I tried to be like those girls in the movies. The ones like honey who sweetly smile, and stick their warmth craving arms outside the car window. Those descendants of heaven who fly through the air while their hair twirls like a dancer in the wind. But I wasn’t sweet like honey, wasn’t half sweet like a ripe fruit. And I tried to let my hands fall into the earth’s warmth, attempted to let my hair flick and fly, only hoping the breeze would hold me. But I knew if the wind’s summer sweat collided with my heart of ice, after it brushed my concealing skin and bones, I’d soon turn the world frozen.
And that’s when I realized I’m not like those girls in the movies. That I’m not like most girls at all. I’ve never been blessed with the skills of a hot glue gun and googly eyes when I walk into a room full of people. Never been blessed with sexy seduction or feminism. I was the sourest sweet in the candy store.
I had to pull my hand back into my lap, holding it just right so the heater hit it, so maybe my frozen heart, my frozen soul, could desperately defrost. So maybe in ten years, I could be like those girls in the movies falling in love, draping their limbs from windows and their hair from sunroofs. But until then, just like an exiled danger would, I’ll sit in my frost forged tower of loneliness. Letting snow fall over my tongue and kiss me sweetly. Letting the icy breeze hold my skin of goose flesh like a blanket. Sitting, slouching, and sleeping so my frozen heart will finally feel like it belongs. Maybe I’ll finally fall in love with someone who’s brave enough to bear the cold. To climb glaciers and trek through winter forests of death and danger. Because in my life, winter is all year round and maybe I’ll freeze your heart over too. When your insides finally cry of frostbite and you leave, escaping death, don’t forget your fur coat and your hand warmers. Don’t forget to say goodbye.
I admired my icicle turned tear fall to the floor, crashing with the other 979 frozen heartbreaks. Not even the car’s heaters could melt my tears of ice, they’d been frozen for twenty years too long.