The Summer Snow

“I wish I could see it snow just one more time,” she said. Her skin was pale white in the cloudy sky. Was she becoming a part of it already? I didn’t want her to go.

We were on the roof of a building, standing on the ledge, two lost causes. My heart raced, but she just smiled at me. The white light coming from behind the clouds made everything tinted, highlighted with a milky notion.

“Maybe we’re both portal walkers,” she suggested. “Wouldn’t that be great? We’d just wake up in new bodies at the moment of impact, live anew somewhere strange.”

“Maybe,” I replied looking down toward the street. Nobody could see us yet. “But we’re dying anyway. I don’t know if even that would heal us.”

“At least we’ll be together,” she said as a droplet formed at her left eye and begun a journey down to her pale lips. I didn’t believe her. The moment we hit the sidewalk, we would be alone in the dark, like I was before she showed up. It was about time that hesitation hit me. My feet were getting tired of standing on the patterned edge.

“No, Angel,” I said. “We won’t be.” Not out there in the dark again. I’ve been dead before. My parents didn’t come to my side there. “Come back.” I stepped back off the ledge. “Stay with me as long as you can.” It was selfish, but I had a few more months to her weeks. I could get something done in that time, try to live a life. She jumped back onto the roof with a grimace.

“Spoilsport,” she said. “You’re the one who suggested this, you know.” It was true. I was tired of waiting to die, but she had less time. Maybe my last job was to give what all she wanted. Could I send her off with a smile into the dark? Her joy could light any impossible darkness, and I knew she would be waiting for me there when it was my time.

“I’ve changed my mind,” I said. “What little time we have left we should savor. Is there anything you wanted to do in life?” She turned around with her fingers woven behind her back. There was something on her mind.

“You’ll think it’s stupid,” she said and looked up toward the clouds.

“Tell me,” I replied. I had a few years on her, but was she old enough to want something like that? My mind drifted off to a fantasy where she asked for a kiss, but the reality was far more brutal. Before I knew it, she was crouching and her fist was travelling with some force toward my crotch. It connected with nauseating pain.

“Sorry,” she said. “I doubted you’d agree, so I just went for it. Does it hurt a lot?” I crumpled up on the surface of the roof from the shudders of the pain. At least that satisfied her curiosity while putting my notions in check. She was too young for such thoughts, making her story that much sadder. I was dying, but I’ve at least tasted the feeling of love and every physical representation, even if it was just one person. Before I could tell Angel how much it hurt to get hit between the legs, she had her hands at my collar. Did she want to punch my face too? I squinted in preparation, but only felt warm lips against mine for a short moment.

“What…?” I asked when she let go.

“I don’t see what the big fuss is about,” she said. “It felt nothing like I read about. Fiction books are liars.”

“Why did you kiss me?” I asked. Her hand knocked on my forehead.

“I just said why, dummy,” she said. “I wanted to see what it felt like while I still could. I’m sorry that I used you for both of these. Do you have something like that too, Evin?” I thought back to when a doctor told me how long it would take for me to die. What did I want?

“I’ve always wanted a friend to hang out with,” I said. Angel smiled and helped me to my feet.

“How much did it hurt?”

“A lot,” I replied. “Whoever put that idea in your head, knew their stuff.” She smiled at the sky again. Was that person already gone?

“Yeah, she did.”

“Anything else on that list?” I asked realizing I would be the one she tried it out on.

“Nothing that can be learned in the time I have left,” she said sitting on the patterned edge in her hospital gown.

“You don’t need a lot of time to figure it out,” I said. My plan was the very same. For the longest time before knowing, I wanted to learn to play a saxophone. It never happened, but with this new time limit, I wanted to try it at the very least.

“I meant the physical things,” she said. For a moment she looked older. My imagination took it out of proportion by putting Angel in a sparkling red dress, pushing up breasts that were not even in existence. I grimaced at the thought in my head. It had to be because of the kiss. My mind went insane after those events, mapping the fantasy of perfect outcome. There was nothing waiting for us in the future now.

“Physical things?” I asked. Was she old enough to even think of those?

