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The snowmen arrived as if by magic one cold February afternoon, James noticed them as he walked home alone from school. It seemed that miraculously each garden in his street had sprouted some of the biggest snowmen he had seen in his twelve years of life.
The heavy, continuous snowfall of two days had come as a suprise to all, even the weathermen could not explain the unusually heavy blanket that now covered most of Eastern and Southern England. They were trying to blame it on an unexpected Siberian wind that had turned suddenly and had caused problems already across most of Europe, but the strange thing was the winds had been coming from the South, a warm wind that should have held no snow in the dark clouds that were overhead continuously at the moment.

James could not believe his luck that his school was closing until the snows were able to be cleared better by the local council, if the teachers could not get to school because of the roads then what hope did the kids have of getting any work done. He was lucky in a way that he lived so close to the small comprehensive.

He found it curious how the snowmen looked to have been made as if from a pattern or template, each stood around six feet tall and of a similar width. No carrot noses on these snowmen, their faces were all made with what appeared to be polished black pebbles. Their mouths were set more in a grimace instead of the friendly smile you would expect to see, the pointed stones bearing a remarkable resemblance to sharpened teeth. The eyes were especially well done, the shine from the stones gave the snowmen an almost unblinking gaze, he felt like he was being watched by these silent, cold creatures as he made his way home.

James began to feel uncomfortable as he turned into his street, yet again each garden was being guarded by a snowman, each one of similair size and shape to the many he had passed already on his walk back from school. His mind started playing tricks on him, from the corner of his eye it looked like the snowman outside old Mr. Jones house had moved towards the road. He spun towards it and stared intently waiting to see something he knew could not be true. Of course he had read "The Snowman" by that Briggs bloke, but snowmen don't come alive...do they.

Once more from the corner of his eye he detected movement, James kept his gaze on Mr. Jones' snowman.
Again he could sense the movement of things around him. That was enough, he quickly thrust his head in the direction of where he thought he saw something.
It couldn't be. The snowman was closer to the gate, closer to the road, closer to James. He let his eyes drift towards his house, the snowmen in each garden were all closer to the front of the gardens, almost as if they were blocking the entrances to the homes behind them.

Disbelievingly he started to back up, he could not take his eyes from the now forbidding creatures that had invaded his street. His hurried backwards steps were jarringly brought to a halt as he found himself backing into a cold wall of snow, the shock of the chill against his back causing him to suck in a deep breath involuntarily.

He was still taking that deep breath when he felt the strong, cold arms of snow enveloping him, gagging him, filling his lungs with ice.

The snow kept falling.

Learn more about this author, Ian Yates.
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