baby, its cold outside.

I was on the bus looking at the frozen lake next to my school when I thought up of this.  It seems to match the whole winter feel.  Listened to Bon Iver the entire time I wrote this.  Enjoy!

               She sat on their snow bank, her breath coming out in small white puffs, her cheeks flushed, gazing out across the white of the frozen lake.  Why’d she have to pick this place of all places?  She tilted her head, up at the dead branches, coated in a layer of ice, and remembered back to the countless forts and snowmen and castles and faraway lands she’d made with Em.  They’d been best friends since forever ago; she couldn’t even remember the first time they’d met.  They could’ve been best friends since they were first conceived for all she knew.  She let out a sigh and watched as her breath took form and dissipated into the chill. 

                And now she had to tell her the truth.  I mean, that’s the least she owed her, after everything.  Even now, on the brink of revelation, her guilt blackened her insides, spreading its snake-like tendrils throughout her conscience until she couldn’t keep it back any longer.  It threatened to consume her, it tainted their relationship.  She’d thought that perhaps, if she forgot about it, or pretended that she hadn’t done what she did in the way she did it, it would be alright, and she could spare Em the inevitable pain.  In a way, it was out of selfishness that finally made it come down to this.

                She heard the crunching of snow come up behind her, and Em sitting down next to her.

                “Hey Em.”

                “Hey!” Em smiled back at her, it stretched across her face, her eyes creasing at the corners.  The same as when we were five, except with more crinkles.

                “Don’t you remember when we were playing ‘Rescue the Princess’?”

                She nodded, unsmiling, “Yeah, I do.”

                Em continued, “And you were the princess, you always were, and you were hiding in the snow bank for me to save you.  And then the snow bank caved in on you?”

                She shivered a little.  Yes, she certainly remembered that.

                “Oh man, and I was digging away at the snow as fast as I could…”  Em trailed off.

                She’d panicked.  One moment she could see Em in her tin helmet and shield buckled over her bulky down jacket toddling up the little hill, killing monsters with her wooden sword.  And the next, complete black, darkness wherever she looked.  She couldn’t scream.  She sat frozen, the walls of her prison crumbling down into powdery snow, burying her within.  And then suddenly, she picked up a faint sound.

                “I’m coming to save you!  Don’t be scared!”

                Little by little, a pair of small pink ski gloves dug away the darkness and light finally broke through.  “Take my hand!”  Both gloves reached out to her.  She just looked at them, fingers outstretched.  They took hold of her and pulled her out into the white light.  Em’s face was red, her chest was heaving.  “What’s wrong with you?!  Why didn’t you take my hand?”

                She didn’t know why.  She stared back at Em, unmoving.  Em threw her arms around her and squeezed tight and it felt warm, it felt like she would never let go.  And she hugged her back.

                “So why’d did you ask me to meet you here?” 

                She looked down at the footprints her boots had made.

                “I slept with James.”

                Em looked at her, disbelieving.

                “It started a couple months ago.”  She waited.  Nothing from Em.  She finally looked up, to see tears threatening to overflow Em’s eyes. 

                “Are…are you still…?” 

                She could only nod, the pain she had wrought, with those few sentences, constricted Em’s expression, showing itself all on her face for all to see.  She sat there, waiting for something, waiting for anything, if not from Em, then from some karmic power.  She shut her eyes expectantly, hoping that whatever was picked for her, it would be swift and painless.  She couldn’t speak anymore; her words seemed to have escaped her, with the mist from her breath, stolen away by the icy fingers of winter. 

                She stood up, it was time to leave.  She didn’t have it in her to look at one of the people she loved the most. 

Then suddenly, a push from behind, “I can’t believe you would do this to me!”  Shocked, she turned towards Em, her face now contorted in anger.  She scrabbled to regain her foothold on the icy surface of the lake.  Em’s lips trembled.  “Doesn’t our friendship matter at all to you?!”  She stood there and took the blast, watching Em from the other side of the lakeshore line, only a few feet apart.  Em’s body shook with restrained emotion.  She waited for more.

                Em shot her a last glance.  It was different than what she expected.  It wasn’t anger, fury, confusion, frustration, hatred.  There was sadness, a deep sorrow, in Em’s eyes. 

                “I never want to see you again.”  Em turned away.

                And then she heard a crack. She looked down.  A large crack lay beneath her feet, and then another, then another, sprouting from the root, they rapidly multiplied until the ice beneath her was completely riddled.  She looked up towards Em, towards her slowly receding back, and then she plunged through. 

                She opened her eyes.  The water around her was dark, black.  She looked up, to see if there was still some ice she could grab onto.  Nothing.  Her heavy overcoat dragged her towards the bottom.  She struggled for a bit, trying to stay close to the surface, bubbles expelling from her mouth, blinding her.  Wait, wasn’t this what she was waiting for? Karma.  Karma bites her in the ass again.  For the last time.  Alright, you have the last laugh.  She stopped swimming, her limbs floating weightlessly, while the rest of her slowly sank downwards, deeper and deeper.  She closed her eyes, and relaxed.

                Suddenly she heard something faint.  A garbled yell.   

                “I’m coming to save you!” 

                Don’t be scared.  She mouthed to herself.  Ironic.  I guess I don’t get to see a light at the end of the tunnel.  Whoever said that was an idiot.  There was no hope, no final happiness, relief.  Instead she was getting flashbacks of the most traumatic moments in her life.  And it was still black as far as she could tell.  She couldn’t feel any pain; at least they were right about that.

                And then her whole body was on fire.  It felt like she was being burned alive.  Pinpricks of pain in every single atom of her skin.  She opened her eyes in shock.

                Em leaned over her, rubbing her sides with her jacket.  “Please don’t die, please don’t die, please don’t die.”  Em’s eyes were squeezed shut, tears struggling to escape. 

                She looked up at her and moved her mouth.

                “Em, Em, I’m alive.”

                Em’s eyes opened wide, glossy.  And then she smiled, her face-stretching crinkly-eyed smile.  She sat up a little and they stared at each other’s tear-stained faces. 

                And then they laughed, long and hard, Em squeezing the life out of her, warming her. 

                And she smiled back, hugging her back with all her being.