I thought I was alone. I thought I was happy being alone. I could not have been more wrong.
I was trudging back to my ramshackle, two-room house, through the heavy, wet snow. Dull gold and pink painted the fallen flakes as the sun began to fall asleep. I checked my ancient watch, exactly five o’clock in the evening. My dog would be expecting me home any minute, but I still had nearly two more miles to go. Frosted wind tugged at my red jacket, causing goose bumps along my spine. I shoved my hands into my deep pockets and marched on as the sun dipped behind the horizon. The dull crunch of snow beneath my boots was the only sound on the long, winding trail home through the empty woods. I hummed softly to myself, as I had every night before, flooding my exhausted mind with happy childhood memories of cool summer nights and bonfires beneath the stars.
“Hello.” A deep voice interrupted my soothing melody.
Sweat gathered on my brow as I shuffled in circles, searching frantically through the forest by the road for the source of the voice. Finding nothing, no one, I trekked on, much quicker. Branches snapped and dead leaves rustled behind me in the trees. I broke into a run, ignoring the fact my home was still far away. Rivers of sweat flowed down my back. The pounding footsteps trailing me grew louder each second.
“Charlotte!”  My pursuer yelled my name, the deep, masculine voice echoed off the petrified trees. My heart clenched and I collapsed onto the stone riddled path, the clasp on my watch breaking in the fall. I whipped around to face him. Gentle green eyes stared at me from underneath his well-trimmed brows. Rosy red lips pushed his freckled cheeks into perfect dimples. Chapped red hands emerged from torn pockets to shake the sweat from his silver hair. He hurt me… It can’t be him…
“Charlotte,” he whispered, crouching to one knee in his faded jeans, “It’s me.”
I scrambled to my feet, leaving my broken watch in the snow, and darted home. I sprinted the entire way, out of the forest, up the dirt road, past my neighbor’s frozen corn stalks, and through my paper-thin door. My golden retriever, Gus, was waiting patiently for me on the mudroom rug.
“Gussy sweet pea,” I mumbled as my body crumpled from exhaustion to the now muddy floor. Gus licked the sweat from my face and pawed my heaving chest. I lay motionless on my back for a few minutes, listening to the wind dance among the trees. I waited for the hard knock of knuckles on the door, the strange, yet melodious voice to call my name, but nothing happened.
Finally, I mustered up enough strength to drag myself to the sagging bed in the corner of my one room house.  Physically, I was utterly exhausted, but mentally, I was going faster than I had thought humanly possible. Gus ducked outside through the hole in the screen, scoped out the premises, and returned to crawl on the bed and rest his graying face on my shivering thigh. I groaned, realizing with no lock on my door, I would not be truly safe.
“Gussy boy, what just happened?” I sighed, stroking his copper fur. I leaned back onto a lumpy pillow, allowing my dark black curls to fall across my face. My thick lashes settled over my pale blue eyes as I tried to make sense of the strange experience.
I had begun walking home at four thirty in the evening, concluding another day’s worth of grueling farm work. My weekly salary of twenty dollars was tucked neatly into my muddy snow boots. I have been working at my neighbor’s dairy farm, three miles from my home, since I ran away from my mother’s grave and abusive father in Maine, boarded the first train I could find departing town, and arrived in Minnesota alone at age fifteen. I had never seen another human being on my rigorous hike home for all eight years I made the trek. Until today.
Why did this man know my name? I thought I was alone after I saved myself from a painful future. How was it possible the entire world had not forgotten me as I planned?
The man’s voice echoed in my mind, stirring emotions I had tried to tuck away. I crossed my arms protectively around my middle, warding off unwanted feelings. Why had he awakened my sentimental side? The side I tried so hard to erase. I resolved to find the man.
The telegram said he was dead... Shards of memories invaded my mind. Stop it… You are happy this way.
I blew out the candle resting on the windowsill. Gus crawled up my solid torso and we fell asleep together, cuddled in a ball of warmth.
The morning sunshine trickled through the cracked glass of the lone window. Gus stirred from his peaceful sleep, licking the goose bumps from my pale neck.  Curiosity about the man began whirring through my mind. I have to find him.
