Christmas on the Lake

Gavagai 1000 Submission — Monthly Prompt: Baleful

It was a postcard white Christmas, the kind that buried the whole neighborhood in silence. Beneath the tree, a brother and sister opened brand-new ice skates and, before breakfast was even cold, raced laughing through the snow towards the lake.

They laced up with clumsy, freezing fingers and pushed onto the ice. Holding hands, they wobbled, spun, and crashed into each other, laughing until their sides hurt.

The brother skated farther out and lost his balance.

The lake swallowed him.

The sister raced to the hole and dropped to her knees, calling his name into the black water.

Without hesitating, she jumped in.

The cold crushed the air from her lungs. Beneath the surface, the world became a murky green blur. Pale daylight trembled above.

Then, in the darkness below, the creature’s baleful eyes turned on her.