Snow By Anna Otto anna_otto@hotmail.com Classification: VA (does it count if it's not Mulder or Scully angst? Just wondering...) Rating: PG Spoilers: The Red and The Black Summary: A lonely man in the mountains receives a letter. Archive: Sure, just let me know if you do. Disclaimer: All the characters are property of Chris Carter, 1013 Productions, and FOX. No copyright infringement intended, no monetary profit is made. I have always loved snow. I grew up in South Dakota, where snow was a way of life, where my father had to get up every morning and clear a narrow path from the steps of our house to the car. It was a tradition I respected, but never fully understood. No amount of antifreeze could start our old Ford in winter -- and even if it did start, it would be unable to navigate the landscape more fitting to Alaska than to the continental America. Washington D.C. winters had lacked the blinding white opulence of the snow country of my childhood, and at times I wanted to go back, to take a vacation well-deserved but never forthcoming. The January cold would melt my heart a little, the flames in the fireplace would cast warm shadows on the simple wooden bench and table, much the same way as they do now, and I would nurture my nostalgia for a day. Or two. There is a crystal clarity in the air of Quebec, Canada. It is the simplicity and grandeur of the mountains, the harsh stoicism of nature conquered by winter. It is the white sky with clouds that swallow the rays of sun. It is the clean, captivating beauty of snow. It filters my photographic memory, and I inspect its fragments as if they were cells in a dark dungeon, unlocked with a rusty old key. I take another deep drag on my cigarette and lace the frosted window with gray smoke. I give a beautiful woman away to her future husband on a mild autumn day. The trees are already bereft of their leaves, only a silk tapestry on the ground until heavy November rains wash them away in anticipation of winter storms. I listen to her laugh, and the sound is exquisite -- as dazzling as the first time I heard it, when she was just a little child. The tall man waiting at the altar takes her hand gingerly, and I silently commend him for treating her as a cherished prize. Because he is not aware that another man, to whom he bears a startling resemblance, has been searching for this treasure with more persistence than pirates search for Captain Morgan's buried diamonds. Because it is hard to find her. I see a little girl and she is smiling at me because I brought her a present. The wrappings are torn away and discarded impatiently, and she is holding a chessboard. The black and white pieces scatter on the floor, and she laughs momentarily, gathering them in a pile, then quickly forgetting her gift. Her mother smiles indulgently at me and says that she is much too young to understand this game yet, and that I would never learn what to do with children. It hurts for a second, and then I shrug my shoulders self-deprecatingly and put the charming expression back on my face. I practice it in the mirror for greater effect. I remember how my father taught me the names of each figure, how I studied them for hours, drawing a picture of the chessboard in my mind and playing match after match with an invisible opponent because my clumsy fingers were too slow to catch up with my commands. I won from my father a week later, and then I learned how to give in and lose convincingly. I should have given the gift to the boy, I think fleetingly, I will have to be more inventive for her birthday next year. Buying gifts for him has always been a challenge, too. Meanwhile, he quickly appropriates the lacquered box, inviting me for a game, eyeing me curiously as if he is still trying to figure me out. It takes an hour, but I win. He asks politely whether I would like a rematch. Next time when I visit, I say. A rematch is always something to hope for. I do not like Christmas, the forced jollies and the stilted banality of carols. The pretty wreaths and shiny objects signify only a pathetic ornament for an everyday life. But it is almost tolerable in the year when my son is six years old. He writes a list for Santa Claus and hides it in the red stocking hung above the fireplace. My smile is happy and genuine as I read his wishes, as I wonder whether I have ever been this innocent. I know that the answer is positive, and I reach for affirmation in the lost cells of the dungeon. I recite my own Christmas list from the year when I was five. It is easy to remember... all I wanted was a car. A real one. Automobile revolution had reached me and I swayed. Maybe I wasn't so innocent even then. On Christmas morning, I have to fly to New York. The red-eye flight will not wait as I kiss his small sleeping form, and as I fill his red stocking with a few gifts that do not correspond to his wishes. His mother, at peace with her world, forgives me and does not tell me that I should stay. At times, I hope she will throw a good tantrum. Doesn't my absence deserve some emotion, after all? The snow starts falling, as if a mad artist draws giant bold strokes with a wide brush that obscures a few detailed trees. I wonder if there will be too much snow, if my little friend, Jack, will show up today. He had never failed to do so previously, and I speculate whether it's because he does it for money I offer or whether he is brave and foolish enough. And then I remember a slender young woman serving tea on a cold winter afternoon, and I realize that if I do not leave right away, I will get stuck on the road because of layers and layers of snow that still keeps coming. Her husband asks me if I would like to come and work with him, because it pays well and it's a government job, and it brings most unexpected benefits. He adds slyly that it's exciting and dangerous, and a woman smiles at me, asking me whether I am foolish enough to accept the offer. And I answer inwardly that I am foolish but not because I am about to say yes, but because I will seat here until the latest hour permissible by the social etiquette. Because there is excitement and danger in seeing her, in accidentally grazing my fingers against her hand as she hands me the cup, in hearing her voice. It is not electricity that heats water inside the teapot. It is the warmth of her blood. I speak to her in charades that only I can understand and appreciate. If she knows the double meaning of my words, she doesn't show it. But she might, and I find pleasure in the game, in predicting the future with her by my side... In designing the future. Her husband is my friend, and after I accept the job he offers, we celebrate by opening a champagne bottle that they keep in the basement. The primate in me wonders how many champagne glasses would it take to get her to sleep with me. More than one bottle, obviously, and I almost sigh out loud with regret. How many glasses of whisky to put him to sleep? I toast to the upcoming changes in our lives, and they both smile encouragingly. Don't they know that change is a finer form of Chinese torture? I get lost on the way home, and as I circle highway after highway, I think only of her full lips that offer heaven to any man lucky enough to be admitted. I didn't know, then, that one could still tumble from heaven to hell faster than a meteor pulled from the sky by gravity. And I followed in the steps of Lucifer, reigning in the netherworlds of human weakness and sin. The fire in my cabin is the same fire that must burn in the deeper regions of inferno, the same fire that I remember blazing in the fiery blue air of New Mexico. It is cleansing and deadly; it is hotter than the orange sun that hangs in the cloudless sky. It is consuming the evidence of our crimes, simultaneously ravaging my enemy. And some enemies become dearer to us than our friends. There are only fifteen days from hate to... Respect. The snow stops as suddenly as it started. The boy will come today after he visits the post office and opens my mailbox. And in looking at the return address on the envelope, in shuffling through the loose leaves of paper, in searching the words for a scrap of affection, I find hope. I open the door to the impatient knock, and I school my features into the usual mask of indifference, trying to still my beating pulse lest the bearer of hope understands the importance of his gifts. And as I read the return address on the envelope, as I see my post office box number and a "Return to sender" stamp, I feel heavy despair settle like white, cold snow over my heart, extinguishing the fire inside it. I murmur my thanks and close the door numbly. I throw more logs in the fireplace, and as the hungry flames eat my letter, I hope that they will ignite and crack the ice core inside my chest. Because it is heavy and I am too old to bear it. Then I retrace my steps quickly and call out to the ten-year-old, who turns around curiously, suspicion and interest mixed on the small face. I invite him in for tea and he hesitates for a nanosecond. Then Jack nods happily and walks through the snow back to my door. As he drinks from a huge steaming mug that obscures his face save for a pair of black inquisitive eyes, I type another letter. And I address it to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, The X-Files Division. Finita la comedia. Will work for food... oops... er, feedback :-) All comments gratefully accepted at anna_otto@hotmail.com