A cold wind blew across the open land. Thin clouds hurried along the moon, making it difficult to see. The field was covered in snow but Aileen knew she had to keep going straight ahead. She didn’t know why but she often found herself here on this same stretch, walking the same snow covered field. I must be dreaming, she thought.

She noticed now that her feet were not sinking into the snow. Despite going barefoot the only cold she felt was from the wind blowing in her back. A thin, gauzy white dress flapped around her sandy brown legs. Around her arms there were a few strips of cloth attached to the dress at the shoulders.

The strips billowed in the strong breeze leaving her arms unprotected. Well this is a bit dramatic isn’t it? Aileen wanted to wear something more comfortable. The dress obliged, turning into a cotton summer dress with a motif of small white flowers embroidered along the hem just above her knees. Her arms were now covered to the elbow by slightly puffed up sleeves that allowed for easy movement.

I suppose a pair of jeans and my snow boots are out of the order then? Aileen sighed. She wondered if she could change the season to match her dress and make the sun come out. But the snow still stretched across the field and clouds still chased the stars out of the sky. A crunching sound started coming up from behind. Aileen looked over her shoulder.

A darkness within the dark was fast coming towards her. Fear gripped her heart. Aileen turned and ran. The gauzy dress was back. It’s long fabric flapping around her legs made it difficult to run. She hitched it up and tried to move faster. But the harder she ran the further her feet sank into the snow. Panting she searched for a place to hide. The crunching sound was upon her. Aileen got slammed to the ground. Snow filled her nose and mouth as she screamed. She scrambled onto her back and desperately fought her assailant. Aileen scrunched her eyes closed and kept on struggling until it all went black.

A voice sounded far off. There was music playing. Aileen opened her eyes and saw a soft light coming from below. She lifted her head from her pillow to see it was 6:30 in the morning. The air felt cold around her face. With a groan she dropped her head on her pillow again. She would give herself three songs on the radio, which roughly translated to 15 minutes, before she’d get up.

The dream came back to her. Aileen tried to recall as much as she could. When she got up she wrote what she could remember in her diary before taking a shower. A pale light hung in the sky when she shut the door behind her.

Wearing a thick winter’s coat, wrapped in a scarf that covered her nose, braids hidden under a fleece cap that she’d pulled down to cover her forehead, Aileen gingerly walked and slid across the small courtyard to the bike rack. A thin layer of ice covered her saddle.

If only they made winter tires for bicycles, she thought. She would manage in the city. But the day-care centre where she was subbing today was out in one of the small towns. Some of the paths she had to take never saw a salt spreader truck. Still she had to get to work and in these conditions it’d take her a good 15 minutes longer than the usual half hour.

A strong wind buffeted Aileen as soon as she left the last buildings of the city and turned south towards the Schie canal. She crossed the bridge while struggling to keep her bike straight. Out in the polder the biting east wind was relentless.

It crawled through her gloves to nibble at her fingertips and crept underneath her fleece cap to chew her ears. Aileen slumped forward over the handlebars careful to keep her nose buried in her scarf. She went along at a snail’s pace adjusting whenever she felt the front wheel trying to escape her grasp.

With the frozen Waif canal on her left-hand side this was no place to slip. She had successfully navigated through a bend when she saw a dark blue lump hanging on the grass bank to the left. Her stomach knotted. There was something strange about that lump. A dark smear covered the ice on the road next to it.

As she got nearer Aileen could make out a pair of legs stretching out beneath the dark blue with what appeared to be a bicycle trapped on its way down toward the Waif canal. She eased off her bike and did a penguin shuffle toward the figure. A woman lay unconscious on the bank. Aileen reached for her brand new cell phone. Zero bars.

‘Now what?!’ She knelt by the woman who seemed to be breathing. Aileen couldn’t see the wound on her head but the trail it had left on the ice was bad enough. Fear settled inside her chest. What could she do? The nearest place was the students flat at the other end of the road. But that was nearly a kilometre away.

She couldn’t take the woman with her. Still the idea of leaving her felt utterly wrong. Maybe she could haul her on the bike somehow? But what if she had hurt her spine? It might be dangerous to move her. Then again it was freezing. Lying on the grass like that she could get hypothermia. Aileen didn’t know how long the woman had been there, what if she got help only to find the woman frozen to death?

The dream came back to her then. She had been in control until she got scared. She wrestled with a person without seeing their face. I must have been wrestling myself. A sudden clarity came over Aileen in that moment. She saw that the bicycle was still trying to drag its owner down. She went round and carefully untangled the woman’s legs. “Ma’am? Can you hear me? Can you open your eyes?” No response.