The Winter tale of the curious Amber Perking

Part one

If Amber would be asked to pinpoint the moment when she first experienced developing feelings (different ones than annoyance) for someone, she would probably tell you that it started with the tiramisu incident.
This may sound absurd, but don't you start laughing now.
Because when people tell you that love goes through the stomach, they are actually perfectly right.

It had been a day in December, a couple of days before Christmas.
The light had been an almost glowing gold, adding an exceptional air to everything you did, even to the most routine of acts.

Streets were crowded with people that were running late for their Christmas errands.
There were husbands having stressed out calls with their wives about which napkins to buy (red or green, that really was a very hard decision!),
mothers with their complaining children trailing after them and the occasional busker singing Christmas carols to the pedestrians.

The day before it had snowed, so the whole city seemed to be sparkling like a sea full of diamonds, a sea ,that yearned to be discovered.
It seemed to sing to you in hushed tones, almost daring you to come into its embrace, which looked so pleasantly innocent.
The plush, white blanket hid all the dirt and made everything look like a winter wonderland consisting only of marshmallows.

It was also the time of coats.
Thick, long, plush, feathery, all variations you can possibly conjure up in your mind.
London is quite a fashionable city meaning there were a lot of possibilities to choose from.
The week before Amber had seen a man wearing one in a bright orange color, but still with a cape of fur.
She had almost fallen flat on her face, it looked so ridiculous.

Amber herself had acquired a coat to which she had looked extremely forward to wearing.
It was a dark red, plum colored one (yes, that is a color) which looked more like a cape.
It had been love at first sight.

The cold December days were the time when you were looking forward to that oh so special cup of hot chocolate when you made your way towards home.
The cold biting your skin in that especially cool way that makes you appreciate the hot beverage even more.

Another truly delightful sight were the red tinged cheeks of people, who were getting onto the tube in the morning rush.
A sign that it truly was winter.
What was even more becoming, Amber thought, was that you could pretend to be a magician, breathing not fire but fog.
The exhaled air became visible when you puffed it out.

Amber did that all the time during the colder times of the year. If you would follow her for a day you would probably notice it, too.
The girl with the blonde, messy bun that walked along the Thames, while puffing her breath into the sky.

Sometimes she would even stop to see it dissolve in the cold air, the aqueous vapour slowly fluttering away from her.
It felt as if setting free a caged bird.
Strangely relieving.
The dissolved water often reminded her of a town where she had lived when her parents were still together, a century ago, so it seemed to her.

Across from their house had been a field filled with wild grasses and the most wondrous combination of flowers.
They were always attracting big amounts of bees in the hot summer days, yet in the winter mornings (her favorite) there had always been a thick mist over it.
She had imagined fairies playing hide and seek in the misty grass, their muffled sniggers carried over to her by the wind.
Sometimes she had envisioned one of them waving at her, luring her in to come and join them.
Nigh to beckoning her to run away, away from her serious life. Far away to a miraculous country in another universe.
Her imagination had always been quite queer.

She was out of the ordinary one could say, but the question is, isn't there something miraculous about everyone?
Something so strikingly astounding, it can only describe this single person?