Snowflakes

By Marcus I. N. D. and SilvrWingsDragon

There are just some things that are always the same, and at the same time always different.

Like the chatter that permeates throughout a room whenever more than a few people enter. The noiseless buzz that somehow boils down to many individual, coherent conversations, all blended into a single warm noise. It's the same noise every time, steady in it's rhythmic resonance, but deep down, it's never the same people, never the same two words. Different, just like the glassy snowflakes, each perfectly unique and perfectly identical in it's very essence.

That was what I thought about at the birthday party, listening to that voluminous hum wrapped around me like a warm blanket, so many fibers of tales being told and gossip being passed around.

“It's been a great year for apples, I haven't had better in as long as I can remember,”

“Did you hear about old Miss Stenson? I hear she's doing better.”

“No really, a bunch of really funny people there, and something about their eyes.”

“Her seventeenth? How she grows up so fast!”

“I just love what you've done with your hair, Maurice. It's wonderful.”

Until finally one of the strings caught me and brought me back.

“Happy Birthday Chelsea!”

My eyes opened and were met with the sight of my best friend Theresa and I couldn't help but smile back at her broadly grinning face.

There was something about Theresa. She was a mirror image of everything I liked about myself, everything I wanted to be. We had become very close in our friendship. Closer than sisters, because there are things that differ between sisters and they always fight. But we we never fought. We were like twins.

Almost as one, our two pairs of eyes looked around the room, seeing all the guests, and without even having to say, we left together, finding ourselves smiling at each other in the cool crisp, air as if we were still inside sitting next to each other. Watching soft, fluffy crystals of snow drift lazily around us.

We started walking down the street, hardly watching where we were going as we started to spin our own thread of small talk. The same as every other chat we'd ever had. The same giggles, the same jokes about who was cute because they didn't try and who weren't, no matter how hard they tried.

Just the same as all the others, with the warm familiarity of our friendship and the fresh uniqueness that each new day brought with this and everything else.

“So my dad finished the boat, just in time to give it a try before the lake freezes over.”

“Does it work?” I asked with a smile.

“Of course it does, it was my dad who built it.”

This made me laugh. Partly because I knew it was true, partly because I felt the same way about my own father. He could build or fix anything he wanted, just as Theresa's could. I thought about this for the moment, about how our mothers were the same too. The warm, loving kind that could mend and heal what our fathers couldn't repair. How similar we were, how natural it was that we should be friends. We were just a little pair of snowflakes.

It's hard to explain, but there was this notion I'd always had whenever I watched snow fall. I somehow always thought that the snowflakes fell in pairs together. Every gentle fluffy snowfall would be grouped into two snowflakes, best friends among the falling crystals. Each crystal having one that stayed at it's side, and they would be best friends.

Whenever I thought about snow I thought about this, and felt warm thinking of memories watching the snow fall in my warm house next to the fireplace, talking and drinking of hot cocoa with my best friend, making a conversation just like every other, but completely different, just like the snowflakes we watched.

I always liked snow. It meant so much to me. It was the perfect uniqueness deep down for everything, no matter how much the same it seemed. It was the entrancing cascade of crystals that me and my best friend always watched together. It was why winter was my favorite time of year, the warm white blanket that covered everything so perfectly. I was happy to have my birthday that time of year, it made it feel that much closer to me. Almost as close as my best friend Theresa.

I thought about this, almost feeling the warmth of the fireplace as me and Theresa chatted, and being completely entranced by our conversation, and I didn't see that patch of ice on the ground.

I didn't have time to fall, though, for as if she knew before it was happening, she caught my shoulder and held me up.

We laughed together, amazed at our link, and then we both together realized that neither of us had been paying attention to where we were going, and we surveyed the scene, almost two pairs of eyes that surveyed the scene together as one.

There, standing in front of us, was the old Land Sellers building. In the paper I remembered having read about a convention there that day. A gathering of some sort. We looked at each other and had with just the curious smiles on our faces already agreed to go in and see.

