyr was a m-mistake...m-maybe I've gone and killed us both, B-Buddy...B-Buddy..."

Amanda coughed, pulling her frostbitten hands to her chest. The snow was coming on thickly now, covering the clearing in the woods we'd stopped in faster than I could bark at. The trail we had tried to follow--the one that led to her friend's house. The friend Dad always seemed to tense around. The friend who had Big Plans and Fun Times. The friend that wasn't here to save us now.

Dad never liked Yell Friend. Yell Friend had a loud voice. Yell Friend liked to scratch behind my brown ears, and pet me until I'd rolled over, tongue lolling out, tail wagging faster and faster and faster. Yell Friend liked to talk with my Amanda, and when he did so, he was fun. He would wave his hands and shout excitedly, speaking of things I did not understand, like all Human Language, but I did catch some words. One of them was Yell Friend's Big Plan. Big Plan involved "the city". Big Plan would involve "dreams" and "success" and "see-ee-ohs". Amanda's eyes would light up like a thousand fires when Yell Friend talked. She laughed with him. She liked to be with Yell Friend. But Dad didn't. Dad liked to yell about Yell Friend. Dad liked to use the word "only fif-teen" and "only a dream" and "bad in-flu-ence". I did not know what those words meant, either. Yet nobody likes being called a Bad Dog. Was Yell Friend a Bad Dog?

I drifted into a trance as I tried in vain to lick the heat back into Amanda's forehead, thinking over the events that happened before the blizzard. Dad yelled some more about Yell Friend. Dad said something about "stop seeing". Amanda showed the anger scent, and it made my tail drop. I didn't like my Amanda being angry. Angry and sad. Angry and sad. Fire and water. Water was what dripped from my Amanda's eyes when she put the leash on my collar, briefly stopping to wrap her arms around my neck, her soft whispers tickling my ear.

"Dad's wrong, Buddy," her perfect voice said, low and warm and quiet. "Zephyr's a good kid. He's just...he shoots for the moon while he's still on Earth. But Dad won't let me shoot at all, Buddy...I want to try. I don't care if I miss, because I'll land among the stars. You wanna go with me, Buddy-Buds? You wanna be a city dog? City dog, city dog?"

City dog, city dog. I liked those words, because they came from my Amanda's perfect mouth. My Amanda was great, wasn't she? She was great from the day she found me on the cold, hard roadside five years ago, five years ago as a puppy. She could do no wrong. My Amanda, my Amanda, my Amanda. My tongue flicked out to trace along her cheek, and her sweet, musical laugh touched my ears. "I'll go anywhere with you, Amanda," I woofed quietly.

Amanda smiled, pulling back from me, though the salty scent of her eye water was still strange, stinging to my nose. Her hands, her wonderful, caressing warm hands, scratched my ears one last time as she stood, dusting off her knees from where she'd knelt next to me. "Buddy...Good Dog, Buddy. You're my good boy."

I loved my Amanda. I loved being her good boy. I loved being a Good Dog. I thought Amanda would last forever. That's how it was with Humans, wasn't it? Dad had probably met my great-grandfather, or his grandfather. They lived for a thousand years. The end of a life so long, so precious, so fragile...it was a phenomenon I'd never seen. I didn't even think it was real.

But why was my Amanda fading?

"B-Buddy..." Her voice, her wonderful, wonderful warm voice, hitched at the end, her cold hands slowly losing their grip on me. Her eyes, her perfect, perfect crystal-blue eyes, glassed over, the salty water leaking from them again. Whimpering, I snuggled closer to her, but she was so cold, she wasn't even trembling anymore. Her breath was shallow, slowing, and she gasped with each labored inhale. Nosing my snout into her palms did nothing except shock me from the chill. Icy water...it's like it's in her veins...!

Raising my head, I again wondered what might've happened had Amanda not opened that door. Had she not taken us into the forest. Had the snow not begun to fall harder, into Amanda's perfect crystal eyes, into my own coco-brown ones, had it not taken us from the path through the woods. Had Amanda been stronger...had she fought harder, had she not fallen into a snowbank...

"T-the blizzard...I didn't think it would be that bad. Buddy, I-I..."

Her voice wavered, and I nosed my snout into the curve of her neck once more. ''Don't cry, my Amanda! Don't cry! I don't like it when you cry! You're sad! Sad! Sad...''

She started to shove me away, gasping for breath. She tried to get up, tried to stand, but the cold was in her heart now. The cold was going to hurt her, it was already too deep, it was going to do worse things than make her sad. I barked in surprise, trying to help her, but with an agonizing yelp of pain, Amanda collapsed again. My heart felt like it was fracturing to bits. ''Amanda? Amanda?!''

"Buddy...you h-h-have to g-go home...you c-can make it, B-Buddy...w-w-what are you--"

She was silenced with a medium-sized, medium-furred brown-and-white dog nosing his way into her listless arms. I wrapped my paws around her neck, my cold black nose finding its way to her icy cheek, my tongue flicking in and out, my mind trying to memorize the taste of her, the sweet scent of her, the warm voice I would die over and over again just to hear one more time. Her whispers, growing softer by the moment, I couldn't understand, but I didn't need to. My Amanda knew just as well as I did the thoughts that flooded my brain, the waves of emotions that rolled off my whenever I saw my wonderful Human's perfect face: I loved her. I loved her. I loved her. My Amanda, my savior, my Human, my friend. My Amanda...

She could hardly lift her icy hand, I could tell, but somehow, my Human managed. She stroked my head, her fingers limp and cold, but I didn't care. All that mattered now was that I was with her now. My Amanda.

"B-Buddy...my Good Dog...I love you..."

I love you, too, my Amanda...