Snowflakes In Autumn (A Novella)

Eight

Faith awoke to the light pouring through the drapes on the window. There wasn't a single time she could remember waking up after the sun arose, and grabbed her phone from the table beside her, seeing it was just after eleven in the morning. Normally she would have woken up seven hours ago and wouldn't have been able to fall asleep, but she hadn't woken up a single time last night.

Not hearing a single sound in the house, Faith climbed out of bed and trotted out of the room, looking every which way until she spotted Noah outside, sitting at the table they ate at the evening before with his back turned away from her. She opened the door and walked outside to join him, feeling the cool autumn breeze prick at her bare arms.

Noah folded his newspaper up and dropped it on the table. "I was going to make breakfast for you two hours ago. You'll have to settle for going somewhere for lunch."

Faith sat in the vacant chair across from him before collecting her shoulder-length brown hair and tying it into a ponytail. "I never sleep this late."

"It's good to do sometimes. Healthy for the heart, makes your brain sharper, boosts your immune system, regulates your blood sugar."

Faith shook her head at a slow, steady movement, ignoring his laundry list of health benefits. "Every night I dream about the shooting and wake up at three or four in the morning and can't go back to sleep. Every night, without fail, until last night."

The green in Noah's eyes seemed to fade right in front of her, leaving only the hazy gray. "For me, shutting off my brain and falling asleep is the problem. As soon as I lay down, all this shit goes through my head; the crappy memories, the worries. Last night I got a solid eight hours of sleep when I'm usually lucky to get five. I guess with you finally under my roof, I didn't have to worry."

A blush took over Faith's cheeks when he said that. "And I guess being under your roof kept the nightmares away."

"Or," Noah began, coming up with an alternative theory, "with you being here, your dad could keep a closer eye on you."

"I like that," Faith admitted with a smile.

Noah let out a cough, then scratched at the stubble on his face. "So what did you want to do today after lunch?"

Faith normally didn't eat lunch, but hadn't eaten before or during the flight the day before because of nerves, and had barely touched the dinner he made her. She couldn't deny the empty, knowing feeling in the pit of her stomach. "There was a kind of information overload last night during dinner. It took me a while to process it all, but I remembered you bringing up home movies."

That fact had snuck in her brain just before falling asleep, having been lost at the time with a sea of other facts.

Noah lowered his head and nodded at a slow and methodical pace. When his eyes hit hers again, he spoke. "One video a day. That way you can let it sink in without being on information overload, and I can keep you here for longer."

A small laugh escaped her lips. "That sounds like a very polite version of kidnapping. How many videos do you have?"

"A little over thirty," Noah admitted with a smile.

Faith propped her elbow against the table and placed her chin atop her fist, staring him down. "And what if I can't stay that long?"

"Then I guess you'd have to come back."

He seemed so at ease with his well thought out plan, causing Faith to wonder how much he'd thought about it prior to her bringing the videos up. "This is extortion."

Noah leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms. "Extortion is obtaining something, not someone, through force or threats. I'm not forcing or threatening. All I'm doing is using leverage as a way of encouraging you to stay, which is not kidnapping or unlawful imprisonment. The fence to the right of me leads to the sidewalk, and you know where the front door is. You're free to use either any time you wish."

Faith gave him a deadpan look.

"Crime novelist, remember?"

She'd meant to read the book she grabbed off the shelf this morning once her dream forced her awake again, but that hadn't happened. "And what if you get sick of me? One look at this place, and I can tell you're a loner. This house screams 'leave me the hell alone'. You don't even have a television. Which reminds me, how are we going to watch these home movies with no screen to play them on."

"First off," Noah began as he leaned forward. "There's not a chance in hell I'll get sick of you. Second, this house screams nothing, because it's quiet. So damn quiet that it's bugging the hell out of me. Third, you're right. I am a loner, just like you. We both lost two people we loved, and whether or not you remember it, witnessed something incomprehensible. We saw the worst version of humanity that day, which is why you and I both struggle with forming relationships. Not only can people not be trusted, but when you lose someone you love, it's one of the greatest pains there is. And forth, I have a television. I moved it to the basement to make room for another bookshelf."

Whenever Noah opened his mouth, he seemed all in. Whether it was something sweet, factual, revealing, or whatever, it was always something that needed processing.

"I'm a person. What makes you think you can trust me?"

A small smile formed at the corner of Noah's mouth. "You aren't just a person, you're my little snowflake."

"Both are nouns," Faith pointed out, wanting to one up the man just once.

"That's not even a slightly solid argument. Like I said before, you aren't just a person, Faith, you're my person. You're one of the loved ones I lost and I'm just trying to avoid that happening again, or at least prolong it."

She remembered him saying that the evening before and it felt so conclusive. "What makes me your person?"

Noah let out a heavy breath. "We have a connection that can't break. Even when you lost every other memory, you still had a flicker of me that couldn't be taken away. You can disappear from my life for nearly fifteen years, and I can still pick you out of a crowd of hundreds. I can still read you just as I could when you were young, because you either don't or can't hide yourself from me despite having shut out the rest of the world. No matter the distance or time, you still found your way back to me. You can show me your best, and I'll cherish it. You can show me your worst, and how I feel about you won't falter. That's why your my person, little snowflake, and that's why I'm yours, whether you see it yet or not."

The problem was that Faith saw it. Not just saw it, but felt it in her bones. She, too, was able to find his eyes on hers in a crowd of hundreds. After fifteen years, she felt the familiarity in his aged voice. Her soul never could let go of his existence.