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Rescue

"Three days and still it snows…" Amelia's voice faded away as she gazed out the upstairs window at the skeletal, shivering gray maple tree in her front yard. "Mama, Daddy, how I miss you. Bleak November has left nary a colored leaf to inspire my muse, which slips away like an escaped prisoner from this Norwegian wasteland. Oh, that I could follow where it leads!"

The quill pen slipped from her fingers to land on blank paper as she laid her head down on her desk. Her parents' cuckoo clock ticked hollowly, scarcely disturbing the stillness of the large and empty house.

"Yip, yap, yip!"

"Ah, what now? A dog barking upon my doorstep? I welcome any distraction from my heart's chill gloom."

The brown and white terrier wore a name tag: Spunky. Amelia knelt down and held out a hand.

"Be still, Spunky!" Her request went unheeded as he made short dashes back and forth off her porch, peppering the untouched snowfall with a trail of paw prints, barking persistently.

"You yelp with a sense of urgency. I shall come."

She stepped out into the bitter cold, allowing Spunky to lead her around the corner. Seeing a boy lying on the icy sidewalk, she rushed to help.

***

Amelia brought out a tray of tea and cookies, setting it down on the wicker table in front of the settee.

"So tell me, young Joey, how is your ankle?"

"Much better today, Miss."

Amelia poured the tea as swirls of steam wafted to the glass ceiling.

"I am indebted to you, dear soul, for finding and helping my son," the boy's mother said.

"It is my own blessing that Spunky chose my door to come to." Amelia passed a cup and saucer to her. "I have enjoyed the fresh air for the first time in a week, thanks to your dog. The splendors of a winter evening have been lost on me, I must confess."

Amelia pulled out a pencil and notebook and patted Spunky, offering him a cookie.

"My heart spills over with observations of local beauty. See the wavering patterns of lace which the bare maple tree casts upon the moonlit snow?"

She paused as effervescent emerald curtains of light descended upon the northern sky.

"Ah look, Joey, it is the Aurora Borealis. One can almost hear the radiant energy it emits." She scribbled in her notebook as they watched the glorious sight. "With new companions by my side and the return of my muse, life in Norway does not appear so unhappy."

"Yip, yap!" Spunky seemed to agree.

Word count: 430.
Written for the Bard's Hall November contest:
Choose one of the following quotations that inspires you the most about the month of November, and write either a poem (up to 60 lines) or story (500 words or fewer.)

“It is also November. The noons are more laconic and the sunsets sterner and Gibraltar lights make the village foreign. November always seems to me the Norway of the year.”

— Emily Dickinson

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