“Want some water, Pop?”  Young Jonathan Hughes held the glass of
water with both of his small hands as he approached his father’s bed.  “Pop?”
the boy repeated when he received no answer.  A bit of alarm crept into his
stomach when his father’s body did not move.  He placed the glass down on the
bedside table and softly poked the older Hughes on the shoulder.  From under
the layers of blankets and comforters came a groan, followed by a pale wrinkled
face.
	“Junior?” queried the weak voice of old Jonathan Hughes.  With a loud
cough and a lot of effort the old man rolled over to face his son.  His swollen
eyes searched the youth’s face for a moment and then closed.
	“I brought you some water,” the boy answered, gathering the glass
again.
	“Thank you.  Did you remember the straw?”
	“Yep.”  Steadying the glass close to his father’s head with one hand,
Jonathan brought the straw to his father’s lips.  A few sips at a time, the old
man emptied the glass.
	“You want anything else?”
	“No son, just a little bit more sleep and I’ll be fine.”  A heavy fit of
coughing followed, as if his lungs refused to let him speak more than a few
words at a time.
	“Okie.”  Still clutching the glass, the youngster softly walked out of the
bedroom.  He turned back at the door, to watch his father’s head disappear into
the mountains of covers.
	After disposing of the glass, Jonathan crept through the house until he
found his mother.  She sat at the dining room table, a telephone in front of her. 
She was rubbing her face and listening to a voice in the receiver.
	“Are you sure there’s no way?” She asked, a hint of desperation in her
voice.  “I don’t know if he can last that long.”  Jonathan stood quietly next to
her, his head buried in his chest.  When she hung up, she turned to him and
sighed.  There was a pained expression on her face that made her look much
older than her forty years.  Her hair was uncombed and there were the telltale
signs of insomnia around her eyes. 
	“They’re not coming are they?” He never looked up, he just kept his
head down, staring a hole into the floor.
	“They’re coming tomorrow,” his mother answered.  “If the storm’s over
by then.”  Before she could say another word, Jonathan hurried to the nearest
window.  He cast aside the blinds and gazed out at the snow falling heavily.  It
had been four days since his father had become ill.  The blizzard came the very
next day.  With all the subtlety of a wrecking ball, it charged in, blanketing
everything.  The small town had been immobilized and there was no way for a
doctor to come out to their modest little cabin in the middle of nowhere.  
	The youngster shivered as he watched it all come down.  He wondered
where their car would be under the sea of white.  “Please stop,” he thought,
barely holding back from screaming it.  Day turned into night and still Jonathan
stood by the window, sobbing as the storm continued, it’s fury showing no
signs of stopping.  Finally his mother gave him a weak order to go to bed.  One
look into her hollow eyes and he went without fussing.
	Throughout the night the storm raged on wildly outside Jonathan’s
window.  It howled and shrieked against the house, whipping itself into a lurid
frenzy.  The boy hid under his covers and tried, in vain, to fall asleep.  He sat up
in bed, a burning fear ripe in his gut.  His bare feet touched the icy floor and he
shivered.  The youngster looked around for the slippers his mother demanded
he wear, but gave up finding them, and scurried to the bathroom.  As he passed
his parent’s bedroom he heard his father cough dryly.
	“He needs some water,” the boy thought, bypassing his urge to pee and
going right for the kitchen.  Carefully holding the glass he began his journey
down the hallway to their bedroom.  Using his back to open the door, he crept
on his heels to the bed.  On one side lay his exhausted mother, sleep finally
overtaking her.  On the other was the mass of comforters and blankets that had
become old Jonathan Hughes.
	“Junior?” called the frail voice of his father.
	“I thought you’d want some water,” the son answered, fumbling his way
through the dark room.
	“Sure.  You remember the straw?”
	The youth stopped in his tracks and placed the glass once more on the
bedside table.   “No, but I’ll be right back.”  
	Careful not to bump into anything, the boy went slowly back into the
kitchen.  He rummaged through the drawers as quietly as he could.  The very
moment his hand found a straw, a breeze whistled at the back of his neck. 
Jonathan looked up to see a white vapor come seeping through the walls.  It
floated softly into a pile in the center of the room.  For a moment Jonathan
thought it was snow coming in from a hole in the roof, but the way it swayed
about like liquid dashed that idea from the boy’s mind.  Pieces of it would
occasionally dart out from the mass of white, only to be reeled back in.
	Like floating paint, the youngster thought as he watched.  He stepped
back into a corner of the hallway and watched silently.
	The thing became less fluid then, small parts of it shifting back into
vapor while the rest became solid.  From his corner the boy saw the apparition
grow long slender limbs and a head shaped like a football.  The body itself was
partially hidden by the cloud of vapor still floating about.  It walked, stumbling
like a newborn calf, down the hallway. 	
	Jonathan was transfixed by the creature, but as it came closer, a sickness
fell over him.  His stomach churned and his mouth suddenly filled with phlegm. 
Fever came racing over his body in waves that left him face to face with the
floor, gagging.  The white demon went past without noticing the boy, it’s
delicate legs carrying it toward the master bedroom.
	“No!” the youth managed to gasp between coughs.  One needle-like
hand reached for the doorknob, but the boy was already on the move.  On legs
made weak by the creature’s enchantment, Jonathan stumbled to the door.  He
managed to grasp at its forearm before collapsing to the floor.  His hand slid
through it as if he were trying to grab the falling snow.  The feeling that ran
through his body was like thousands of needles jabbing into his heart.  For a
moment he went numb and then he could do nothing.  The blank face of the
demon looked down at him and then touched his cheek softly.  A cold dirty
taste filled his mouth and his heart fluttered wildly before returning to normal. 
The ailment that had come over so quickly and with such force a moment
before was all at once gone.  The thing entered the bedroom without a sound. 
The youngster looked up and saw a slight glow emerge from the creature’s
body as it approached his father.  The room burst into total white light as it
placed one of its hands on the old man chest.  That was the final thing Jonathon
remembered before a sudden wave of sleep overtook him. 	He awoke the next
morning in his own bed, a feeling of dread in the pit of his stomach and that
same cold taste in his mouth.  Barefoot he ran across the floor to his parents
room.  He burst in, his eyes already tearing up, only to find old Jonathan
Hughes sitting up in bed.  His mother was already scurrying around the room,
changing sweat soaked sheets and blankets.
	“Morning ,Junior,” his father said with a weak smile.  His voice was still hoarse,
and there was a heaviness as he breathed, but there was more color in his face.  His
pajama shirt was open and there on his chest was a scar in the shape of the snow
creature’s needle-like hand.  “You gotta glass of water for your old man.”  Wiping an
errant tear the youngster bounced into the kitchen, stopping to check at the window.  The
snow had stopped falling.