The snow slows me down. It grabs my ankles and squeezes the air out of my lungs, it pulls at my elbows until they are scraped raw and bleeding. I don't feel it. I'm too scared, too cold to feel anything; at the moment, my heart is as frozen as my toes. The ice coats the road, a reflection of the sky. The only sounds are the sloshing of the snow beneath the yellow boots with the holes in them, coupled with the rasp of asthmatic breathing. A white puff of steam periodically clouds the air in front of my eyes- a nuisance, but a reminder that I haven't dropped dead yet and am unlikely to any time soon.
The way the house is situated, you see the top of it long before you see anything else. When I reach this point, I like to pretend that it looks better than it actually does. Like the paint isn't peeling and the windows aren't covered in grime. The doorbell hadn't broken years ago and the off-white carpet is unstained. I hate it with a passion, nearly as much as I hate how the other children laughed and pointed: the weird house in which the weirder girl sat. Yet the shabby home had become as much of a part of me as my dark hair and dark eyes. I throw the front door aside and fall unto the carpet that lies beyond. So riled, so exhausted. It is slightly warmer in here but hopefully not warm enough. Pulling myself on to my hands and knees, I claw at the carpet, dragging my shattered body towards the kitchen.
Damp.
The closer I get, the soggier the carpet becomes. I scuttle faster, my eyes teeming with tears, my chest fondled by fear. Maybe if I can just get there fast enough, maybe if I can just get there fast enough, maybe if I can just. I know it is too late the moment my fingertips meet the hard tile and find it beneath an at least inch of water. I scramble to my feet, sending tiny droplets of water careening towards my face. I creep around the island tenderly, gingerly. My chest is squeezed tighter as tears clog my throat. I can't breathe, I can't breathe. My shoulders shake as my body is wracked with sobs. I hurt all over, sinking.
I am losing myself, drowning in an inch of water.
A pale face looks up at me from the wet tile. The reflection should be mine-dark hair and pale skin, eyes too big and ears too tall-but instead, I see him. His hair is dark like mine but the similarities end there. His jaw is more chiseled, less oval, his eyes the sort of blue that my boring brown ones could only dream of. No, the reflection wasn't mine, but I know the face of this boy almost better than I know my own: Elize Gardner.Elize had moved to town only a year ago, but it felt like it had been much longer. The other fifth graders laughed at him, said his name should belong to a small scrawny girl. Maybe they had meant me.
I didn't like Elize much at first, though I am ashamed to admit why. My playground was quiet but it was safe, the complete opposite of Elize. He drew attention; he had exactly the type of presence I liked to avoid. The stupid boy wouldn't just take a beating the way I had learned to. He fought only for himself and he fought hard. When Allan Field punched, Elize Gardner punched back twice as hard.He was difficult not to like, but oh how I tried. Elize Gardner was my only friend and soon he fought for me too. I never told him how much I appreciated his presence or how he hadn't laughed at me the first time he had seen the weird girl's house. I had a theory that as soon as a person figured out how much they meant to you, they would shortly leave you after.
Elize's favorite season was winter. He loved the way sparkly frost coated the barren tree branches. How the ice coated the road and reflected the sky. Most of all he loved the snow but more than he loved the snow he loved the snowman that had been birthed from hours of our labor. Elize named him Harrold. Harrold the snow man was born a week ago, only a week ago.
That night was a week ago, the night I got so angry. Elize had looked up at me from beneath frozen, dark eyelashes. I hadn't been able to get him to speak for hours. Those were the last hours that my heart would remain unbroken. At first, when he spoke, I didn't hear him. I snapped at him to speak up, just tell me already.
His timid voice tickled my ear. "Laura," That was my name. "I'm moving tomorrow."
My words were caught in my throat; I struggled to push them out. "How long have you known?"
A pause. "A while..."
"To where."
He looks to the sky, taking in a deep quivering breath. "Far." He shoves his tiny hands in his tiny pockets. You know that theory, the one about people leaving? I can't remember if I told him or not. However, I know I said many things I wish I hadn't.
Elize, the boy who punches back, didn't punch back. He didn't push back when I shoved him off my porch. He didn't yell back when my voice broke from screaming obscenities at him. He didn't stop me as I plowed into Harrold, knocking the snow to the ground and the hat off his head. He didn't hug me has I sobbed. He simply got on his bike and rode faster than I'd ever seen him ride. That was the last time I would ever see him.
Elize rode his bike down the icy road, the one he found so beautiful, the one he said looked like the sky. If only he had known that it would be the icy sky that would carry those heavy tires to him. That it would steal the pale blue of his eyes and add them to its collection. Elize Gardner died at the young age of thirteen, hit by a hydroplaning semi.
I gathered Harrold's snow and remade him the best I could before shoving his limp body in to the freezer. A big smiling snowman on such a gloomy day. When the power had gone out city wide, I felt Elize dying all over again. I ran all the way home even when I knew I would be too late to save Harrold the way I was too late to save Elize. Melted snow and dripping tears.
I am losing myself, drowning in an inch of water.