“Like running a marathon,” she said putting my mind at ease. “All kinds of physical activities that require years of conditioning. I’ve always admired pole vaulting, was even going to sign up for gym before I knew how long I had left.”

“Ever wanted to play music?” I asked hoping our interests coincided at least a bit.

“Oh, yeah,” she said remembering. “Piccolo and trumpet. I doubt I’d be good at the brass though. It’s another one that requires physical training for the lung capacity.”

“You never know until you try,” I said. “I’ve always wanted to play the saxophone. It’s such a cool instrument, but I was too afraid to play it wrong, so I’ve never tried it.” When I looked up, she was no longer sitting on the ledge. My mind panicked and looked beyond the fall. The sidewalk was empty.

“I’m sorry,” she said behind me. “Did I scare you?” My body shook with a tremor. She would die, but I did not want it to be by her hand. She wanted things out of life that chance made impossible. I needed to let her experience some with whatever time I had left.

“Let’s do those things,” I said. “The things you wanted to do. I know you can’t do some, but at least try the ones you can!” She smiled a weak melancholy.

“You sound so eager,” Angel said. “But there are limits we can’t get through. Your family wouldn’t happen to be rich, would it?” I shook my head. Everything cost money. It was so discouraging to hear. I was dying, but my lack of earnings prevented me from living what sliver of life I had left in me.

“What about that charity that helps children experience stuff because they’re dying?” I tried, but that meant only she would be able to do it. Being in late teens, I was no longer a child. Angel shook her head.

“I’m not doing something you can’t do,” she said. Half of me was happy, but I wanted her to try out her inklings of passion before… before.

“You can’t have some stranger limit what you want,” I protested.

“You’re not a stranger, Evin,” she said. “You were my first kiss.”

“Something I hope you keep to yourself,” I said. “I’m serious, Angel.” She smiled a touch brighter than I’d ever seen.

“I will take it to my grave, I promise,” I breathed a sigh of relief and felt horrible at doing so. Why did I care? I’d be dead in a few months anyway.

“Sorry,” I said. “It’s just people often make leaping assumptions about that kind of stuff.” Why did I even care what people thought of me? I did just escape the age of teenage aggression, only to find myself angry at everything once more. Going through that hell was a wasted effort.

“Can I kiss you again?” she asked. “I won’t tell anyone anyway, right?” She came up to me, but I was too tall to steal a kiss when fully aware. The first time around, she brought me to my knees before she could reach my mouth.

“I can’t,” I said and turned away. “Why? Did you like it already?” I glanced to find her laying down on the floor of the roof taking rapid short breaths. Panic burst my body to her side. Was it because we were out in the wind? Did the outdoors make her conditions worse? I had no idea what she was dying of.

With a hand under her neck, I listened for the cause, but I was no doctor. This was beyond my knowledge. When her hand clutched the collar of my shirt, I was too panicked to realize it was a trap. She prepared to get me closer. When I realized, it was already over. I grimaced in anger.

“I knew it,” she said pushing off the ground. “It was too dry the first time. Don’t sulk, Evin. You helped a dying girl with one of her final wishes.”

“You can’t do that, Angel,” I countered. “Fake dying is not fair. The pleasant feeling comes from being connected to the person you’re kissing. Anything else is just- just-”

“I do like you,” she said. “But I won’t be here for long enough to grow up into someone your age, so I had to make do. I hope you’re not mad at me for using you as my emotional pincushion.” I stared at her with amazement.

“You act as if you’re older than me,” I said. “That would be a terrible defense in court. You’re too smart for your age, Angel.”

“Or it could be that you’re just a little stupid for yours?” she countered.

“And with that, I’ll be off,” I said. My original plan was just to stop by her room before being released. I was dying, but did not want to spend my last few months in a hospital bed. My aunt was there to pick me up and drive my around. She was my recently deceased father’s sister, still grieving like me. I never even considered how she’d feel if I jumped off the roof with Angel.

“Wait,” Angel said at the roof entrance. “I have something for you. Just, stay here a moment, I have it in my room.”

