The Little Things You Give Away
By Leah Howland
Tumbling down the hill by our houses, from mine to yours. Snowflakes whirled in the air around us, the bitter cold minutes away from freezing us in place on the freshly plowed road. Our beaten-up black and red sleds from Walmart barely held on as we slid down the icy path. Time crawled to a standstill as we ricocheted down the hill on a collision path with the lumbering pine tree weeping scented needles into the snowbanks underneath.
The world is at our fingertips. Nothing can ever stop the two of us. We’ll ensure everything is okay, and this moment will last forever as we zoom down this sharp decline into the soft snow patiently awaiting our arrival. Nobody will create an end to this wonderland. It’s too perfect to dare disturb; this moment in time is preserved through photographs taken on a black Canon camera.
The tree at the base of the hill catches us as we crash land into it, getting stuck in its underbrush. The smell of pine surrounds the crisp mid-December air as needles and sticky, sweet-smelling sap coat our winter clothing. The viridescent needles change the colors of our burnt umber and light rose snowmobiling jackets, two sizes too big, borrowed from my parents. The snowflakes fall gently around us, landing delicately on our gloved hands, hand-knit hats, and ruby-flushed faces, their intricate patterns visible on our skin.
We stare up at the marbled gray and white sky, storm clouds raging miles that feel like lifetimes away from us. Sitting up just enough to look at each other and lie there breathlessly, we stare into the distance, contemplating our existence. Snowy winter afternoons leave little to the imagination, letting us conjure up a perfect world where none of our troubles exist. One where we needn’t worry about being separated from an indelible, irreplaceable friendship by the chance that my family might move away. One where time outside this snow globe moment is nonexistent. One where we never grow old, and the traumas of the outside world don’t exist. A perfect world, forever frozen in time in the ice on the slick path we had just barreled down faster than the speed of light.
Amidst the pine trees, we lay stuck. But there was no want to leave and interrupt this fragment of time. We held the world at our fingertips, a realization we couldn’t brush off or leave behind. We lay relishing the moment, soaking up every emotion that washed its way over us. We were acutely aware of everything around us: every swoop and call of the crows above, every whoosh of the wind, every snowflake and bead of water rolling down our bodies, every pine needle stuck to us, every car that drove by, every sound carried on the breeze. All we were was a fragment in time, lying silently and looking up above, counting seconds and snowflakes as years fly by.
We lay silently, enjoying each other's company, clinging to the light of day, until darkness befell the sky. Snowflakes danced angrily around us, challenging us to remain in place, begging us to become frozen fragments of time like them. They force the end of an everlasting moment, immediately forgotten once it’s over.
Leah Howland was a SUNY Canton student from Fall 2021 through Spring 2023 before transferring to Vermont's Castleton University to pursue a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing. Leah was the Secretary for SPECTRUM through the 2022-23 academic year. They identify as nonbinary and hope to publish novels featuring queer and neurodivergent characters.