After I nibbled some canned carrots and poured Gus a bit of milk, I zipped my jacket, knotted my boots, and strode out the door. The countryside gradually roused from its slumber under the thick comforter of fresh snow. Shivering cardinals and ravenous squirrels scavenged the ground in search of breakfast. Today would be the first in eight years I did not go milk cows or bail hay. Today, I would find that man.
Six miles and countless steps later, I finally arrived in town. I had never been in town during the winter months. Each fall was the only time I came, once in September and once in October, to help my neighbor sell the harvested wheat and fresh milk. In fall, the town was bustling with families and their animals, rushing to finish laborious tasks before winter buried ease and warmth beneath mountains of heavy flakes. Now, the town was calm and silent.
I ambled around the icy brick roads, peering into shop windows, straining my eyes past the glaring sun reflecting on the glass, hoping to see the man. After nearly thirty minutes of walking window to window, door to door, pressing my face against the frosted glass, I realized I had not seen a single person, much less the man I was looking for. Just as I slouched in defeat against a chilled brick wall, church bells began to sound.
What seemed to be the whole town flooded out the chipping double doors of the gray stone church. Rambunctious children escaped their distracted parents to go play in the fresh snow. The people of the tiny town meandered back to their homes, enjoying warm rays of sunshine while sharing the latest news with nosy neighbors. Everyone seemed relaxed, smiling contently despite the cold, except for one man. The collar of his long black coat shielded his aging face from the biting wind. Strong, long legs maneuvered him through the bustling crowd towards the edge of town. My stomach erupted in butterflies as I stumbled across the ice, failing in my attempt to follow him discreetly. The man must have been too engrossed in his mission to notice my gangly figure fumbling after him.
I crept behind him, walking quietly like a ballerina, out of the cozy town, miles down the icy dirt road, and onto the narrow path through the forest before I realized I knew where he was going. He was going to my house. Why hadn’t he kept following me yesterday?
His long stride remained smooth and relaxed as if he made this journey daily. I clasped my shaking hands over my drumming heart in fear he would hear its rhythmic pound. I should talk to him now. But wait… He reminds me of…
“La ti di! La ti dum!” his alto voice reverberated off the frosted trees. Curious chipmunks and shy deer peeked out from their winter homes to watch him. Their sleepy eyes followed him as he walked on, continuing to sing with perfect pitch. My eyes stretched wide in awe. I expected the animals to shy from his muscular figure. Instead, they seemed to gravitate towards him like an old friend. The only person I knew who could do that was… never mind. It can’t be. I shook my head, knocking the memory from my thoughts.
I trailed him all the way back to my home. As we reached the tree line, my tiny house became clearly visible in the clearing next to the dirt road. His pace quickened and his breath became audible from where I stood, roughly six feet away, in the shadows of bare trees. I shrunk behind an ice-crusted snowdrift and watched him stride swiftly through the front door of my house, greeting a slobbering Gus with a familiar pat.  Gus has been with me my whole life. Nobody knows Gus, except… Stop that. I lightly flicked my wrist, disgusted by my outrageous thought.
I waited for the lightweight wood to close behind him before slinking around to the lone window on the side of the house. Crouching low to conceal my red jacket from his view, I craned my neck to peek in the frosted glass. The man sat cross-legged on the corner of my bed, his dark leather shoes had been neatly placed on the entryway rug.  His thawing red hands held my watch, which I had left broken in the snow yesterday. Thick graying eyebrows wilted in sadness as he stroked the worn leather wristband. The way his muscular back collapsed, how his freckled cheeks slouched into a frown, made me feel warm inside. I felt safe, a sensation I had not experienced since early childhood. A sensation that I thought had died, just as my mother, just as my innocence.
I walked slowly to my front door, anxious to confront the man, yet calm like a morning’s breeze. I opened the door gently, hoping not to alarm the man. With arms wrapped snuggly around Gus’s neck, he kneeled on the corner of me bed.
“Charlotte”, he whispered, lifting his tear-stained face to see me. Suddenly, I knew why I felt torn between terror and calmness while in his presence. I knew why he had followed me here.
“Are you…”
“Dad.”