“Why don’t we just go the…” I started, but she was already gone. I sat on the patterned ledge and traced a finger in the groves of the design. Why did they make it patterned in the first place? Did it help the bird’s-eye-view esthetics of the hospital roof? The fall from six stories was unlikely to cause enough damage to die on impact, at least for a healthy human. It being a hospital also factored in to how quickly care would be administered. The plan was half-baked and stupid. Maybe Angel was right about being a bit simple for my age, but my injuries were at fault there.

By not jumping, we avoided additional unnecessary pain and hospitalization. Well, I did. Why did I suggest it anyway? Oh, right. Angel was crying that she’d be dead before I ever came to visit her, and that she’d rather die in that moment. It was hell of a time for her to fall in love for the first time, but I was glad she got to experience it.

Angel came back out of breath, and I worried that she was making her condition worse. I helped her to sit on the ledge of the roof and found a plush toy in her other hand. It was a little hand-made toy bear with red bowties on each ear. When she held it in my direction, I felt conflicted.

“Here, take my favorite toy,” she said. “His name’s Havoc. I’ve had him since I was a baby. He means the world to me.”

“I- I can’t take that,” I said trying to push her hand away. With a grimace, she dangled the bear in the air just beyond the ledge.

“You take my Teddy Havoc or the sidewalk gets it,” she said, but I saw a pain in her eyes at threatening a toy she loved so much. I sighed and held out my hand.

“Please take good care of him, ok?” she asked kissing the bear one more time before handing him over. “And maybe bring him here to visit me again if you have time.”

“I will,” I promised not knowing if I was lying at the time. “Don’t you go dying just yet, ok?” She nodded and looked up into the cloudy summer sky. Her eyes watered.

“I wish I could have seen it snow one more time,” she said. “Never knew I’d miss it so much when I could no longersee that beautiful magic of nature.” Watching her gaze up into the sky like that I wished there was something I could do. I squeezed Teddy Havoc in my hand at my weakness. We held hands while sitting on that patterned ledge until I had to leave. I left promising Angel I’d come back soon, this time fully aware that I was lying. I had to do something with the precious months I had left, something to make the world better.




A call came in a few weeks later for me from the hospital. Becoming friends with nurses was a bad idea. They saw through my mental defensed built up during puberty. In all that time, I hadn’t visited Angel once. I was afraid to go back for fear of being hospitalized again. Those hospital beds consumed months of my hourglass-timed life. I wanted to see Angel, but this fact did not conquer my aversion. This call did the impossible.

I rushed to the hospital as fast as I could, or when my aunt was able to take me there. She was my nanny for the short time I had left. She cried a lot on some days, whether it was for me or for my father’s death. I could only hope she wouldn’t be alone after I died. I imagined she was the type of person who was self-destructive in the face of sadness. The head-nurse was calling me on behalf of the collective of all nurses at that one hospital who tended to Angel, a child that would never grow up. Her condition was declining, so I brought Havoc with me on the way over. At the entrance, my feet stopped moving, frozen with fear.

“I lied to her, Megan,” I said clutching the small plush bear. “I promised to visit her, but I couldn’t face this place. What am I doing here?” She didn’t respond, only smiled and pushed a hand at my back until we were inside. The receptionist girl was a friend I made while hospitalized. When we first met, I told her I was dying, and that I’ve always wanted to see a girl naked in person. It was a beautiful lie and she felt happy to make that wish of mine come true. She was not very quick on the uptake.

“Evin!” Rita called out at first glance. Everything just stopped as her chest enclosed my head. Her heart beat warm and fast in my ears. “I’m so glad you’re here!” Would she let me go further? I reached to squeeze a butt cheek, but she pulled away. That sort of boyish craving never went away. With a distancing thought, I wondered how Angel would look now. Was she a husk of her previous self?

“How is she?” I asked.

“Angel?” Rita replied. “As expected. All we can do now is make her comfortable. It won’t be long now. Where were you?” I was confused at the question.

“Sorry?”

“She was asking for you, Evin,” Rita said walking back to reception. I had to look as her hips moved on the way. It was too magnetic. In a month or so I would no longer be so interested, but for now my mind was still thinking of procreation. What puberty developed into a man, the disease would now destroy.