We walked together to the door, passing an older man. I can still remember his eyes as he glared at us as we walked past. There was something about those eyes I'll never forget, but I couldn't put my finger on it then. They said so many things, but the only thing I picked up on at the time was that the door he was guarding was to a place that we shouldn't enter, but we walked towards the door anyway. Surely, he was just another grumpy old man, why should he matter?

“Is there a problem?” I asked him, seeing his ill disposition.

His gaze fixed on me idly. “How old are you, little girl?”

“Just turned seventeen today, is that old enough to get in?”

“It's not about age,” he replied, a hint of pain in his voice.

“Then what is?” I asked.

He didn't answer, just stood there, frozen to the spot for a few moments.

“Well?” I prodded.

Without a word, he opened the door to us, and we disappeared into it, finding ourselves in what at first appeared to be empty space dotted with brightly shining stars, but as my eyes adjusted, I saw we were in a showroom, pitch black except for small illuminated patches every which way, islands in a sea of inky blackness that stretched outward as far as the eye could see.

Together me and Theresa crept to the nearest island of light and saw it to be a pedestal, the top covered with black velvet holding the most amazing sapphire I had ever seen, attached almost seamlessly to a fine silver chain.

My jaw dropped in amazement. “It's...”

“Beautiful...” Theresa finished, her eyes glowing same as mine.

I reached out, as if my hands were being pulled by magnets towards the shimmering blue stone, so fine it was as if it were glass.

Behind me someone made a coughing noise and I spun around, startled, and looked into the eyes of another older man, dressed in a night black robe. There was something odd about that robe. It was a robe in every sense of the word, the way it fell around his form and billowed just over the ground, but for some reason it had several large, blocky pockets patched into the front, as if it was trying to be a trench coat, something businesslike that people wouldn't look twice at. It obviously missed, or as I would later realize, fulfilled it's duty, for I could not stop staring at it.

“I... I'm sorry, I...” I stammered, and felt a tug at my arm, and instinctively let Theresa pull me away.

“Did you see?” she whispered as we retreated deeper into the darkness. “His eyes....”

I turned my head around and saw quickly two white dots in the darkness next to where we had just been. They focused on the sapphire we had been gazing at, then I felt rather than saw them turn onto me, sending a shiver deep into my spine.

And as if it had never happened, they turned away and danced off through the air as the owner walked away. Like two snowflakes drifting elsewhere.

I gripped Theresa's wrist tightly, as if for a second I was holding on for dear life. I took a deep breath and relaxed, hoping that I hadn't hurt her wrist in my tense fear. She didn't seem to have noticed.

“Look, we're...”

My head turned again, this time taking in the room once more. It was still the great, voluminous darkness, like being lost in space, except for the islands of light, illuminating countless pedestals, each glinting with a treasure resting on top.

Entranced, we drifted over toward the nearest one, and found on top to be a gold filigree ring, set with a perfectly round jade etched with delicate calligraphy that was filled, perfectly level with a bright gold. I couldn't read the tiny words that had been scrawled into the face, but I couldn't take my eyes from them either.

Like the Sun,

Scorching the blood in my

Vampire Heart

There was something about that piece held before me. It was of such intricate beauty, but there was something pained about it. In the same way that a pearl is a most beautiful sphere, but was something that was thrown into the life of an unknowing animal and killing it from the inside.

I almost felt guilty for admiring its beauty.

“Let's look at this one,” she whispered excitedly and we drifted across the floor to a stand cradling a bracelet of a fine, heart shaped gold chain with flawless amethysts perfectly placed in heart shaped stones on every link.

“It's so...” I gasped, amazed by it's infinite beauty. I looked around, unable to believe that there could be so many other pillars, each with their own jewel of intricate beauty.

But what I saw this time was different. The little islands of white in the darkness were all still there, shimmering invitingly, but now there were hundreds of pairs of eyes, glittering darkly just like the other man's, all moving around, and all fixed on us.

Like so many pairs of snowflakes swirling around us. But different from any other kind of snowflakes. In many ways they were just like snow, but somehow I couldn't relate them to anything good about snowflakes. Not the warm times next to the fireplace talking small talk. These were definitely cold. Not the thought of perfect uniqueness that each crystal had, for these were all the same. And they were all fixed on me.

