A Year of Winter

fifteen

“Maybe she left her phone at home,” Tyrone said with a shrug.

Curious, I looked up at him, furrowing my brows, “You think she left home?”

Tyrone looked up at me, raising an eyebrow as he took another big bite of his food. He swallowed, and nodded, leaning closer as if to whisper some advice.

“Henry, I’ll tell you something,” he said quietly. “When a girl like Winter wants to get away, she does it. She’s not gonna stick around at home, waiting for someone to find her. If she doesn’t want to be found, she won’t. Trust me.”

And then he pulled away, relaxing back in his chair and finishing up the last bite of his food before the bell rang and we set off to our next classes.

❄

January 19th, 2013

I waited days for any reply from Winter, and got none.

It was unnerving and unsettling, and was quite honestly just making me sad. Such a huge portion of my day had begun to revolve around her, and I hardly even recognized it. It was like the earth not knowing it revolved around the sun, or the birds not knowing they were looking down on people instead of ants.

But eventually, I got a text, and it gave me an instant spark of reassurance. Something inside me told me it wouldn’t possibly be from her. But when the name “Winter” flashed across my phone screen in bold, black letters, I could hardly believe it. Maybe Tyrone was wrong, after all. Maybe she’d just been sick, or something.

But then, I pulled open the message, reading it over and over again to see if it was real.

Meet me at the diner in ten.

Before I could even think about it, I grabbed my coat and car keys, flying out of the door as quickly as my feet would allow.

❄

I busted into the diner, nearly out of breath from the long run from my parking spot, in the farthest corner of the lot. I didn’t quite care, though, and my eyes scanned immediately for Winter, and finding no trace of her in sight. There were a few people in the diner—an elderly couple, a small family, and a young woman, probably no older than twenty-five.

I decided not to hop to extreme conclusions and instead sat down, taking my seat farthest from anyone. I wasn’t in the mood to strike up a conversation with anyone other than Winter. And maybe she was just running a bit late. I had to keep my head up.

It’d been a few minutes, and a few different waiters had come to take my order when I heard something odd.

“Psst! Hey! You. Glasses boy!”

I looked up immediately, only to see that the young woman with ginger hair I’d seen before was looking directly at me. Having no clue why, I just averted my gaze quickly to avoid confrontation, only to be yelled at again.

“It’s not polite to ignore a lady when she’s talking to you, you know! I could be dying right now!”

I looked back up at her quickly, confused. And though I had absolutely no clue who this woman was, the way she spoke was oddly familiar.

She gestured me over, narrowing her eyes, “Come over here!” She whispered sharply.

I frowned, perplexed. I crossed my arms, finding it not the most convenient thing to hold a conversation over a booth with someone. “Do I know you?” I whispered, wondering if that familiarity I’d experienced was because I actually had met her.

“No,” she said after a pause. Her lips twitched, forming a lopsided smile characteristic of only one other person I knew, “but you know my sister.”