It all began one winter’s afternoon, when I was doing my homework.
On my bedroom desk was the globe. If I tipped it up, the snow inside
fell gently on to a miniature snowman. It was the last present from
my sister Sue who had drowned a couple of years earlier, falling
through the ice while skating on a local pond.
I loved my globe and never tired of watching the snow fall on the
smiling snowman, so you can imagine my amazement when I picked
up Sue’s gift and saw the snowman was no longer there. I just
couldn’t believe what was happening.
Bewildered, I stared closely into the miniature world and saw he
had been replaced by a frozen pond and on its surface I could see
Sue skating.
Unbelievingly I saw her glide in widening arcs until a great crack
suddenly spread across the ice and she fell, disappearing into a
black hole.
The images faded and gradually the cheerful snowman returned,
leaving me shaking and unable to move. After a while I began to cry.
When I picked up the globe again, the snowman still stood there
smiling – and as I tipped it up, the snow gently fell. I knew I must
have imagined what had happened. Nevertheless, all the pain of my
sister’s death returned to me, and the great ache that had only
slightly subsided started again.
Next day was Saturday. Snow was falling and my friend Lesley
rang. She made the suggestion sound casual but I guessed she had
been building up to it for hours.
‘I’d thought we’d go skating.’
‘I’d rather not.’ I hadn’t put my skates on since Sue died.
‘Milham pond’s frozen over. Everyone’s going.’ Lesley was my
oldest friend and I knew she was taking this opportunity to try and
get me to come to terms with the past. ‘Give it a go,’ she pleaded.
In fact Sue had died on another pond – Heathside – and Milham
was some way from the scene of the tragedy. I hesitated – and then
agreed. She was right – I had to face up to it. Then I remembered
the globe.
I went upstairs and stared into the snowman’s face again and he
smiled back at me blandly. Then I turned the globe upside down and
the snow came gently fluttering down.
Lesley and I walked to the pond, chattering rather selfconsciously,
but when we got there my nerve failed me. Although I hadn’t been
present when Sue drowned, I knew that she had fallen under the ice
and that the other skaters had run for hard objects to batter at the
surface, trying to get her out. But the ice was too tough and for
weeks I had had the most dreadful nightmares as I imagined my
sister a dark shadow beneath the glassy surface, gazing up at the
distorted shapes of her frantic would-be rescuers while they stared
helplessly down at her, as if they were watching a mermaid
scrabbling at the ceiling of her freezing prison.
It was a vision I thought I had managed to forget, but now it came
back, clawing at me somewhere in the pit of my stomach.
‘I don’t feel well,’ I said, dumping down my skates in the snow on
the edge of the pond. ‘I’ll just watch.’
But Lesley was insistent. ‘You can’t do that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you’re a good skater.’
‘I haven’t been on the ice in years – and you know why,’ I said
stubbornly.
‘You’ve got to try.’
‘Why?’
‘To get over it.’
‘No. No, I can’t.’ I gazed round at the skaters on the ice – longlegged,
black insects on the dull white sheen. It was early afternoon
but the winter sun was low on the horizon, a pale pink orb in a grey,
leaden sky.
‘Do it for me, Jane.’
‘No.’
‘Please try,’ Lesley persisted, but I still refused. She smiled sadly
and I suddenly realized how lucky I was that someone liked me
enough to try and help.
‘All right then.’ I grabbed my skates, took off my shoes and began
to pull them on, but as I did so, a wave of clammy terror swept over
me.
We began to skate together, slowly at first and then in widening arcs,
and my confidence began to return.
‘You OK?’ asked Lesley and she grabbed my hand.
‘I think so,’ I stammered, self-conscious again.
Looking down I thought I saw a shadow under the gleaming ice
and screamed, skating to the side of the pond, leaning on an
overhanging tree and shaking.
‘You’ve been on for ten minutes,’ said Lesley. ‘That’s enough for
one session.’
‘Maybe I’ll go on again later.’
‘See how you feel. At least you broke –’
‘The ice?’ I said half laughing, and then beginning to cry.
‘I’m sorry.’ Lesley was immediately concerned. ‘I don’t know what
made me say that. Of all the stupid –’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘It’s just one of those sayings. Forget it.’
‘You did well,’ said Lesley, looking at me anxiously. ‘You really did
well to try.’
