The Final Embrace

by L.B. Zinger

January 21, midnight, -40 degrees. Twenty mph winds out of the northwest howled at the windows of the patrol car. The heater coughed and choked, barely keeping up. The cops spied two figures huddled against one of the high mast steel lights on the overpass.

“Look!” Dan pointed to the dark shapes accumulating layers of ice.

“Eejits! It’s blowing like hell.” Des shook his head. “Freeze to death in ten minutes.”

They pulled on balaclavas, zipped up and got out. They saw a classic tableau: frozen hands clawing at mouths, tongues firmly frozen to the steel lamppost, two dead eejits.

L.B. Zinger

L.B. Zinger is the pseudonym of a retired physician living in New Hampshire, USA.