I narrow my eyes in on her and follow her into the living room. Pulling her fur hat onto her head, she smiles my way. “It’s faux fur. When I was a kid, I saw this documentary about what they do to get the real fur, and let’s just say I’m anti-fur. And anti-watermelon…but that was a different documentary.” She’s so fucking weird and I hope she never changes. I think the world could benefit from more people like her, more weirdness. Plus, she looks pretty damn sexute herself in her winter getup.
“Well the faux fur goes perfectly with our faux relationship.” When I say this, I see the corners of her mouth turn down for a split second before she reverses her frown and reaches for my hand.
“Let’s go.”
How is it already colder than it was when I walked out earlier for a smoke? I even have more layers on, and I’m pretty sure my dick is a popsicle. Why couldn’t we stay inside, licking syrup off each other? I like the licking of the syrup.
Jules is already knee-deep in the fluff, balling up snow as I stand on the edge of the drive-way watching her go at it. All the trees surrounding the cabin are decked out in white Christmas lights, and it’s a perfect setting for a perfect scene. The way she smiles as she continues to build a snowman is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life.
Sliding my hands into my pockets, I sway back and forth. “Her name was Penny,” I blurt out. The world comes to a halt, everything freezes, and the sounds of my own words fight me, wanting to rip me apart, but I remain standing. The only thing keeping me upright is Jules staring back at me, interested in what I’m saying, interested in the words that are forming sentences, that are forming my history right before us. “My grandmother gave me her engagement ring before she passed away. It was six years ago, and I was planning to propose to my girlfriend Penny. I had it all planned out, some real romantic crap…flowers, music, tears. She was supposed to meet me at our favorite restaurant and she never showed. Penny had a lot of personal demons that she fought constantly. She tried to overcome them, but that night she lost the battle and overdosed.”
I see Jules’s eyes filling with tears, and the burning sensation in the back of my eyes is painful; but with effort, I don’t break down.
“I don’t talk about it.” I laugh, but nothing’s funny. I laugh because I’m still angry with her. I laugh because I’m still sad. I laugh because if I don’t I will crumble. Every part of me will fucking crumble. I laugh exactly for those reasons, because nothing’s funny at all. “I never talk about it.”
Jules studies me, tilting her head to the left, trying to find something, trying to find me. “You blame yourself?”
“Every day, every night, every moment.” I squeeze my eyes shut and shake my head back and forth. And when I reopen my eyes, Jules is much closer; she’s marching closer to me, taking big strides through the snow. Her mittens are covered in snow, and her arms wrap around me. She holds me, and I allow it. All I want her to ever do is let me hold her in return.
“There’s nothing you could’ve done differently. It’s not our job to fix people. We can’t fix people.” She pulls me closer and my arms wrap around her, breathing in her fragrance. “It’s simply our job to love them, even when they’re broken. No matter what you could have done, no matter how much you told her you loved her and that she was enough, it wouldn’t have made a difference. You couldn’t save her. People have to save themselves.”
I kiss the top of her faux fur cap and thank her, even though a thank you will never be enough.
She wiggles in my arms and pulls away a tiny bit. “Yeah well, there was a time I was talking to a stranger while driving to a cabin and he told me that no one was coming to save me and that I had to save myself. I get the feeling he was onto something.” I barely notice the cold air that still surrounds us. Jules nudges me in the arm and holds her hand out to me. “Come on. Follow me.”
She leads me into an untouched layer of white snow and stands shoulder to shoulder with me. “What are you doing? What are we doing?” I ask, and she smirks.
“The first Christmas after my grandfather passed away, Grandma and I lay out here and made angels for him. Now lie down on your back. We’re making snow angels.” Before I can reply, she plops down into the freezing flakes and spreads her arms and legs, moving them back and forth to create her snow angel. It seems so fitting too, because she is an angel. Somehow I stumbled across this astonishing earth angel, and I cannot tear my eyes away from her.
Her soft voice orders me to lie down, so I follow suit, losing myself in the moment. When we have both created these snow angels, we lie still and hold hands and gaze up to the dark, starlit sky.
“This is for her…for your angel who’s stronger today than she was before. Merry Christmas, Penny.”