“If you cannot sleep, we shall not sleep. Let’s do something else.”
“Like what? Play chess? Dance the waltz?”
“Whatever you wish, but, I warn you, dancing is not one of my talents.”
Micha was silent a moment. Then, almost shyly, he asked, “Can we go out? Away from the walls?”
“Of course.”
They dressed in the half-light, struggling into whatever garments they could most easily find, and stumbled outside together. The world was only just beginning to stir, the sky a pale mirror reflecting the fog-drenched fields. Everything was frost-limned, brittle and silver, and the breath left Micha’s parting lips in a coil of smoke.
“It’s like it’s just for us,” he whispered.
Unthinking, Thomas took his hand.
And Micha did not pull away.
They walked in silence through the meadows. The nascent light gleamed gently on the grass that crunched beneath their footsteps, and the mist curled the bare trees in gowns and garlands that formed themselves anew with the passing moments. The pond had become a cast-down moon, as still as an unblinking eye, staring back at the heavens.
Micha went carefully down to meet it. He tapped the frozen surface with his boot and then edged out onto the ice.
“Micha,” Thomas murmured. “Think how foolish you will feel if you fall into the water twice.”
He looked up, grinning, his eyes shining like pieces of polished onyx. “But how can you resist?”
“I confess I do seem able to find that power.”
Micha glided a few steps, his arms flung wide for balance. “But look. It’s fine.”
Thomas covered his eyes, peering between the slats of his fingers. “The ice will break. I know it will.”
Micha swooped into the middle of the pond, twirled, slipped, righted himself, and spun in a giddy circle, breathless and laughing. “Thomas, Thomas, I’m walking on water!”
Thomas spluttered.
And Micha came flying back to him, hair streaming, hands outstretched. “Come on.”
“Oh no. Certainly not.”
“It’s safe, I promise.”
“‘O’er ice the rapid skater flies, with sport above and death below, where mischief lurks in gay disguise, thus lightly touch and quickly go.’”
“It’s a very small pond. There’s absolutely no danger of death.”
“I’m not reassured.” But, somehow, Thomas was taking Micha’s hand again and he was being drawn, step by reluctant step, towards the ice. As soon as his foot touched the glassy surface, he flinched. “Oh God.” As soon as his other foot landed, “Oh God.” He tried to move, slipped, and clutched at Micha. “Oh God.”
“Are you taking the Lord’s name in vain? A lot?”
“No, I’m genuinely praying.”
“Don’t you trust me?”
“Of course I trust you. I just—”
There was a cracking as loud as gunfire, and they plunged straight through the ice into cold, brackish, ankle-deep water.
There was a long silence.