I shivered involuntarily and me and Theresa crept to the next island of light, looking closely at the great emerald pendant it held. A huge, perfectly faceted gem, the center face perfectly level and taking up most of it's size. I peered into it and with a hint of delight saw my own smiling face next to Theresa's in that precious stone.

We stood there, entranced, hovering over the gem for a second, looking at each other's reflections in its perfectly cut face.

Until I felt a hand on my shoulder and a soft gasp told me that Theresa felt one at hers as well.

We spun around, almost as one, to see a man, very similar looking to the other man we had seen, bearing down on us.

I thought for a second I would have seen his reflection in the gem. Maybe the light bouncing off his glimmering, sinister eyes.

Then he grinned, showing long, glistening fangs, and it hit me.

“Hello there little girl.”

“You're all vampires!” I shrieked, and stepped back quickly, trying to distance myself from him, but his hand held tightly to my shoulder.

He leaned in close, grinning wickedly. I could feel his icy breath on my neck.

“Yes we are. Now tell me, what's a precious life like your own doing here?”

I pushed him away, but he didn't budge and his grip kept tight on my shoulder.

“There's nothing precious here,” he said darkly, giving a pained glance at the pendant. “So why are you here?”

“What do you want from us?” I cried, my heart racing. I could feel it's every throb push deep in every vein in my body, shaking me with every pulse.

“It hurts so much,” he said conversationally, as if he hadn't heard me at all. “Knowing that we must be in secret. That everything we hold dear will all end. That nothing we ever do will be good enough. You see, they hate us for what we are.”

His icy eyes fixed on me, and I could feel any warmth left in me vanish.

“You see, my darling, we have crafted these elegant works of art, but who can we ever show them to? If anyone were to find out about us being vampires, then we would be hunted. They would not see these works of art, they would only see these eyes, these fangs.”

I cringed and pushed away at him, somehow breaking his stone grip and stepping away from him. “Our families know where we are!” I lied quickly. “If you kill us they'll know you did it, and they'll find out!”

Theresa sobbed softly and I looked, seeing that though I had escaped the vampire's grasp, she was still held in his embrace.

“Let her go!”

Another icy cold voice, like a frigid gale. Matching the voice of the vampire in front of me, but coming from a different one. “They know who we are! We can't let the witnesses escape!”

The man shook his head. “I'm sorry, my darling, but what other choice do we have. If you go you will tell someone.”

“No!” I cried. “I promise, I'll never tell anyone!”

He stepped towards me, as if he hadn't heard my groveling and I cowered beneath him, my eyes darting around the room for something, anything to save me.

To save Theresa. I couldn't let the only person I had in the world go. Not her. Not my sister.

“There are enough of you to watch us and make sure,” I whispered. “Please, if I promise not to tell and you can watch us and make sure that we keep to our word... could we please....”

The man retreated slightly, looking over me critically. I could feel his eyes like cold hands gripping tightly at my neck.

“Well... now that you mention it... but...”

His eyes fell off me and onto Theresa, looking almost sympathetically towards her tear streaked, beet red face.

“You are right, if we were to kill you, they would look for you, and in so doing find us. Dead men tell no tails, but dead girls...”

He paused, his voice lingering in the air. “We will agree to this, even though it is such a task for us, since we have no other choice but to agree if we wish to remain unknown. But be warned. We will have to watch you everywhere you go, just to ensure you do not speak. You will feel your eyes follow you as you walk down the street. At work and at play. And I'm afraid there will even be one of us standing over your deathbed.”

The word death buzzed harshly in my ears for some time after he said it, as he paused.

“Would you live with that?”

I choked back a sob and nodded slowly. “What choice do I have?”

I'd never forget that fateful day. I remember that was the day that the way I had always thought of snow had changed dramatically.

