Free Snow Angels by Elizabeth Gill

All I could see was this space and my father shouting at us and the smell of my mother’s clothes, the smell of her powder. And she was always coming and going like something that’s never still. I feel like I’m losing something, yet when I search my mind there’s nothing to hold on to. And that day in the office … I wished I had been kinder to you.’ It was only drink, Gil told himself when his brother, embarrassed by the words, had gone to bed; but when Edward left the room all the magic went with him. Gil had not known until then that his brother held the magic. He hadthought that it was the night or the brandy or the firelight. He realised then for the first time that the magic is only within people. The room was cool without his brother, and silent, and had nothing to do with him. Something was over and something new was just beginning and there was nothing left to do but go to bed.

Chapter Five
    Helen and Edward’s wedding day was as white as the icing on their three-tiered cake, but didn’t prevent anyone from getting there since the snow was decorative only and quite soft. The service was held in St Oswald’s in Church Street in the middle of the small city. From outside, you could see the cathedral in the background. Gil felt that his father would have been better pleased if the service had been held there, but Helen’s parents seemed determined that William should not be allowed to ask everybody of importance in the entire northeast.
    Edward had been drunk every night for a week and on two occasions, nights when he had not asked Gil to go with him, had not come home. His mother would have protested but his father said, ‘Let the lad alone. He’ll be leg-shackled soon enough.’
    Durham couldn’t help looking pretty in the snow, with its narrow streets, grey river and magnificent cathedral and castle, but when Helen walked up the aisle of the church she looked to Gil like some kind of sacrifice, as though the vicar was about to slay her on the altar. Gil had to make himself not stand in front of her to protect her from what looked to him like ancient rituals up to no good. For the rest of her life she would be Edward’s, belong to him in the most basic way possible, sleep in his bed, bear his children, obey him, be there for him to come home to. It was like a cattle market, Gil thought. Edward didn’t smile andToby, who was his best man, looked so pale throughout the ceremony that Gil was convinced he would faint. But Helen shone. She wore a long veil and a cream dress and nobody in the history of the whole world had ever been as beautiful. If he had doubted that she loved his brother, he doubted it no longer. She looked as though she had waited all her life for this moment. Her responses were clear and precise, whereas Edward’s were low and mumbled. Edward was better after the ceremony, laughing and throwing pennies for the local children who gathered in the street. Since the day was now bright and fine and the snow had retreated to lawns and rooftops, he insisted on walking with his bride on his arm the short distance to her parents’ home down New Elvet and across Elvet Bridge to the towpath where her parents had a gate to their house on the riverside.
    It was a big townhouse. They went in by the gate and up the winding path through bare trees to where the house stood with its front to lawns and the river and its back to Claypath, up the bank from the marketplace. The older people went by carriage but the younger ones walked, laughing and chatting as the sun made the snow glisten.
    Abby had said nothing but hello to Gil and he didn’t speak to Robert, for whom he had developed hatred. Rhoda Carlisle looked pretty in yellow and when Gil ventured to tell her so, since he was beside her and had to say something, she smiled and said, ‘Actually, it belongs to Abby. I haven’t a decent dress to my name. Who needs dresses when you live in the wilderness?’
    ‘I thought you liked it