WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO?
“Winter, I need you to calm your snow tits. You’re at a twelve when I need you at like, a five. I can’t feel my face.”
It was a chilly bleak clammy December day, with intermittent snowfall, the defoliated trees looking gnarled and frigid. She heavily luxuriated in uniform, weatherproof jackets and comfy snow boots, and described to Dela and Cillian the overwhelming desire she had for a cup of piping hot chocolate. It was her latest craving.
There was something new to Vera this holiday season. Her experience of most winters had been confined to a quiet place, grieving in a corner to cradle her hundredth box of tissues. She accepted a change of tradition, scarcely believing that she could, and the time spent with just two very nerdy misfits would just about delight her.
As she fell silent a perfect ball of white snow crashed into her numb rosy face, and half a dozen swear words burst from her coral pink lips, where flabbergasted children and their parents topped her slew of vulgarities off with looks of astonishment. But what luck had she that no one could see the angry middle finger that poked angrily through her harmlessly soft mitten of red.
Vera saw the whole picture like a movie scene in slow motion as she fell; her back hitting the ground, with the freshly constructed, albeit small, snow fort crumbling softly under her weight, the children crying louder than her pride as their work collapsed, and parents rushing to comfort the blubbering little ones, Vera’s upper body trapped in a blanket of white. She had a very merry time making things worse, and did not salvage the ruins as she wiggled out of the shambly fort.
Complaints reached her ears in good time for them all to be ignored and rejected as she got back on her feet, and found a pink little boy standing in her way, the lad looking solemn, his beady black eyes made colder by the darkening sky, and his whole countenance shaming Vera in ways she didn’t think possible, the reflection of pure disappointment.
“It’s all fun and games ‘til Santa checks the naughty list.” the white-haired scion told not just Vera, but her two companions as well. “Merry Krampus.” The tiny choirboy moved past them and if any one of them had bothered to observe his feet they would have discovered hooves in the place of shoes.
The team of three, if they followed her, soon adjourned to the main attraction, and as Vera Jayne stood before a great sign sucking in her breath, and looking at the blonde and her once upon a ball date, the two most likely engaged in the throes of witty banter, she read it quietly to herself. “I’m down for a quick snowball fight if you kids are.” Vera casually stated, as if she had no part in the destruction of a pre established fort.