“This should help,” The smiling man behind the counter said as he set the medication down in front of the young blonde on the other side.

The young lady tried to smile, but her face was numb— so much so that it was hard to even open her mouth to speak. Frost crept from her purple lips and crackled as she tried to pry her jaw open enough to say something. “Thank you.” It was said in little more than a breath. She took the bottle in her puffy reddened fingers and stowed it away in her pocket.

The bell above the door gave a weak jingle as she left the pharmacy and began her treacherous trudge home. Snow engulfed the town, but filthy muddled walkways carved up the streets, leaving heaps of gravel and snow to tower either side of them. Sheer winds and blizzards had bleached the once colourful storefronts a hideously dingy grey. The moisture that breathed within the walls and roofs slowly ate away at them and caused the buildings to sag— they were ever tired of their endless fight against the elements. The trees that lurked overhead were barren and rotted black, only held in place by the frozen soil’s suffocating embrace and the densely packed snow at their bases. It wasn't fresh, fluffy snow. No. It was solid, the top layer cracked away in chunks. Below the surface it was sticky, it clung to clothes and shoes in little balls should anyone try to traverse it.

It had not always been that way. Once this town was lush and green. But those days were long gone. The woman knew she must have had memories from back then, with someone special. She was sure if she dwelled enough on it she could dig them up, but the ground was essentially a layer of permafrost now. It wasn't worth the effort to dig up anything. All that mattered was the all encompassing cold that took hold of her heart in adolescence and spread from there. The very curse that bestowed this everlasting winter upon her.

At first, the curse was small. Some days her breath could create a frosty mosaic upon her window if she pressed her face too close. Sometimes she’d require an extra fuzzy blanket during the night. However, as she aged the tendrils of this tragic cold would follow her more and affect her daily life. It would kill the grass where she stood, it would chill every meal she tried to eat, it made it so she could not touch anyone without the prickles of winter piercing them. Most would dismiss her. Most blamed her and scolded her for this cold heart she was cursed with. Most would avoid her. Most, but not all. Her best friend was always by her side. Though she could not be sure if this cold heart was contagious, she grew to assume it was. Troublingly, he was never as bitingly cold as she was so she did not see his infection until it was too late. As bitter as it was, this memory was not one she had to dig for.

A note addressed to her in the mailbox. A heartfelt goodbye. That was when the snow began to drift down from the blue skies above. She had dropped the letter and ran barefoot to the lake they both loved so much. There she saw it. The result of this cold heart curse. Her best friend was face down in the water, blue, bloated, and unmoving. The snow became a furious storm as the sky darkened. From her unprotected feet the horrific frost blossomed and overtook everything around her. The ground. The lake. The town. Her whole world. She could never go to that lake again. She knew his corpse was still frozen in its once serine waters. She just knew the snow could never fully bury that scene.

The slush sloshed around her as she dragged her feet all the way to her front door. She braced herself against it and forced it open, the ice that had built up during her time out cracked and protested, but quickly gave. Within the walls was no warmer than it was outside, simply more desolate. Icy stalactites clung to the ceiling by the dozen. Foreboding spears that hung like an executioner's axe above the young woman's head. Threatening for now, letting her anticipation eat away at her, but solid and sturdy. They would only fall if she shook them with slammed doors or screams of an emotional meltdown. A simple solution was that she could clear them. But she had let them build up so much and simply, she had grown to like them.

She took slow, steady steps across the slick floor. The frost stuck to the fabric of her socks like velcro, it grabbed and tried to hold her still, but she meandered on. Past the kitchen who's food was rock solid and inedible. Past the bathroom who’s pipes had long cracked and broken. Past the living room that held the frozen memory of her family. They stood like statues in the middle of the room, her father’s face contorted in anger— but a deep worry was behind his eyes. Her mother had her head in her hands, hiding the tears and snot that her now silent wails produced. The young woman didn't even glance their way anymore. She opened the bedroom door and pulled the medication out of her pocket. They skittered about within the bright orange container with the movement. How odd it was to see such little things move about. They had yet to slow and freeze like everything else. With it in her hands she crawled into bed under a dozen blankets, and cradled the warm pill bottle in her palms. Her eyes were glued to it. Her blackening fingers twitched towards the lid, aching for relief.

Yet, she could not bring herself to take them.

It might cure her frozen heart, or it might make it worse. What if it dwarfed this never ending winter she had conjured with an ice age? And should it work, what if this frost was who she was, would it erase her— who was she under it all? Though these questions haunted her, a far more grim outcome surfaced in her mind: What if it worked and everything around her also thawed? All she had done, all she had destroyed, all she had hurt— she would suddenly have to deal with it. Her neighbours might blame her for all the trouble her cold heart had caused. Her parents might never forgive her for how frigid she had been. Her friend, who still laid frozen in the lake, would have to leave and be put properly to rest. Her grey-blue eyes flicked away from the bottle as it rolled out of her hands and onto the floor. She turned and faced the wall to watch the ice crawl up it. It was easier to stay cold, even if she knew it meant she’d one day freeze in place too.