Page 12 of Break the Ice

‘It started snowing today, temperature dropped, I’m just insulating,’ I say, looking outside at the branches on the trees, frosted and white. It’s heavier now but the perfect reason for me to be wrapped up and doing absolutely nothing.

‘Preparing for the next ice age, Kenny?’ she asks, raising an eyebrow at my hood that’s up over my head, the drawstring pulled tight, like I live in South Park. Maddie is my younger sister, the excitable arts major. Her big bushel of auburn hair takes up half the screen. ‘What are you eating on Christmas Day?’

‘My friends Mark and Spencer are coming round.’

‘Cool.’

I can’t tell her the truth, which is there’s a magical supermarket here that isn’t even a supermarket, it’s a ‘food hall’, and I’ve already got supplies in that involve three types of potato and some candy called Percy Pigs to which I’ve developed a mild addiction.

‘I’ll be fine,’ I tell her.

‘I worry.’

‘So does Mom,’ I say, smiling. ‘I’ll be there in a week and we can celebrate again then.’

She smiles. ‘We can catch a Knicks game? You want to do or eat anything special?’

‘Bagels. I want a taco from that place in Jackson Heights. I’ll make a list,’ I say.

She laughs. ‘Has Mom told you about New Year’s?’ she says apprehensively. ‘They have plans.’

‘No. I assumed we were staying in and watching it all on the TV for a change?’ I reply. My shoulders slump at the idea of having to be sociable and fancy when the season dictates cosiness. I also know my mother. It’ll be a party, something fancy. She won’t take kindly to me putting on my standard navy suit that I wear to any formal occasion. She’ll make me hire something that will have a strange Eighties fit on the shoulders and be two inches too long on the pants.

‘Not quite. The Pattons have invited us to their annual shindig at the Waldorf. I think Mom and Dad have replied to say we’d go,’ she says cautiously. ‘We don’t have to go. I don’t think it’s right they’re making us go.’

I pause for a moment. ‘I’ll assume Avery will be there.’

‘I’d assume yes,’ she says, her voice tightening at the end to gauge my reaction. I don’t reply. I just take my gaze off-screen and look into the fire, then to the TV screen on mute showing me a couple trying to buy a house in the country.

‘Joshy…’

Before I have time to reply, though, I am distracted by a voice outside the front door, the shuffle of someone trying to locate keys and using the word bugger repeatedly, which makes me think this isn’t a postal worker. ‘Maddie, someone’s at the door, I gotta go… I’ll call you back.’

‘OK, love you…’

I hang up on her, letting that last piece of news sink in as I rise from my blanket den, trying to work out what’s happening at the front door. This better not be a burglar because I’m wearing too many layers to take them on. ‘Hello?’ I say weakly, poking my head around the doorway. But before they can answer, the door flies open, the force of the blizzard outside making it slam open and into the wall. Snow flies in but also a dog, a black and brown mutt who races inside. He doesn’t even stop to look at me, just leaves wet footprints on the wooden floor, runs up the stairs and then down again, and then into the corridor, stopping to pee by a coat stand.

‘Whoa whoa, hey there buddy. Don’t do that,’ I say, moving towards him. I look up briefly at the woman who accompanies him, in a big padded coat, a bright pink beanie over her blonde curls that have caught all the snow, and bright yellow Converse on her feet. The first thing I can think is that it’s snowing outside. It’s not Converse weather, and I am right because they’re soaked through. ‘Hey lady, your dog! Can you control your dog?’

She looks up at me immediately and adopts a strange stance, like she’s going to punch me. ‘Who the fuck are you?’

She looks me up and down. I pull at the drawstring of my hoodie, put my hood down, fluff out my hair with my hand. Two days in these plaid pyjama bottoms and I am aware that I might smell. ‘I could say the same. Can you close the door? It’s freezing.’

She looks around the hallway for a moment, as if she’s wondering if she’s in the right house, and then pushes the door shut. ‘Poochy! Poochy! Shit, has he peed?’ She takes off her shoes and sheds her coat at the door.

‘Yeah, he has.’ I look at her, deep in confusion but wondering why someone would call their dog that. That’s not a great name. Poochy has wandered into the kitchen. My three types of potato are on the counter, so I hope he doesn’t go for them. ‘Are you gonna clean up that pee?’ I ask her.

‘Not until you tell me who you are,’ she says.

She reaches for a phone and dials furiously, flaring her nostrils at me when the person at the other end doesn’t answer. ‘Are you a squatter? Did you come in here, looking at a vacant house, and think you could take advantage? I will call the police.’ She reaches for a plastic snowman at the door that she’s possibly going to use as a weapon.

My mouth opens in shock and I put my hands in the air. ‘I’m a housesitter. Norah and Adam hired me to be here and feed their fish.’

‘Then what are the fishes’ names?’ she says.

‘Wanda and Willy,’ I say, impressively quickly.

She sticks her head through the door. ‘She paid you to wear all her blankets and light a fire?’ She scans down to my feet, obviously not impressed by my slippers at all.