Chapter Text
The cross-nation train went on. The train took him from his original destination to his next destination. From the city where investor meetings for Ocean Electric took place, to the Swedish suburbs that became his next visiting point.
The place where Tod and P'Earth decided to take a vacation.
Arthit let his gaze wandered outside. His eyes was trailing the typical mountainous landscape of Europe, which now looked like they were having a race against the train. It was all white, with snow piled every here and there. If this was the first time Arthit went traveling abroad during winter, then one might saw a wide grin plastered on his expression. A grin that typically belongs to someone who had never seen snow before. Such grin wouldn’t escape his expression, given Arthit was born and raised in a tropical country with its famous beaches that were well known even to Europeans here. But...
All the sudden, Arthit found himself hard to swallow.
He directed his gaze upward, as if he were looking for the sun. But I am the sun, he thought. And for him, such thought made everything drop dead frozen immediately. The breath that he inhaled and exhaled felt heavy altogether.
Why?
Unexpectedly, his memory dragged his consciousness back to a point in time where he and Kong had spent the day getting warm in front of the fireplace in a small cabin they had rented in Japan. They were trapped by a sudden snowstorm with a diminishing supply of firewoods to keep the fire in the fireplace on. Together, they decided to conserve the remaining firewoods by getting each other warm enough. Together, the two of them sheltered themselves from the ever-declining cold temperatures. Together, they were hiding themselves beneath the thick blanket they had accumulated from whatever supplies they could find inside the cabin. Together, the two of them were… ah, Arthit closed his eyes.
The two of us.
"Khun Arthit?"
The rest of our stories are memories, now.
"Khun Patcha," Arthit opened his eyes. As a response, the figure whose name belongs to threw a typical I-am-not-impressed look to Arthit in return, for Arthit shortened his full name in such manner.
"You know, the waiter on this train gave me her mobile number without me having to ask her—and I," Khun Patcharapon handed a glass of warm pink milk to Arthit, who then mumbled something that sounded like 'I-should-not-have-bothered-you-this-much' as he accepted the glass from Khun Patcharapon with both hands.
"I thank you for that," he said, lifting his drink and holding it in the air, as if he was waiting for Arthit to welcome his toast.
Arthit weighed a minute before he finally gave up and let the glass he held touched Khun Patcha's glass. He then turned to the other direction, back to the view outside the window.
"Sorry," he said, barely audible.
Khun Patcharapon looked at Arthit for a moment. He shrugged his shoulders and took a seat in the chair next to him. He let a few minutes pass in silence between them, as he and Arthit enjoyed their respective drinks, before he broke the silence by saying, "Khun Tod and Khun Earth will pick you up at the station."
"And you?"
"Me? What about me?"
Arthit frowned. "You said you're staying there as well."
Khun Patcharapon shook his head. "I have something else to take care of."
Arthit stared at his coworker. "Okay."
"Okay?"
The glass of milk whose contents were being sipped was now hanging half-way. Arthit turned to Khun Patcharapon. "You said you have something to take care of."
Oh, Good Lord. "Khun Arthit Rojnapat. Did snow get into your eyes?"
"Huh?"
"Have you ever heard about the story of a boy? A boy who first saw snow and his eyes had a piece of snow that turned out to be a split of a broken glass belongs to the Snow Queen?"
"Where did you hear that creepy story from?"
"Listen to me first. The snowflake turned out to be a split of a glass belongs to the Snow Queen. This split of glass then grew. It was spreading to other parts of the boy's body before finally turning his heart into a cold and frozen-hard one, up to the point where no more warmth could reach it. Ever heard of this story?"
Arthit looked at Khun Patcharapon with a skeptic's gaze.
"What do you mean by telling me that story?"
"You. You are the boy with this little shred of glass in his eye." Khun Patcharapon made a movement as if he was about to examine the eyes of Arthit—who was quickly denied by Arthit.
"What the hell?"
"The little shred of glass is still in you."
That’s ridiculous. Khun Patcharapon might have read Arthit's mind from his face. Only then, Khun Patcharapon squeezed Arthit's shoulder and said, "You're still keeping his number, right?"
Arthit, who went to sip the pink milk, was almost choked. "He—who?"
"Do you want me to find you a mirror, so you can see for your self how your face looks like, like, right now?"
"I am not—“
"Do not say anything about yourself that everyone can easily say otherwise, Khun Arthit. You miss him, call him. How hard can that be?”
Arthit remained silent as the train continued its journey.