Baby It's Cold Outside ✔️

Don't Freeze

Kaylee couldn't remember the last time she had made snow-angels.

Ever since Ruby went missing, Kaylee's stepmother had forbidden Kaylee to set foot out of the house. That had been five years ago, as they awaited her sister's return, hearts breaking a little more whenever the bed adjacent Kaylee's remained untouched.

When would Ruby return?

Kaylee continued to glare at the falling snow, as if it were their faults Ruby was gone while she was trapped inside, but the snow paid no heed to the anger boiling in the 17 year old. Instead, they continued to dance in the air and plaster themselves on the windows, until all Kaylee could see was white.

Sometimes she wished she were snow; she'd waltz through the chilly air, dissipating when spring arrived, and do it all over again. If she were snow, no house could lock her in.

Kaylee slid off the windowsill and walked toward her bookshelf. Her hands glided past the fragile spines, before it stopped on a noticeably thicker one. With a steady grip, Kaylee pulled out the Grimm's Fairy Tales Collection and opened it to the page she had caressed more than a thousand times. She started to read

Once upon a time, a queen sits sewing at an open window during a winter snowfall when she pricks her finger with her needle, causing three drops of red blood to drip onto the freshly fallen white snow on the black windowsill.

Then, she says to herself, "How I wish that I had a daughter that had skin as white as snow, lips as red as blood, and hair as black as ebony."

Some time later, the queen gives birth to a baby daughter whom she names Snow White, but the queen dies in childbirth a short while later.

She loved reading fairytales. When Ruby disappeared, she'd immerse herself in the world full of princesses, castles, and knights who kissed you awake, while stepmother raged and yelled at the world full of despair, heartbreak, and the daughter who ran away.

Sometimes she'd also yell at the daughter who didn't.

Kaylee would find solace in the pages filled with true love's kissed and happy endings to mask the pain of her stepmother's slaps.

When would Ruby return?

Kaylee was about to turn the page, when her stepmother came stomping into the room. The temperature immediately dropped to a chill, and it wasn't because of the cold weather.

"Dumb girl! Why are you reading those stupid stories, when you can be doing something useful like me around here! You're as useless as your sister, and she's not even here!" her stepmom yelled before wrenching the book from her grasp and boxing Kaylee's ears.

This had happened one too many times that Kaylee just sat there, absorbing all the hatred like a sponge helplessly submerged in a barrel of acid.

Sometimes she only got slapped once in a week, but other times she would be flung around like a ragdoll and it would take all her might not to burst at the seams of her sanity.

She didn't remember exactly when her stepmom started using her as a punching bag, but she did remember the fatal consequences she would face if she tried to avoid them.

A year back, her stepmom had had a bad day. Walking into the house, she hurled a can of soup straight at Kaylee and it would have dislocated her jaw if Kaylee hadn't ducked.

The can of soup spiralled into the wall behind her, leaving a splattering mess of liquid, and Kaylee almost wished she hadn't ducked. Her stepmom started screaming about how Kaylee was ungrateful and spoiled, and all Kaylee wanted to do was run away, run anywhere as long as it was away from the monster her stepmom had morphed into.