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“Claire, c’mon, c’mon!”
Birdie hooks her elbow through Claire’s and starts through to the front door, but Claire digs her heels in. This is to her benefit; Birdie’s not Duke, so she can’t physically drag her, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t try, pulling and tugging her until she stops, unhooks her elbow, and turns to Claire with a pout. “Why are you?”
“Well, you’ll find, Bird,” Lionel says, smoothly hanging an arm over Claire’s shoulders, “is that when a woman loves a man very, very much—”
“—then she sleeps with him too young, her conservative family forces her to have the baby, and she gives it up for adoption or it gets thrown into foster care due to negligence, I know, I know, but that doesn’t explain Claire,” Birdie says, gesturing to her with a hand covered in way too many rings. When Lionel just stares at her, blinking, she stares back at him. “What?”
Lionel blinks again. “I’m just trying to figure out where that came from.”
“Oh.” Birdie shrugs. “I’ve seen all of Claire’s campaign stuff.” Her gaze flicks to Claire. “That’s one of your arguing points, isn’t it?”
Claire shakes her head. “No. No, it’s not. I’ve never said any of that stuff.” The corners of her eyes widen, and she tugs her lip between her teeth. “At least not like that,” she whispers, mostly to herself. She unwraps Lionel’s arm from her shoulder. “Where were you taking me, Bird?”
“Outside.” Birdie twirls to face the window, and as she does the skirt of her Christmas green elf dress with the bright red edge flares out around her. It’s stupid – for all of her fashion sense and best foot forward, when it comes to their yearly holiday party, Birdie always dresses in the cheesiest holiday outfit. They’re always alluring, always tailored to be the most sexually provocative they can be without taking away from their cheese factor, and always one hundred percent Birdie. At least this one isn’t…appropriative. Or very politically incorrect.
Claire’s gaze sweeps away from the thick coal black belt cinched tight around Birdie’s waist and up to the window outside. Snow drifts by not in lovely, spiraling flurries but in a thick set constant curtain with only a brief sparse holes through which the dark sky beyond can be seen – and even then, the sky isn’t dark; it’s mirage white, laden with snow clouds. “You want to go out,” she says, nodding to the window, “in that?”
Birdie turns back to Claire, rolls her eyes, and props one hand on her waist, drawing attention to it once more. “Of course. This is when the snow tastes the best!”
Lionel chuckles to himself as Claire just stares at Birdie, her eyes widening. She isn’t able to say anything at all, but Lionel comes up with something almost immediately. “Snow for those special liquor recipes, huh?” He reaches over and pats Birdie’s shoulder. “You can just leave a bowl out. It’ll fill up with that blizzard out there.”
“What?” Birdie gives him an incredulous look. “No. You just stick out your tongue, Lionel. Snow falls on it.” She raises her eyebrows. “You’ve never done it, have you?”
“Oh, no, I’ve done it.” Lionel raises his other hand, gestures to the window with his glass tumbler. “But not out in a storm like that, I haven’t.”
“You’re just chicken,” Birdie replies, sticking her tongue out at him.
Now Lionel’s eyes widen, and he turns to Claire. “Did you – did you see that? Birdie Jay just stuck her tongue out at me! Someone should take a picture of this momentous occasion!”
Claire shoves him to one side. “Lionel, you’re drunk.” She looks out the window, shivers again. Given how cold it is outside, she’s discarded her normal beige for a much darker chocolate brown, all soft, warm sweater dress with threads of cinnamon coursing through the chocolate, and that same cinnamon in her tights, a much darker shade on her boots. She tugs her lip between her teeth again, sucks on it, and then, “Fine.”
“You’re coming?” Birdie asks, bright grin splitting her face.
“Yes,” Claire growls out. She hooks her arm around Birdie’s elbow and is much more successful at dragging her to the door than Birdie was at dragging her. “Put your coat on, Bird. You’re not going out like that,” she says as she pulls her own full-length peacoat – this, in beige – from the coatrack.
Birdie, for her part, does not have a coat, but instead has a Mrs. Claus inspired red cloak edged with lace so white that it seems to glow. “You always take such good care of me, Claire bear.”
“Shush.”
Wind whips white as soon as Claire opens the door, and her eyes instinctively squint as she steps out into the cold. “Tell me we don’t have to—”
But Birdie sprints – skips – prances past Claire as if the blizzard doesn’t bother her at all, despite the thick flakes of snow collecting on her shoulders, and goes out into the front yard, spins around with her arms outstretched, and leans her head back, hood of her cloak dropping away, blonde curls spilling down her back, mouth open and tongue stuck out to catch snow. For a moment, all Claire can do is look at her, taking in the image. Then Birdie looks down, props her hands on her hips, and yells out, “C’mon, Claire! You said you would play with me!”
“I did not say play,” Claire mutters under her breath, but she does as Birdie asked, tentatively stepping down the steps from Andi’s front porch. She slips, grabs tight to the railing, and lets out a bad word a little too loudly than she would like to do outside where other people can record her. Still, she makes her way into the front yard next to Birdie. “Now what.”
Birdie slips one leather gloved hand into Claire’s. “Now you lean your head back and try to catch a snowflake. Haven’t you done this before?”
Claire shakes her head. “Not since I was a little….” She hesitates, doesn’t finish the sentence. “Not since I was little.”
“Okay, so you lean your head back like this,” Birdie says, as though Claire didn’t hesitate at all, tilting her head back, “and you open your mouth wide, and you try to catch one. Like this!” She opens her mouth wide, eyes closed.
For a moment, Claire is convinced that Birdie didn’t even notice the stumbling in her words, but then Birdie gives her hand the slightest of squeezes, and despite the cold, she grows quite warm, cheeks flushing bright, although neither of them can see it. Then she mimics her friend, leans her head back, opens her mouth wide, and tries to catch a snowflake on her tongue.
When she does – which takes much longer than she thought, considering how fast and furious the snow is falling – it tastes crisp. New. Right. Claire smiles, gives Birdie a look that makes Birdie grin, and then glances up at the sky, at the falling snow, and tries to catch another flake.