Work Text:
But sometimes, we remember our bedrooms,
and our parent's bedrooms,
and the bedrooms of our friends.
Then we think of our parents,
well what the hell ever happened to them?
When he was younger, his parents would tell him a story on cold, snowy nights. It went something like this:
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Once there was a young boy and a young girl. They lived in a European town where high-rise brick buildings lay claim to the land. The boy would often look out his Victorian-style window, across the cobblestone street below to the adjacent window across the way. There she sat, with blond hair in two braids and they’d raise their voices to speak. She wasn’t allowed to leave her house; she never told him why. In the space between them, he enjoyed making her laugh. In space below, he’d hear his mother cry gently. One night before going to sleep, the boy wished that no one in the world existed except the girl and himself and thus, nothing could keep them apart.
The boy’s wish manifested itself in the form of a wasteland. He wasn’t sure what shocked him more: the fact that his wishes could come true by sheer power of thinking or mountains of snow that encased him. When he awoke, he called for his parents but there was no one there. He looked for the girl through the window but the snow was too great. The boy closed his eyes firmly and wished, “Let her meet me in the middle of town.” The boy then dug a tunnel through the circle snow formations. He climbed right through to the girl’s window even though there were stories upon stories of emptiness beneath him. Her room was abandoned, as was her house.
The boy took in the images around him. The snow was bountiful and the air was filled with its scent. The boy breathed in and then his breath caught upon seeing her. She donned a simple pink dress, her hair shining in the morning light. When she saw him, she smiled softly. She said nothing, just put her hand in his and they walked.
They wandered the expanse of their neighborhood and beyond for long hours, for days, for weeks. They walked through wastelands of silence and peace. Occasionally, she’d sing under her breath and her voice would carry when he made ice sculptures of carriages appear before her. Their hair grew long and wild and they laughed in the bright sun of winter. Food was not an issue. There was no struggle. He simply wished for it and it arrived. She eventually tired of the snow and asked for autumn. He gave it to her and made the streets glow flecks of orange and yellow upon their every step. The years passed and soon they were older and she was with child. One evening she frowned at him and whispered, “I don’t recall names. What will we call him?” She looked lost and he wished for her to remember, but it futile; it was as though their memories were preserved under lock and key and he could not access them. He thought of two people, people he know cared for him once. He realized he could not explain their disappearance. She named their son Winter. When he asked her why she chose it, she responded, “Because it exists.”
He wished for snow more often than not, because it made her content. They rose Winter in castles and golden igloos. Some nights she would lay her head on his chest, their fingers intertwined, and would recall fragments of something that sounded like her old room. He remembered something akin to his window bed, but they were mostly shapes and colors than fully formed memories. When he tried to wish them to reappear, he could not.
Their child grew older with each passing day; unfortunately, so did his own mind. He told her all he felt was ash and darkness. The colors and wishes were fading and the ability to retrieve food waned. So she said to him, one night when it was colder than he’d requested, “Let’s just go back. Why don’t we go back?” He tried to wish the world to return but it wouldn’t. He wished for everything imaginable, and then one night, so lost in his own mind he wished he were a child again all the while knowing he’d lose everything. Still, it would not come to pass. He wasn’t sure if he was relieved.
Years later, when the light would no longer come and the sun was gone and the igloo was no longer golden and Winter was sleeping next to them, wrapped in his blankets, she said, “Wish for the snow to be gone.” He did. And so were they.
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This is the story his parents told him on cold evenings. When he was just a boy, it fascinated him and his parents told it beautifully, their eyes locked onto one another. As he grew a little older, he realized this wasn’t a happy story but then again not many fairytales were. Each year, he’d ask for the story whilst wrapped in his blanket, a cup of hot Ovaltine in his hands. Each year his parents obliged, but on their terms. As he grew older, the story became less frequent but he never forgot it. He grew into a teenager, made friends, and courted the girl he’d eventually marry. He started to remember, in random intervals, that the story was always told on one particular evening, even if he asked for it or not. He realized that when he asked a handful of times about his Grandparents, the response had always been, “there are certain things best left unsaid.”
He started looking into it, would search local library records for persons with his father’s last name, but to no avail. Eventually, he gave up. When he was married with children of his own, he told them the story; they loved it. His wife found it darkly beautiful --curious. It wasn’t until many years later in the attic of his childhood home in London, while helping his parents pack their belongings for their move to Spain, that he found a newspaper clipping. Now yellowed and faded with age, the text revealed an accident on a snowy road in London in 1947, which had claimed four lives. The article indicated evidence of children in both vehicles, who were nowhere to be found, their identities largely unknown. .
The paper fell from his hands and he sunk to the floor. He pictured his parents: cold, bruised and scared, climbing out of their vehicles through doors or windows, whatever they could reach. He pictured them saying goodbye to their families and journeying out on their own. He wondered of their life, if they’d been placed in foster care, or if they’d survived on the street taking whatever odd jobs they could find.
He put his head in his hands and sobbed for his parents and for the grandparents he never knew. It was then he realized he’d been hearing about their lives his entire life and had even passed the tale onto his own children. He thought of the story – of the tunnels and the windows and snow. He recalled the lost memories and the desire to go back. He knew his parents were happy and he knew they loved him. But he also knew there was no way of forgetting something like this -- no way of not regretting one’s actions regardless of what the road ahead ultimately brought. He understood the story more now than ever.
He folded up the tattered paper and placed it down with the foresight that he would not reveal his discovery. After all, there were certain things best left unsaid.
[end]