A Year of Winter

ten

December 7th, 2012

“Winter McLane, since when are you cheerleader?”

Winter grinned at me, just as the school filed out of the auditorium, a smile on her face as wide and vast as the gymnasium itself. I looked at her with surprised eyes and disbelief that couldn’t seem to wash from my face, no matter how hard I tried to look calm and collected. I just couldn’t seem to manage to even begin to fathom how there as any way, shape, or form what she’d just done was possible, unless she really was a cheerleader.

As she walked out, numerous people congratulated her, slapping her on the back and giving her high fives, like they’d all known and admired her for months, just like I had. She smiled, walking alongside me once the praise and admiration had subsided, and we’d gone far enough along on our own so that there was hardly a soul around us.

She looked at me, “Henry Carson, I think you’ll find that there are many surprises about me.” She told me with a mysterious grin, running a hand through her untamed mess of hair.

“Oh, I don’t doubt that.” I told her, shoving my hands in my pockets. “So what? Are you like, an undercover cheerleader?”

She looked at me with a smirk, looking almost like she was pondering the idea. But she shook her head, and laughed it off, like the idea was preposterous, “No,” she said, pausing. “Well, not to my knowledge, at least.”

I raised an eyebrow, perplexed. Though I knew our exchange was purely comedic, there was a part of me still yearning to know what the mystery behind her was.

“Then how would you know their entire routine?” I wondered aloud, frowning speculatively.

She looked at me, almost blankly, like it should have been something plain and simple, “…I’m a fast learner, I suppose.”

I looked at her dumbly, wondering if she thought I was stupid. “…A fast learner?”

“Yeah,” she said with a tiny grin. I watched her peculiarly, as we walked down the near empty corridor, until her eyes flashed back to me, looking at me quizzically. “What is it?”

“N-Nothing,” I said, shaking it off.

She must’ve noticed the dumb, confused look on my face, because she nudged me, laughing and shaking her head. And though I knew she was only trying to be funny, it was simply one joke I didn’t seem to get.

❄

“I thought I told you it’s a bad idea to stick around with Winter McLane!”

I sighed, pulling up my essay on my laptop, wondering why Andrew had to call me and interrupt. I wasn’t quite in the mood to talk, and for once, wanted to drown myself in my homework, if only to forget the world for a moment, as well as Andrew’s incessant whining.

I sighed into the phone, running a hand, frustrated, through my hair. “I’m sorry, Andrew, but since when do you control what I do?”

“Calm down, Henry,” Andrew said, sounding almost annoyed. What right did he have to be annoyed? I was annoyed; with him, with Noelle, with Winter, with Hattie, with myself, with everyone. “I’m just looking out for you, you know!”

“Gee, and thanks for protecting me, Andrew. Wow, you’re a great friend.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” He asked, sensing the obvious sarcasm in my dry tone.

I sighed, reaching for the collar of the sweater around my neck, feeling it grow tighter and tighter like a boa constrictor. I sighed, leaning against my work desk on my elbows, the only light being my lamp, shining bright rays onto dull wood, “What I mean is just that you shouldn’t judge Winter like that. You don’t know her.”