A-Minor

by Ross McKeekin

The birds on the shoreline take flight into a cloud that ripples and furls and folds in on itself. You lift the camera to your eye to take a picture, but he blocks your viewfinder with his hand. You remove the camera from your eye and he’s close; he’s picked this moment; you’re alone on the winter beach.

As you roll all over each other, sand gets into everything and parts of you freeze while others steam.

When it’s done and you open your eyes, snow is falling. But it’s the kind of snow that melts the moment it touches your parka.

Ross McMeekin’s fiction appears or is forthcoming in publications such as Shenandoah, Folio, PANK, Green Mountains Review, and Tin House (blog). He received a MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts, edits the literary journal Spartan. Visit him here.