Page 108 of Familiar Things New

“Do you think we should maybe just . . . walk through it the rest of the way?” Andrew asked.

Edwin furrowed his brow, thinking it over. Trudging through the snow, even though it reached his knees, would be so much simpler, wouldn’t it? But neither of them knew what things were like farther up on Pearl. Or elsewhere.

“Probably not,” he said. “We’d exhaust ourselves at least as much by fighting to walk through this much snow, but then our feet would be soaked, too. And then what if we became stuck somewhere? If our feet became frozen and we had to stay out here for a while, we might lose our toes. Or . . . worse could happen.”

Andrew frowned and then shrugged. “At least we’re together, right?”

Edwin smiled halfheartedly. “Right.”

Both of them resumed shoveling. Instead of switching back and forth, they squeezed next to each other and shoveled the narrow path together, bumping elbows constantly while they cleared the area in front of them.

After some time, they came upon an enormous wall of snow. Edwin noticed it first, looking up mid-shovel and nearly stumbling back onto his rear end when it came into view. Somehow, the snow on this part of Pearl, near State Street, was much higher than three or four feet. In fact, it seemed like it almost reached the crown of Andrew’s head. Edwin smacked Andrew’s shoulder with the back of his hand to alert him to the mountain in their path. Upon seeing it, Andrew dropped his shovel onto the pavement in shock. Both men had been so focused on what had been right in front of them that they hadn’t really noticed what was ahead, and only now, when they were fewer than fifteen feet from it, had they realized that their path was blocked completely.

“Holy hell, that must be six feet high,” Edwin said. “No one could possibly shovel that much snow. No one.”

“Should we . . . climb it?”

“I can’t climb that!” Edwin protested. “If I even attempt it, I might fall through. And—oh God, Andrew—what if I did fall through? I could suffocate. Or you could, even if I make it first and you try next. I mean, you weigh a good deal more than I do. If you climb it after I’m on the other side, then you might become trapped in there instead.”

“You’re right.” Andrew made a sour face. “Or, what if we—”

“Excuse us!” someone called from behind them.

Andrew and Edwin both turned to see three men walking up the path they’d carved out, one of them carrying a pickaxe and the other two carrying shovels.

“Good morning,” Andrew said, nearly back to being his cheery self somehow. He furrowed his brow. “Actually, is it still the morning?”

“It’s the afternoon,” one of the men with a shovel corrected with a small smile. “It’s nearly one.”

Damn, they had been shoveling for hours.

Another one of the men thumbed over his shoulder and said, “All of us live half a block back that way. And we noticed you shoveling. Smart thinking, starting on something like this so early. Who knows when or if the city will help. Folks like us will have to lean on each other to make it through however-long it’ll be until the snow melts. Cutting a path here, that’ll give people a way to exchange food and coal.”

Edwin nodded thoughtfully.

“I hadn’t thought about it like that, to be honest,” he said to the men. “I was only trying to make it to my mother and sister so that I could check on them.”

“Do you still have a long way to go?” the same man asked.

“One and a half blocks or so. I live on James.”

“If you wouldn’t mind, we’d love to help you.”

Edwin crooked an eyebrow. “Really?”

“Well, we’re not carrying these around for fun,” the man laughed, holding up his pickaxe with his left hand. He stuck out his right for Edwin to shake. “Christopher Cooper.”

“Edwin Beasley.”

“Beasley,” Mr. Cooper repeated, narrowing his eyes. “I feel like we’ve met before.” He let go of Edwin’s hand and rubbed his chin. “Are you related to Frederick Beasley?”

Fear seized Edwin by the throat. He merely widened his eyes in response, unsure of what he should say. Did the man recognize him? Not as Edwin, but as—

“You’re the spitting image of him,” Mr. Cooper continued. “He had a shop on . . . North Pearl somewhere?”

“Y-yes,” Edwin replied, his face reddening as he stumbled over the word. “Near Clinton.”

“So, you are related to him, then.”