Perfect Snow (Seasons #1)

Chapter 2: Falling

VROOOOM!

I love how peaceful Peregrine Hollow can be, especially in the mornings. When the dawn walkers—what I call those insane enough to be vertical before sunlight hits—start up their blasted trucks and go up and down the road underneath the window of the guest bedroom I stay in. Just lovely.

Bang!

"RHYYYYYYYS!"

Bang! Bang!

"WAAAKEEE. UUUUUPPP."

Bang bang bang!

Ah, and being roused to wakefulness in this idyllic mountain cottage by my little monstrosity of a brother... well, there's nothing quite like it. Really, there isn't.

I stew in my warm bed, wishing I could wish away the cantankerous goblin outside my door.

Bang bang bang!

His little fists pound the door some more, and I hear him giggle as he shrieks my name in an ungodly pitch.

The vocal cords on this kid... Unreal.

Cranky with a side of murderous rage, coming right up!

I stomp to the door and yank it open. All I see is the feather ends of my grandpa's decorative Indian chief headpiece retreating around the corner as Jake makes a hasty escape.

I look away from him irritably to the arthritic pendulum in the tall grandfather clock outside of my room. I catch sight of the time, and I am instantly awake, as in three-dark-roast-ventis-later-kind of awake.

I slept until 2 pm? Wow...

For the next few hours, I don't know what to do with myself. I loiter around the house, taking my sweet time to shower, eat, not look at my ex's photos on any social media, eat some more, let my grandmother shove more food down my pie hole... Really, just being the epitome of a model grandson.

Having done their job of dropping us off, my parents decide to head home earlier due to "business calling." Hah, right. Twenty-four hours with aunt Muriel and you want to leave. Forty-eight is masochism, and anything over two days is suicide territory.

Precisely 0.2 seconds after they've left, I am whistling on my way to Preston's, rusty old skates in tow.

His house is not too far from my grandparents', and looks about the same, as does each and every one in a five-mile radius. Smoke rising from its chimney stains the puffy clouds above, the snowscape making the contrast more dramatic than it needs to be.

I am about to knock on the front door when it opens. Preston all but bulldozes me down as he shoves me out in front of him.

"Bye, mom! I'll see you all later!"

He keeps shoving me forward until we're off the porch and through the outer gate.

"Phew, that was close!" He sighs and then laughs at my befuddled expression. "Grandparents are coming, and she wanted me to go pick them up from the bus stop. If you walked in, that was it! We were both getting roped in and we could kiss our plans tonight goodbye."

I nod, finally understanding. "You've become quite the rebel for your lady, haven't you?" I smirk impishly.

I cannot tell if his cheek turned red with the cold, or if it was... yep, of course, it was the mention of Felicity. He studiously observes his feet as they crump-crump-crump over fresh snow by the road. I am more of an ice-smasher, myself. That feeling of satisfaction you get when your shoe breaks a whole sheet of ice and it makes that crackling noise...mmm...