Perpetual Devotion

"Our food was in there!" She said fearfully as she slumped down. "What are we going to do now?" She asked as she cried.

"Hey...it's all right, we can make it don't worry...I still have this." I reached into my pocket and tried to hand her my last candy bar.

"No, keep it, we might need it later." She said as she thrust it back into my hands. I stuck it back into my pocket and helped her to her feet.

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"You sure you are all right?" I asked as I helped her sit down on a large boulder.

"Yes...I'm fine." She replied.

"We're getting closer," I said as I looked out at the snow-laden landscape.

"Yeah," She looked up at me with her brown eyes. "I never got to tell you earlier, thanks for helping me when I fell." I heard her voice quivering.

"Oh, it was no problem, you would've done the same." I replied with a smile.

"I'm sorry about yelling before...it was stupid." She climbed off of the boulder and walked up to me. "I still love you." She said quietly and embraced me.

"I love you too." I answered without hesitation.

"Oh, look." She pointed beyond the side of the cliff and we saw that a lake had frozen. "We could rest there for a moment..." She suggested.

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We stopped in the middle of the lake and I sat on a broken log that was suspended in the ice. Marketa sat next to me. "Don't worry, we're...almost...there." She said as she panted. I nodded. "We have about 20 more miles to—." I held up my hand to stop her.

I cupped my hand to my ear and listened hard. "What? What is it?" Marketa asked as she stood up.

"You don't hear that?" I replied as I listened. She shook her head and I replied, "It sounds like a helicopter..."

Just as I finished saying helicopter, she heard it too, "Oh my god, we're rescued!" I saw the helicopter on the horizon; it was flying closer to us...

I ran to the log and began jumping up and down, trying to get their attention. Suddenly, I heard Marketa tell me to stop. I stopped and then I realized that the ice was cracking beneath me. I stood as still as I could, I took a small step and set my foot on the ice as if I was walking on eggshells. Marketa inched closer to me; she was about 5 feet away. I reached out as she held out a tree branch that she had gotten from the bank, it was still covered with snow and ice. "Go slow...go slow." She urged me. I saw my hand almost reach the branch before the ice gave.

"JOSH!" she screamed, I saw the horizon and her go up, as I went into the icy water. It hit me like thousands of invisible needles, it seemed to suck the breath out of me, when I pulled myself up with my arms, and I thrashed about trying to get out. Marketa thrust the branch out as far as she could, but it was too short to reach me, she tried to get closer but the hole in the ice made it impossible.

I gasped from the freezing water, trying desperately to stay afloat, but the water was sucking the strength from me. My arms started to go numb and I could no longer thrash out, it only worked sporadically, even though I couldn't feel it. My legs went numb next, and with one final gasp, I slipped into the water. I saw bubbles as I held my mouth open in silence. Then I heard a popping noise in my ears...it got louder...and louder.

Suddenly, I felt something against my back, something hard like a board or something, then something different...tightness around my neck. I saw the dark blackness of the deep water, and then a tiny light, it enlarged to a much bigger one, about the size of a kickball, then I realized it was the sun, someone had pulled me out. I saw a figure move around me, and then waves as the figure moved up and down, I gasped and swallowed in breath after breath of fresh air.

Something stung my face and eyes, it was snow. A strong breeze blew snowflakes around the figure and me, it was a beautiful sight. Then the sound came back as my eyes readjusted and I saw Marketa, she was waving. I tried to call out to her but nothing came out, there was a loud roar in my ears. Three men in red and fluorescent yellow surrounded me, and then I felt as if I was floating on nothing. I saw Marketa by my side and then the snowflakes surrounded her and she disappeared, but before she disappeared, she squeezed my hand, hard. I squeezed back just as hard, even though I hadn't known I had. Then I blacked out.

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I woke up in a hospital bed in Denver, Marketa told me the entire story as soon as I had woken up. It seems that her dream had come true, I fell through the ice, and had floated two feet under more stable ice. It had supported her weight and she had used the tree branch to break through, and pulled me out. The helicopter rescue team took me and her to the nearest hospital, my father and mother arrived the next day, I was still out when they arrived, and feeling like I might be seriously hurt, Marketa took advantage of the opportunity and told them all that had happened. My father seemed upset and a little relieved at the same time. He also told us that he had caught Pam trying to steal some of his property and she was arrested, he pressed charges and that was the end of her.

My father stated clearly that he was not going to enjoy the thought of seeing us come out of the same bedroom in the morning, and speaking about intimate details between me and Marketa made both of them apprehensive and uncomfortable. My mother didn't add much input one way or the other and was pretty much quiet. There was no changing the past now.

I got out of the hospital 3 days later and Marketa made it a homecoming I would never forget, she had rented a hotel room with the rest of her savings for a couple of days. We never left our room until it was time to leave, we had the most romantic sex as both of us had ever had, always calling room service and ordering what we wanted, and having deep conversations about what we wanted to do in the future.

When the Christmas holidays ended, we went back to school since we had both promised our parents we would, we were quite famous since everyone had seen the daring rescue on the news, I watched it and smiled, Marketa never left my side. We got used to the people asking for our autographs. We didn't express our feelings in the hallways or eyes of other people. We would talk like we were brother and sister and even acted like it. The first assignment we had both gotten when we went back was to write an essay about what happened over the Christmas holidays and what we had gotten for presents. We both discussed it and decided to make it all public, though we tried not to be explicit or enact cause for judgement.

"This Christmas was the best of my life. I received the best present in the world, I met my soul mate and have found a love that can never be matched by another for the rest of our lives."

I doubted that my teacher knew anything about us being brother and sister though. We quit school 2 weeks after we wrote the essays, we enrolled in a home course to get out diplomas, and we graduated together and showed our congratulations for each other in emotions that night. Life had certainly changed for the better in just 2 months. But now that I think about it perpetual devotion to my soul mate and sister is going to be the best thing in my life.