The Frozen Lake

Justin Heckert:

"Nature never did betray the heart that loved her." — William Wordsworth

Not long after he saw his brothers drown, Andrew Smith fell in love. Her name was Ruthie Grimes, and she was a girl from back home with straight dark hair. Andrew saw her at the first of two funerals, which was for his older brother, Noel, in the town of Burney, California; he knew little about her, only that Ruthie was one of his sister's best friends, a waitress who used to go to his high school, and who had volunteered to help facilitate the burials of two men from the same family within the span of four days. She'd been around Andrew and his brothers often, as they grew up with their sister in a house…