A Year of Winter

twenty

January 29th, 2013

It was far past midnight when I heard a knocking at my bedroom door. 

Unsurely, I picked myself up from my bed, staring at the ominous strip of light that always flooded from the hallway, since my door never could quite close completely. My fingers curled into a nervous ball as I approached and slowly opened it, revealing Hattie, who looked as tired as ever.

“Hattie?” I asked, surprised. I didn’t know what I expected to be awaiting me, but it certainly wasn’t my sister.

Her face was flat as her eyes looked up at me. “Henry, I want you to answer me honestly.”

I frowned at her, eyes wide. I tried to play it off dumb, but I knew what was coming next. “Yeah, sure. Anything.”

Her eyes were pleading. “Did you help Winter trash Jake’s car?”

The pause that sustained the silence between us lasted longer than I’d hoped. I looked at her, wondering if I could possibly ever lie to her. She may have thought we knew nothing about each other, but she knew enough to see through a farce like mine. She wasn’t dumb; she may have, in some ways, been even smarter than me.

My throat was dry when I mustered out a small, insufficient, “Yes.”

The look on her face was not what I’d anticipated. She looked almost sympathetic, especially when she unexpectedly outreached her arms and dove forward, burying her face in my nightshirt.

“You’re such a dumb fuck,” she told me sadly, laughing nonetheless. It felt good to hear that, even if she was angry.

“I know,” I told her, wrapping my arms around her back. She may have been small, but she was so much bigger than from what I remembered. “I just…wanted to see you smile again.”

She pulled away for a moment, nudging me playfully; a huge, toothy smile was written across her face. She looked up at me, and while she seemed happy, her eyes were sad, “Well, you didn’t have to vandalize his car, Henry. If they can prove you guys did it—”

“—I know,” I said with a curt nod of my head, “I’ll be in deep shit.”

“The deepest shit,” Hattie told me, laughing still, under her breath. “Why couldn’t you just write him a letter and then throw it away, like a normal person?”

“I don’t know,” I told her. I honestly didn’t. My arms fell to my sides, and she stood in front of me with her arms crossed. Suddenly, she seemed like the older sibling, and I, the immature, younger one.

“I know you meant well,” she said, a small smirk playing at her lips. “You were trying to make me feel better.”

I looked up at her and nodded, slightly reassured. “I’d hoped it would go better than this.”

Hattie nodded and met my eyes. Her smirk didn’t fade too quickly, “It was pretty funny, though, when Winter showed him that picture. I almost wish I’d been the one to give it back to him.”

I narrowed my eyes, confused. “Back to him?”

“Yeah,” Hattie said with confidence. “Maggie took that photo about a month ago at some party I wasn’t invited to. She showed the picture to me, and she forgot to ask for it back”—she shrugged—“when I found out she’d also been with Jake that same night, I got really angry, you know? So I showed him the picture and said I’d use it against him, but he took it from me. I wasn’t smart enough to make copies, I guess.”