A Year Without Snow

-39-

Friday, 12th January 2017

That morning I didn't feel like getting up. Something more than usual in my daily routine, but on that particular day, it felt like a supernatural force was weighing me down on my soft and warm sheets. A divine hand, making my eyelids heavy and my arms and legs go numb.

It would be so much easier to simply give in to sleep or maybe just lay there, for a few moments... With my eyes closed, not sleeping... just letting my eyelids rest. And that was when my alarm started again. And I finally gained the courage to get up and meet the cold air of my bedroom.

I couldn't precisely tell why I felt so lazy that particular morning, either it was for the Friday night party that was inevitably happening that night. Because I had to work side by side with my own pair of Bonnie and Clyde, or because the application for college time was approaching.

I made my way to my bedroom window and as usual, the wet pavement of the road met me, the grass of my front yard was covered with a soft layer of dew, as well as the Kanne's to my right and Mrs. Carpenter to my left. I could barely see the houses from the other side of the road but saw perfectly as a figure came out of the house to my right. As Mrs. Kanne picked up her Newspaper and as she turned around she caught me staring and gave me a big wave with her typical bright smile. I stood there for a few moments numb-struck but finally waved back.

After that brief - and slightly awkward - exchange of savings I made my way to my bathroom and took a bath. After getting dressed I tried to put my hair in a ponytail, which ended up looking ridiculous, with only a few strands of hair caught in the back, and the rest falling straight on my face. My hair was always very stubborn in the business of growing fast, but this time it was beating records.

I then went downstairs to find a note from my mother saying she was working a 36-hour shift, which made me both feel sorry for her, as for me, seeing I was about to eat another lonely dinner. Next to the note was a fresh-made batch of waffles.

I looked at my watch and wasn't surprised to see that it was ten minutes until the first period. I made my way to the hall and put on my puffer jacket and a beanie
and quickly grabbed a waffle from the kitchen before heading out.

An icy-cold wind met my face and hands, it had been particularly cold in Oak's Hollow since New Year's Eve. Everyone was sure it was going to snow any day now, which I wasn't so sure about, I was sure that if it hadn't snowed until the end of the year, it wasn't going to for the rest of the winter.

As I entered my car I noticed that Bryson's car wasn't in the driveway, which was strange seeing that he always left for school at the very last minute.

Driving away I couldn't help but wonder if he had left earlier to avoid seeing me. I didn't dwell much on the thought as I remembered that my first class of the day was with the despicable Mr. Thompson.

I entered the school building three minutes after the beginning of the first period, sprinting down the hall to get to class, but stopped straight in my track as I saw a big poster hanging from one wall to the other, with a bad drawing of a mountain covered with snow, with weakly painted letters reading: "Seniors are going to Canada!"

My mouth hung open as I tried to understand why that had been hung without any confirmation that that would be our trip, or why had that poster been drawn by a six-year-old.

As I was standing dumbstruck looking at the reason why I had agreed to tear apart my grandma's storage with all her life's memories, a blonde figure approached me with a furious expression on her face.

"Oh! You already saw it!" Melanie said angrily.

"Yes... What is this?" I asked.

"This! This is the work of the basketball team!" She said as she marched angrily down the hall. I followed her, still confused, "Those morons thought it was good to decide the trip all by themselves! And when me and Scarlett tried to tell them that we had to discuss this, they said that I had no authority! They hung this godawful poster just to piss us off. What disturbed me the most is the grammar in this. So I just went to the principal's office, and he is making them take down that awful excuse for a poster."