John

All had the same white eyes, the same blue-tinged skin, each of them wearing a story they never spoke out loud.

Of course, the uncle had no idea who they were and where they were from.

But the way he told it, the way I'm telling you now, I suppose, each one of them, with their cold, dead eyes, their frozen, cracked skin...

They had all died there in those woods.

Campers, travelers, wanderers.

People whose last moments on this earth were spent in the cold until their hearts slowed, until their blood froze in their veins, slipping off whatever life still clung to them.

And the fire had called them.

The one thing that could have saved them in their final moments had turned into a beacon that cut through the afterlife, pulling them like literal moths to the flames.

At this part of the story, the uncle held up his hand, showing only a ring finger, pinky finger, and thumb remaining.

He'd reached out to the child at some point, instinctually reaching out to try and help the small boy, dead eyes or not.

The uncle recalled that as his fingers touched the boy's hand, at first he didn't feel anything.

Then he felt a cold.

Cold as bad as anyone had ever felt.

Cold that turned into a burning heat as the uncle screamed and fell to his knees in front of the mute chorus.

They watched on as the skin on two fingers turned black and necrotic.

The uncle ran to his truck, leaving everything and everyone else behind.

As you probably guessed, the doctors couldn't save his fingers.

A split second of contact had developed a third-degree frostbite in a matter of moments.

When I asked him what happened, he didn't know what else to say, so he told him the truth.

The truth as far as this telling of the story goes, I guess.