30 Day Writing Prompts

1

1. Cold

Flipped the calendar to January this morning. Woke up hungover, head hot with pain, however my toes curled in when I wandered into the kitchen and my feet hit the cold tiled floor. When my feet adjusted to the cold, I marched over to the other side of the room quickly to make myself coffee. Coffee doesn't really help with hangovers, I know people say it does but I strongly disagree. An aspirin would be better, but I don't have any lying around and it's far too early to leave the house.

Mug in my hand, hot air wafts upwards and tickles my chin. With the thermostat turned up to 30 degrees, it's too chilly to worry about the cost of heating today.

I consider going outside for a smoke, but even with a jacket on and an old pair of slippers I think the frost would still manage to crawl under my skin and freeze me from underneath.

Trotting into the sitting room, I glance through the window, shielding my eyes slightly from a harsh winter's sunlight. Snow. A thin layer of snow blankets every surface possible. It's not that deep, but deep enough so that I can't see the grass in my garden properly. It hasn't snowed in ages. All those winter months last year, January, February, November, and December when it usually snows and it didn't. But it's snowed now. New year, new weather. Strange. I was sure it wasn't going to snow any time soon, that's what global warming does to the weather. No more snow.

On the other side of the street, Laura waves at me. We've spoke a few times, so I give her a wave back and a crooked smile that she probably can't see. Wind blows into her face, I can see her brush her hair from her mouth and tucking it into the hood of her winter jacket. She's shovelling the snow from her driveway, not that it's really necessary considering that the snow isn't even that deep, but each to their own, I suppose.

Turning around, I move through the kitchen and back up the stairs, small amounts of coffee splashing over my mug and burning my hand, but I don't mind.

It's even colder upstairs, the heat hasn't fully kicked into action yet. Leaving my cup of coffee in my bedroom, I strip my clothes off and turn on the shower. The hot water is relaxing, but painful. Like when I was younger. I used to play in the snow with my siblings, and when we'd come inside there was always that familiar burning and tingling sensation due to the quick change from cold to warmth.

Reminds me of last December when we had ran outside laughing, laughing, laughing. It was cold and my feet hit the concrete on the path too hard and too fast, leaving bruises that took weeks to properly heal, but it was worth it because that's the first time you had ever seen snow. You touched it with bare hands and grabbed a handful, shaping it into a ball. I knew what was coming but I didn't move at all, I wanted you to experience what I had as a child so I let you hit me with the snowball. The cold, cold snow fell down my back, I jumped as you hit me with another square in the face. I threw some back at you and you shrieked as the snow slapped against your bare legs and bare arms with a soft thump. After, we bolted upstairs and turned on the shower, teeth chattering together as we waited. Simultaneously, we both burst into fits of laughter. It was like love. Real fucking love. I was cold, probably caught hypothermia or pneumonia and you were probably thinking the exact same thing I was, but we were in love. So in love that no matter how cold our feet were and no matter how much snow had fallen down my back and no matter how much was resting in your hair it didn't matter one bit because we were together. Together. You were mine and mine only.

It burned as the water rolled down our backs and down our faces but we still kissed under the water and I loved it.

I loved you so much. It's cold here, without you. We could've lay in that snow for hours, baring our skin to the elements. Our light pyjama clothes would've done nothing to keep us warm in any way, though, lying there with you would've kept me warm.

Well happy new year to me, it's been a while and I'm still freezing. The snow makes me miss you. I can't stop thinking of how cold it was when you left a year ago today, leaving imprints of your shoe soles in the snow that never returned, coming the other way. I'm feeling that same shiver today, staring at the snow from my bedroom window, hot tears rolling down my cheeks.

It's cold, really fucking cold.