I still thought that snowflakes fell to the ground gracefully in pairs, covering the landscape in a soft white blanket. I always felt warm on the inside, thinking of that blanket as a blanket, and remembering warm days by the fireplace, sipping hot cocoa and watching the flakes drift by the window as me and my own twin snowflake Theresa talked about life, boys, and makeup. The same conversations, but each different at the finest detail, like the snowflakes we would watch, so safe and warm.

Then.

I can't feel that way anymore though. Not about snowflakes. Not about anything.

I think of them and I feel cold. So cold.

Because I see them every day.

Two snowflakes drifting along as I go about my days.

And I know they're not the delicate crystals of ice that I once loved to watch fall and coat the Earth in that soft white blanket.

They're eyes.

It's the kind of snowflakes you watch swirl around you in a blizzard in the night.

Glinting as they swirl around me in pairs, dancing maliciously in the darkness as the cold closes in around me.

“Welcome to the Sellers publishing company, little girl.”

I cringed at the way he said little girl. “Yes, you've received what I'd like to have published?”

He looked at me across his desk, smiling from behind his charcoal sunglasses. Even though we were indoors. “Indeed we have. A very interesting story.”

I nodded slowly, shivering slightly in my seat.

“And you've included your will for some reason?”

“Yes. Everything to my best friend Theresa.”

He chuckled a little bit and I couldn't help but shiver again. “You seem to think it will all end soon? A precious life like your own wouldn't end oneself, would it?”

“I'm afraid it already has,” I choked, looking at the papers in his hands, filling the room with a stiff air of finality, freezing me on the inside.

“Well, let's see, just have to check some things, the date,” he said conversationally. “Ah, it's your birthday. Happy eighteenth, Chelsea.”

“Can we just publish this? And get it over with?” I asked tensely.

He laughed shortly, searching into the oddly square pocket of his jacket and getting a small key, getting up and heading towards the side of the room, inserting the key slowly into a little safe.

“It's snowing,” he noted, motioning towards the window as the door to the safe opened.

“Isn't it always?” I choked, my eyes overflowing with hot tears. “Isn't it always?”

“Oh darling, don't cry,” he said, as if trying to be soothing, but it just made me feel colder. I looked, seeing his face hidden behind the safe door, his sunglasses held in the hand that was keeping the door open.

“What are you doing?” I asked, trying to keep my eyes away from the window.”

“Here at Sellers,” he said, digging around in the safe. “We like to give everyone who publishes with us a special gift. A token of our appreciation.”

“No, It's fine, just publish this, I don't care for,”

I froze as he stepped away from the safe.

In his hand, a large, emerald pendant.

And his eyes. Oh, God, his eyes.

“No!” I shrieked. “NO!”

I don't remember much of what happened next.

I finally came to my senses sitting outside that room, huddled and shivering against the wall, Theresa sitting right next to me.

I remember she came in.

And the wooden chair leg broke.

There were splinters everywhere.

And there was blood. A gray, lifeless blood.

I remember something about a document processor that said it would send my document to be published.

And then I was there.

And it was over.

“Theresa,” I choked. “I'm so sorry.”

She shivered slightly, staring blankly through the wall. “For what?”

“For... trying to...”

A sob surged through my chest and I couldn't keep it back, and felt hot tears pour down my face.

“I just wanted it to end!” I whimpered. “But only for me, I wanted everything to be alright for you.”

She nodded, still staring fixedly through glassy, swollen eyes.

“How did you...?”

She looked at me slowly for a second, then with a weak smile held up a few pieces of wrinkled paper, a neat print across each sheet. Just like the ones I had taken to the man.

I couldn't help but laugh, thinking how amazing it was that we could be so close, so identical. Like the two snowflakes, falling together, supposedly perfectly unique, like everything else, but still just snowflakes, all the same.

I thought about this remembered the many times we had sat next to the fireplace together, talking about boys and makeup, chatting about how things had been going. How we hadn't ever shared that since that day, and how much I had missed it.

She laughed softly, still shaking, as was I, but more calm than we were before.

I could tell that she was thinking the exact same thing.

She smiled and looked down the long hallway, towards the window.

“It's snowing,” she said.

For the first time in a year, that made me feel warm again.