It is the first snowfall of the season. ‘Mama, look! It’s snowing!’ he says at the breakfast table, tugging the side of his mother’s red and green sweater. His mother gently nods her head with appreciation yet devoid of excitement. ‘Is it alright if I play outside today? Please Mama, I wanna play outside.’ His eyes are his rhetoric. Another nod from his mother. 

 

He hurriedly gets up from his seat and puts on the appropriate winter-attire: a scruffy scarf around the neck, a knitted hat with a white pom-pom attached to the tip, and brown boots that were waiting to be worn for the past year. With the blink of an eye, he is out the door, hasting toward the snow. Meanwhile, she comes down the stairs, looking tired as ever, with her pajamas still on. Her mother gestures out the window. ‘Cute,’ she says, simply acknowledging her younger brother. She takes a bite of the waffles at the table and sips her black coffee. 

 

‘After breakfast, can you please go out and look after him? I have some work to do.’ her mother politely asks with a faint hint of chagrin. ‘Sure.’ she utters, a single-word answer. 

 

With reluctance, she puts on a coat and leaves the house. She sees him making a ball: a large one. Sitting down, she decides to watch him for a while. He makes the first ball, the largest, and slowly makes his way to the top. Now there were three balls, one on top of the other. Oh, she thinks to herself, it’s a snowman. He rushes inside and brings out what appears to be the components of the snowman’s face. After the making of the frosty creature is complete, she takes out her phone to let time pass. 

 

It does. It’s about night time now. She goes inside, making sure the fruitful lights are on in the backyard. Upon her entry, her mother stops her. ‘Did you have fun?’ A blank stare, ‘Yeah.’ She pauses for a moment, ‘Though I have to say, he is acting a bit odd.’ 

 

Her mother’s expression changes. ‘How so?’ 

 

‘He’s been talking to the snowman he made. He laughs, smiles, sings… He is as happy as one can be, I guess.’ Suddenly, she feels ashamed for calling her brother odd. ‘Nevermind, he seems to be having fun anyway.’ she says, dropping on the couch. 

 

‘That hat,’ her mother says inquisitively, ‘Where’d he find it?’ To that, she shrugs her shoulders. Squinting her eyes at the window, she looks at the hat. Familiar but unidentifiable, she thinks. Her mother joins her on the couch; they are both watching him. He points upward, at the twinkling bulbs in the otherwise austere nightsky. A laugh, so pleasantly emphatic it may as well have been coming from inside the house, exudes from his lips like a long-forgotten melody. It is contagious: she and her mother start laughing uncontrollably. A fit of laughter…evolves into a flutter of tears. And flutters of snowflakes start falling once more. A picturesque moment of pure joy and misery. 

 

He hugs the snowman with endearment. 

 

‘Doesn’t he know?’ she asks, her eyes glossed with despair. 

‘He does.’ her mother answers without hesitation. 

‘Why is he doing it then?’ 

‘Sometimes,’ her mother says. ‘Sometimes grief can only be suppressed when the love we nurtured in our hearts is imitated by the deceitful wink of familiarity.’

 

She gets up, gives a dull yet sentimental smile to her mother and closes the curtains. ‘The cold won’t last very long.’ she says and walks back to her room.

 

The next morning, the illuminating sun is paving its way through the neighborhood, radiating warmth that can only be described as a kind embrace. Outside, two olives and a carrot are lying on a wistful puddle, resembling that of the tears of a child; inside, there is a new art piece: a stack of cotton balls in ascending order, with the one on top adorned by a rather large hat, proudly presenting the sloppy ink stains of black and orange; there are two miniscule twigs glued at either side with a note in one that reads:

“Love you kiddo, Dad”

 

And there she is, an older sister, laying next to the art piece, asleep, with a subtle smile on her face and fingertips of black and orange. 

 

She had made an immortal snowman.