Walking the halls to her room felt different after time away. Early on, Angel was filled with life unlived. She had no need to pace herself. Where I wanted to preserve energy to survive longer, she wanted to be an ember, go out with an explosion of a firework. Would she be that now, the wreck of an exploded firecracker? I stopped into her room bear-first, hoping she would notice Teddy Havoc first and be at ease when seeing my face. With no reaction, I feared the worst and hesitated, but Megan pushed at my back again.

“Angel?” I questioned the room as my eyes scanned it. There she was, sitting up on her bed, looking out the window.

“Is it winter yet?” she asked with a sad voice. Her head turned to me with a smile, but her eyes were shedding tears. There was no way she would survive the summer.

Over the weeks I couldn’t visit her, I got a job and set up so many credit card accounts to use before I die. It was my final middle finger before vanishing into the known dark, but I spent the money on myself, learned a bit of saxophone, and even paid for sex once when the “I’m dying” line stopped working on beautiful drunk girls. In all that fun, I’d almost forgotten about Angel until that time I first attempted to visit. The sight of the hospital brought me to my knees, gasping for air. What use was money if it had no purpose?

“Angel,” I said while stepping closer to meet her eyes. “I have a present for you.” I held out Teddy Havoc to her, but she did not reach for the plush toy.

“Evin,” she said. “I’ll never see the snow fall ever again.” She plucked Havoc from my hand and hugged it against her neck.

“I’m sorry that I can’t give you what you most wish for,” I said. “But I did come across this piccolo. It would be a waste if you never have it a try.” Her eyes lit up with the spark from before. I sat with her as she tried to play the small instrument. By the end of an hour, she went into a violent coughing fit that required me to call for a nurse. When all was calm again, I sat by her side with a smile.

“Thank you, Evin,” she said with Teddy Havoc in her hands. “I’m so glad you came to visit. How are you holding up?” There were a few things I could no longer do. Where my damage from the crash consumed my brain, Angel’s whole body was being apart from inside by a disease. It was deceptive to see her smile in this state as she had to be in a great deal of pain.

“Comes and goes,” I replied. “Headaches mostly, but I sometimes forget how to do simple things. That’s why I was reluctant to visit. It would be a bother if I lost control of my bowels in front of you. Eventually, my brain will just forget how to breathe.”

“You could never be a bother, Evin,” she said and patted the bed beside her. I lay down beside her and put a hand on hers. We were alone again, just like on the roof.

“One last kiss for a dying child?” she leaned closer as best she could, but the pain shook her back to the reclined position. She no longer had the energy to trick me and take things she wanted.

“I have one more gift for you, Angel,” I said. “Just- Wait here a moment.”

“Evin, what…?” she asked before I left the room. How could I let her go in this manner? She was a snow princess in my eyes. The only way she could leave this world had to be with a proper send-off.

Back when I tried to visit her, an idea ignited my mind. She wanted to see the snow fall again, and I made it priority to make this dream into reality. Together with a foundation for granting wishes, we would make it snow in the summer. I funneled all money left in my accounts into this project. That was then. Now everything was ready, I only needed to signal them to turn on the crazy amount of snow-making machines and cold air blasters. It was all I could do for her.

“Come on, get up,” I said walking back into her room. She was still and her eyes were closed. For a second my heart jumped out of my body and stopped. Did I not make it in time? Did she go? My brain froze me in place from shock until she smiled.

“Got you,” she said. “It’s great to see I can still fool you, Evin, but as for walking, I’m afraid that’s out of the question. I haven’t felt anything below my waist in a few days.”

“We need to get to the roof, Angel,” I said and rushed to unplug her machines. She would protest, but I could not let her die in a bed. “Come on, I’ll carry you.” With her on my back, we ascended the stairs and made it onto the roof before it started. I could still see the afternoon sun at the horizon, slipping beyond the curve of the world.

“I always did want to fly,” she said. It was getting colder in the summer night, but that was due to the snow setup I hoped would work. Making it snow in the summer was no easy feat, but it only had to happen over the hospital. If they could make snow in the mountains for the ski slopes, they could find a way to make it fall over one building.

“I brought you here, Princess,” I said putting myself in character. “For you have the breath to freeze this night. Breathe into the air so the chill may descend.” She laughed out.

