Snow Angels

Snow Angels
By Scott Wilson
Word Count: 349

The snowstorm came suddenly. Blinding snow clogged the highways, slowed traffic, and created an unexpected hazard to everyone. There was something in the snow that had a terrible effect on most of the population in Mayneville; something nobody understood or could explain.

Ben narrowly avoided running into the Ute in front of him when the blizzard came over without warning. He was on his way home, driving along the Bruce Highway in peak hour traffic.

“You turkey!” he yelled when he swerved to avoid the Ute.

Ben noticed that the traffic had stopped on both sides of the highway. People were getting out of their cars, falling to the ground and making snow angels in the middle of the road.

“What the hell’s going on here?” he said.

He turned his Hoodoo Gurus cd off and flicked the radio on to see if he could catch the news, but no stations were broadcasting.

“Blizzard must be interfering with the reception,” he said.

Across the highway, an old biker leant over a teenager making a snow angel. He was yelling some choice words that Ben couldn’t quite hear, but assumed to be a barrage of F-bombs. After a minute, the teenager grabbed the biker by the head and tore half his face off with a savage bite.

“What the f...”

Ben looked around and saw dozens of snow angels attacking those unaffected by the unnatural blizzard. He shoved his car into four-wheel drive mode and sped off into the pine forest beside the highway, occasionally seeing a staggering snow angel from the forestry workers affected by the blizzard. The drive home took an extra hour, but at least half of that was through areas not affected by the snow. It seemed that the blizzard was only in a small radius from where he first saw it.

“You’re home just in time,” his wife said when he walked in the front door. “There’s a terrible snow storm headed this way.”


THE END