Frozen Purgatory

When my mother told me stories of snow -- the flakes that would float lazily toward the ground, coating it in hills and valleys of white powder -- she always described it as earth’s herpes: it never leaves. With snow always came slush, the grey, infective sludge that made the once-pure landscape sick with rotting foliage and the remains of dead livestock.

Even so, every night, I asked her to tell me the stories of the dancing flakes that clothed the trees and bushes in white sweaters. Even if every story was infused with virulence and bitterness over the cold, I ate up every word like seed cake. 

I sat on the floor near our living room window, my head tucked under the curtain and my nose pressed against the glass. 

My mother walked in as she got ready for work. “Get your face off the glass.”

“But, Mother, something’s falling from the sky!”

She pulled the curtain aside and cursed. By the time she had gotten up, the snow was already at least at my waist. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“You told me not to wake you up unless it was an emergency.”

She cuffed me on the side of the head. “You should have known that this was an emergency. There’s no way I can get to work in this weather!”

“Sorry, Mother.”

“Go sit on the couch while I call Tylee and tell her she doesn’t have to come over today.”

I grabbed one of the cushions and hugged it against my chest. “Is Tylee not coming over because I was bad?”

“No,” she said as she reached for her phone. “If I can’t go to work in this snow, do you really think you need a babysitter?”

“Is this snow?”

She thumped me on the head again. “Answer me.”

“ . . . No.”

“Exactly. Think before you speak.” She held her phone up to her ear as she walked into the kitchen. “Hi, Tylee . . . “

I sat on the couch and waited until I couldn’t hear her footsteps anymore. Then, I scooted off the couch and back to my place against the window. 

It was summer, which was strange, since all of Mother’s stories happened during the winter, a time of business affairs and cleaning equipment for the farm. I didn’t mind it, though; winter seemed like it was always years away by the time summer arrived, and I didn’t want to wait any longer than I’d have to. 

The land outside our house -- a small, two-bedroom bungalow -- was composed of pink sand, as it was near the ocean. Usually, the outside world was consumed by pink: the pink of the ground, the sky, and the cactus flowers that bloomed from the cacti that spotted the area. That world was now covered in snow, with only occasional glimpses at the sweet strawberry land underneath.

The ocean was visible from my place at the living room window. If I were to go out onto the ocean, would I be able to see the snow as it fell? How would it change the smell, that stale, salty-sulphur smell of the ocean, if it were to be mixed with the smell of the powdery white rain? What did snow smell like?

I stood from my place near the window and headed towards the door. I stepped only on the spots on the floor that made the smallest noise, for I had memorized them long ago.

I would only be outside for a moment.

I unlocked the chain and tugged on the door, lightly at first, before I began pulling at it with all my weight.  It wasn’t long before my small hands slipped from the knob and I fell to the floor in a heap of skinny arms and loose cloth.

“What the hell are you doing?” my mother yelled from the kitchen.

“Nothing!” I yelled back as I stood from the ground and dusted off my knees. “I just fell.”

“Be more careful. I don’t want you scuffing my floors!”

“I will!”

The front door wasn’t an option. It was too heavy, and my mother was just in the next room. 

I headed from the living room to the hall that led to both our bedrooms: mine on the left, my mother’s on the right, and a small storage closet next to my mother’s room. I went into the storage closet, for that was where my mother’s roomkey was.

The storage closet was about half the size of my room; I could spread my arms and touch two opposing walls at the same time. There was a shelving unit, on top of which was my mother’s key, so I took one of the chairs in the corner and climbed it to reach the top shelf.

My mother’s room was like that of a princess, with a canopy bed and a window seat with decorative pillows. I climbed onto the window seat and opened the window, which let the biting wind in. It sliced open my cheeks and lungs, and I took short, quick breaths, lest the coughing begin.

I climbed out of the window and sat on the sill. The snow nipped at my feet, and, when I leapt off, I sank until it brushed against my hips and waist. I had never felt such cold before, and it filled my senses until I wanted nothing less to coat my skin with the white snow.

I waded through it toward the ocean.

The cacti were tall -- taller than me, at least -- but they were also swallowed up by the snow. They lined my path, almost as though it were my wedding day and they were seeing me off toward my next adventure. 

The ocean was an endless, deep blue, like nothing I had ever seen, even if I had seen it many times before. I knelt down and traced the water with my fingertips, and they came out cold and red. I dove my hands past the surface and into the inky blue below until I was up to my elbows in icy, salty water.

I stood and brushed the snow from my knees before I waded out into the water.