I hoist the overloaded shopping basket up onto the counter at Richardson’s, possibly the only family-owned grocery store left in America, but Ernie, the owner and part-time cashier, has his full attention diverted in the direction of the massive front windows, his forehead wrinkled with worry.

“I didn’t want to close before six, but…” He gives a little shake of his head.

“It’s pretty horrendous out there, that’s for sure,” I respond.

I almost spun off the road on the way here. The way the snow is coming down, it’ll be nothing short of a miracle if I make it back to my parents’ house in one piece. I’ve only been in the store for fifteen minutes, and there’s at least another three inches piled up on their Subaru.

To say I regret making this trip into town becomes a bigger understatement by the second.

There are no other customers in the store, and the overriding silence is punctuated only by the monotonous beep accompanying each item that Ernie efficiently glides over the electronic scanner. I shift my weight nervously from foot to foot.

“Glad you made it in safely,” he says.

“I had to get out of the house,” I say with a grim smile.

He nods sagely and tucks an onion and a package of butter into the paper bag. “Holiday cabin fever?”

My parents shop here every week and I’ve known Ernie since I was a little girl. “Something like that.”

I hand him my credit card across the counter and he finishes ringing up the sale, glancing out at the snow again. “I hate to close up early…”

“You have to, Ernie. You’ll get snowed in if you don’t.”

Ernie comes around the counter to hand me my two bags, stuffed with last minute items from my mom’s shopping list and several impulse buys, and follows me toward the door.

“You need any help cleaning off the car?”

I give him a confident smile. “You close up. I’ve got it.”

I haven’t been out in the driving snow for ten seconds before I thoroughly regret rejecting his offer. I brace myself against the blustering wind and step off the curb into six inches of snow, my socks soaked inside my boots. How the hell did I get into Richardson’s in one piece?

I didn’t bother locking the car, thank God, so all I have to do is pry the passenger door open with frozen fingers and throw the bags in, then grab the extra-long combination ice scraper/snow brush from where I left it leaning against the seat. I lean into the vehicle once more to insert and turn the key in the ignition, the engine rumbling to life. Hood pulled up over my red hat, complete with pom, I tackle the snow that’s piled up on top of the car.

The only reason I’m even able to get the new snow scraped off the windshield is because the car had sat in the garage all day, keeping it pristine from the flakes. They started falling gently around ten this morning. Idiot me thought it would be a winter wonderland in town, not a damn nightmare.

I clear the back windshield and then shake off the snow clinging to my coat before sliding into the driver’s seat, tossing the scraper into the back seat. I run the wipers to clear the quarter-inch or so of snow that’s fallen in the short amount of time it took me to move from the front of the car to the back. In the rearview mirror, the Bayside Inn’s vacancy sign blinks. They’ve got room. I could just leave my car right here, book myself a suite, and climb into a sudsy warm bubble bath with…

With images of my mother’s teary, disappointed eyes dancing in my head. I’m only here for a week. It’s only three miles back to the house. I can make it.

I resolutely shift the car into reverse and cautiously back the trustworthy Subaru out onto Main Street. There is not a single other car in sight. Everyone else must have gotten the memo to stay inside.

Good Lord, I can’t see a damn thing.

I’m maybe a mile out of town when the wipers stop providing any help against the thick falling snow. No matter how hard I squint my eyes, I can’t see the difference between the road and the swirling snowflakes. My jaw clenches. If I die for two bags of groceries…

I’m traveling at an absolute crawl, ten miles an hour on the fast side. If anybody comes from the opposite way, I’m screwed. If it’s a semi-truck, I’m completely screwed. My heart leaps in my chest every time I think I see the flicker of headlights through the blinding storm, but a car never materializes. When I get back, I’m going to have an enormous glass of wine. Maybe I’ll just drink straight out of the bottle. My head throbs and my hands are sore from gripping the wheel so tightly.

I’m going by the feel of the tires on the road, just trying to follow along in what’s left of the previous vehicle’s tire tracks, when it happens.

A truck—all I can tell is that it’s lifted and bigger than me—comes screaming from the other direction, only he’s not quite in his lane. By the time I see that one of his front tires has to be driving along in one of my tire tracks, he’s almost on top of me.

The scream catches in my throat and my hands jerk the wheel to the right, my high school driving teacher’s voice echoing in my head. “Do your best to remain calm. The worst thing that can happen is that you overcorrect, sending you into the oncoming traffic…” My hands scrabble for the wheel, but I can’t hold it tightly enough to spin the wheel back into the road, and the next thing I know, the front of the car is slamming down into a snowbank in the ditch next to the road.

My heart punches at the inside of my rib cage, painfully fast, and I can’t catch my breath thanks to my adrenaline-fueled panic.

Joy to the World plays softly from the radio inside the sudden silence of the car.

Joy, my ass.

I inhale a deep breath and then lean my forehead against the steering wheel on top of my hands, still encased in my mom’s purple gloves. Merry Christmas to me.