‘It was you,’ I said. ‘Go and get some more skating in and I’ll
watch.’
I delved into my rucksack, bringing out the globe which travelled
everywhere with me – even to school – and tipped it up, seeing the
flakes fall on the face of my snowman.
Then I looked up, watching the skaters skim their way over the
surface of the pond, some elegant, some daring, some clumsy, and
some such downright beginners that they hung round the edge, often
falling to their hands and knees.
My gaze unconsciously returned to the globe. I turned it upside
down and immediately saw the snowman had gone. In his place was
a skater. At first the figure was plastic and inanimate, but then it
began to glide and immediately I started to shake. This couldn’t be
happening. It had all been in my imagination – or so I had hoped.
At first I thought I was watching Sue. Then I saw it was somebody
else.
In the globe the figure was skating towards a hole in the ice.
I stared down incredulously and then transferred my gaze to the
pond and the whirling skaters. The shifting crowd seemed to be
getting denser all the time and I briefly searched for Lesley before
frantically staring back into the globe to see if there were any clues
to the skater’s identity. But the blandly smiling face of the plastic
snowman was back.
I stood up, yelling, but the skaters were making far too much
noise to have the slightest chance of hearing me. I had to get on the
ice and I knew I didn’t have much time.
*
I darted around, warning each group, each individual, speeding
around the edge and then beginning to make for the more crowded
centre. I shouted but no one took much notice. Several people
jostled me and I would have fallen if my old expertise had not
returned.
I kept staring down, terrified I would see someone under the ice,
their hands pounding. Then I saw Lesley again and gasped with
heady relief. She was standing, talking to a couple of friends on the
far side. Somehow I had forgotten to warn her in my panic.
Then I saw her begin to skate again, this time towards the centre
of the pond. Suddenly I heard a grinding sound. Was the ice
cracking? Splintering?
‘Lesley!’ I yelled and sped towards her as hard and as fast as I
could. ‘Stop. You’ve got to stop. Get off the ice. Now!’
Everyone was beginning to stare at me, but I only had one
thought: I had to get to Lesley before it happened.
‘Get off!’ I grabbed at her and she wheeled round
uncomprehendingly.
‘It’s all right.’ She was trying to reassure me, imagining I was
having my own personal panic attack. ‘It’s all OK. You’re fine. I’m so
pleased you decided to –’
‘The ice is going to break up any moment,’ I screamed at her. ‘Get
to the bank.’
Lesley tried to take my hand but I shook it off violently. ‘You’re
going to be all right,’ she said, as calmly and as reassuringly as she
could.
‘But you’re not,’ I yelled.
Was the deep grinding sound in my ears alone? Couldn’t
everyone hear it?
Then the ice split and a black hole appeared metres from Lesley’s
feet.
I jumped the widening gap, pushing her away, and as she fell I
rolled on top of her, cutting her ankle with one of my skates. Lesley
gave a sharp cry of pain and the other skaters moved back from the
hole, warning each other, the panic spreading.
‘Get off the ice,’ someone yelled.
I struggled up and grabbed Lesley. ‘Come to the bank.’ She
hesitated and I pulled her up. ‘Come on.’ Eventually she got the
message and we skated to safety, the ice making a low rumbling
sound as we went. Then the hole widened, great cracks spiralling
out from around it as a massive section began to collapse.
Lesley held me as I sobbed. ‘How did you know?’ she demanded.
‘You saved my life, Jane. You saved a lot more people, too.’
Gradually I became calmer and turned to watch the skaters
standing on the edge of the pond, staring down at the still breakingup
ice. They were silent, almost as if they were taking part in an act
of worship.
Later, when I got home, I lay on my bed and took out the globe
again. The plastic snowman gave me his bland plastic smile, and
when I tipped him up I saw the soft, gentle slivers of snow begin to
fall.
‘Can I have a look at the globe?’ asked Jamie.
‘You’ll have to be careful,’ said Jane. ‘If anything happened to it I’d
be terribly upset. Sometimes I’m afraid of breaking it myself.’
‘Does it still predict the future?’ asked Tim.
‘No,’ she replied quietly.
Jamie passed the globe back to her and she replaced it in her
rucksack.
‘It’s not the future my story’s about,’ said Tim. ‘It’s about the past
coming back into the present – at least, that’s how my friend Andy
saw it.’
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