He sat on the cold, damp pavement. The chipped ice poked his shoe and the frost gleaned on his glorious trophy for figure skating. His lips and skin red as his arteries. The frozen lake beheld itself in front of him. Frost fell on his lashes, but he didn’t move. He sat in the cold, gloomy atmosphere with a murky memory. His eyes lined with tears that dropped down like pinnacles, touching his sharp chin. He removed his mittens. That was the first he had moved in half an hour. His knuckles felt numb. With a grimace on his face, he fisted his hand and beat right on to the thick layer of ice. All this agony poured out in streams of glacial reminiscence. Both his hands, fist first onto the block. The tiny tips of glass ice cutting through his hand. The lines on his hand were stained with blood, jetting through the cracks on the mirroring ice. He saw his blotchy, bloodshot reflection and gave a cry of range. The crystal-clear waters blend with the scarlet from his body like his past and present grief.
His father came running to the lake with a limp in his foot and held his son, tight in his arms. He was fazed at the self-harm he had caused. He rested his son’s head on his shoulder and let him dishevel his pangs. The onslaught of flashes that made him clutch his father’s jacket, just like he did a decade back. It was the same frozen lake, December’s finest. She loved the snow, and he loved her. She had spent all night, under an oil lamp, crocheting her way through the top of the ice skates; to fit her little man’s feet. At sunrise, they twirled through the rimy lake on the rims of the skates. The chill breeze didn’t prevent them from smiling wide. They spent hours on the ice. He promised her he would become the most proficient at it. She chuckled and told him to always follow his heart. He raced her to the heart of the lake, unaware that they were stepping on thin ice. A slit from her skate to the cover below, shattered the ground beneath her. She lost her balance and slipped back. Her head slammed on the drifted ice block. She splashed through the frigid mass of water, silent screams until numbness engulfed her. He turns to see her punctured fingers and clobbered corpse. The entire ceiling below his feet turned into a slab of ruby, like the death of a rose. His face turned hot and the residual water touched his feet as he gave the same cry of rage.
He wiped his tears, dusted the snow off his trophy and flung it as far as he could over the icy lake. He loathed the winter from then, he loathed ice skating, but he did it to fulfil his only promise. Now, that he was done reliving his worst memory he stomped off through heaps of snow. His father picked up the gold-plated trophy that was now in two parts and placed it on the mantle beside her with an inscription for her love of winter.
~ It has the colour of the moon and the glow of it,
The darkness it brings only to lighten your day,
And the moment I smell snow, I feel like I’m born again.
~ A frostbite that rejuvenates your senses,
Or a cardigan woven out of undying love,
The friend you see in the glistening snowman you build.
My son swiveling on the glitter in the light of twilight,
Sitting with my husband, in the warmth of my abode,
Knowing all will be fine if this bleakness swallows me.
~SVP
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