“You’re silly, Evin,” she said. “The inside of my body is burning up, not cooling down. Not yet at least.” I grimaced at her.

“Just breathe a lungful and believe in me, won’t you?” I asked. After a pause, she closed her eyes and took a gulp of air. Right as she output her lungs, the flakes began to fall. “Now open your eyes and see the magic you created.”

As her eyes opened, the few snowflakes multiplied the wonder within them. They watered without sound as she reached out a hand to catch a snowflake on the fingernail of her pinky. When she looked to me, her eyes were full of tears, but she couldn’t move to thank me or do anything besides crying. I lifted her in my arms to walk among the falling snow in the fading light of day. The story would be in all the media tomorrow, but I had a feeling Angel would not be there for it. This was our final dance.

“Evin…” she started while looking around at the flurry of snow surrounding us. “This is… this-”

“This is a proper send-off for the snow princess that you are and will forever be,” I said. “I hope you never forget this moment, even if you leave this place before me. You deserve this, Angel.” With that, I was content enough to close my eyes. The next thing I knew, I was on my back, having slipped on the slosh the snow became. Angel was there, laughing, but something was fading from my sight. I refocused to find her kissing my lips, but did not resist. It was the final sensation I felt before my sight faded.

The disease of my brain made my head a fragile mess, and that one fall started a chain reaction that would kill me in minutes. Angel looked from above, her hands burning up like an oven in the snow shower. They were like red irons, caressing my face in the snow. I was dying and she had no idea. How long would it be before she noticed? Her head rested on my chest with the heat of a casting crucible.

“Come on, Evin,” she said pulling us through into another environment. By the next one, I knew I was no longer in my right mind. She danced on the roof in her hospital gown, without a care, as the snow fell around her. She motioned a hand to me, but the scene faded. Normality was distorted, but I felt bad that I left her on that roof without a way to return. Now I was subjected to my wild imagination.

In that darkness, I saw a spot of light. The closer it got, the more defined the figure became. It was a star child, a Zaxient, a creature of wonder, and it had Angel’s face.

#Of course it would,# I thought, but I could not move.

“I found you, Evin,” she said. I reached out a hand, but the arm was an oddity, with fingers in strange positions, flexing at random intervals. Fear burst within me, but she put a hand to my cheek. “Don’t worry about what you are, Evin. I will love you even as a Garavand.” The scene faded to the two of us, supposedly human, standing on that roof.

“I- I died here,” I said and looked at her for a response.

“The human you did, yes,” she said looking over the last rays of the sun. “This was the place where you gave me the best gift, and the worst burden in the world. You left me to die second, alone, but here we are now. In this place, anything is possible. Watch this.” I looked at her as the child of eleven grew into a woman of twenty or so before my very eyes. “We can be the same age here. Time has no place in the Infinity Void.”

“Infinity Void?” I asked suddenly aware of the pain in the back of my neck. It felt as if someone was rolling an orb, a sticky orb.

“It’s where we all go in the end,” she said. “All the tales and stories gather here and exist as gems of a world that once was, ready to be found by some person who will tell others of this, or will try to.” I was confused.

“What about our lives?” I asked. “Was it fair that we had to die so young?”

“There is no fair and unfair, Evin,” she said turning back into a child. “Only the ideas remain here, survive here, and this place welcomes all, from Tisyros to the darkest of Wordsmiths, and even darker tales still.”

“What about Heaven and Hell?” I asked.

“You want to go?” she asked. “Those two topics have been defined in so many iterations that you can now choose from among them. In the end, every faith is just another story, all welcome in the Infinity Void. It’s more fun to be where you can be comfortable, Evin, but it’s up to you. This is your mind, a mind that is a story and can witness the stories of others. That is what exists in you after you die.” I felt my imagination bubble with the possibilities.

“What should we visit first?” I asked. Angel waved a hand in a circle to produce a circular pad of light like a screen of a touchpad. In a few moments of tapping, she grew beautiful white wings to look just like an angel.

“Be who you want to be,” she said. “Not the husk of something that once was.” I looked over my chubby arms and broke past them to no material body. It was time.