When the Snow Softened

It’s been ten years since Plainfield’s last snowfall.

And ten years since the accident.

For most of my youth, I associated snow with childhood bliss—the kind of bliss that wraps you in a soft, fuzzy blanket on a late winter night, taking in the crisp smell of pine trees and whatever sweet treats were baking in the oven. But for the last decade, I’ve only felt anxiety and shame whenever winter comes. Whenever I felt a chill, my body tensed with anticipation. I braced for potential snowfall in such a heavy, daunting way that it crippled me, buried me alive.

Snow meant shame.

Snow meant no forgiveness.

Snow meant my mother’s spirit was around to remind me of what happened—each falling snowflake an intrusive, painful thought.

Taunting. Relentless. Infinite.

You did this.

I’ll never forgive you.

You are the reason everything is ruined.

Yet here I stood, in front of my childhood home, staring at the house now occupied by a new young family. Where my family and I once shared countless mornings filled with laughter, chaos, and togetherness, it is now someone else’s to make their own memories in. To experience their own tragedies and heartbreaks. I would do anything to go back in time and relive those moments before I stole the rest of my mother’s life.

The house is still exactly the same: from the chipped white paint on the porch railing, to the tilted shutters, to the crooked dogwood tree in the front yard. I didn’t know how being here would feel after all of this time. Would the house feel welcoming? Or would it feel like a stranger?

Admittedly, it felt like seeing an old friend for the first time. The feelings were fresh, as if the house still belonged to me. But I had to accept the fact that it would never be mine again, and it was all my fault.

The memory of the accident was as fresh as the moment it happened, and it rotted me from the inside out. It was like a wound that would never fully heal. The only way I could fully accept and move forward is to have a final goodbye. I closed my eyes, tilted my head up, and let the tiny snow crystals falling from the midnight sky pepper my face and stain my skin like freckles. Something about the piercing winter chill and the ice kissing my cheeks felt…nice. Was it nostalgia or sadness? Or some warped form of relief, a punishment I thought I deserved?

“Here for the anniversary, too?”

I whirled around. There she was, in front of me for the first time in ten years. “It just happened to be snowing,” I replied.

My sister Betty marched up beside me, the snow lightly crunching beneath her boots. Even without seeing her, I could recognize her footsteps anywhere—from the pacing to the lightness of her step. I’d recognize them on Christmas morning, fast and determined. Or when she was heading out on a mysterious date, steadier and careful. Her footsteps were as soothing as a lullaby because they meant my soulmate was with me, even if she was in another room.

Betty stuffed her hands deep in her pockets, her cheeks growing rosier by the second. “I’m surprised to see you here.”

“Why?” I asked, a bit too defensively.

“Because I come here every year on this date,” she responded. “And you’ve never shown up.”

I stared ahead, my eyes fixed on the house. “You know why I don’t come here.”

“So why now?”

I took a deep breath. “I’m leaving Plainfield, and I need to be done with this,” I said. I looked over at her. “I have to be done.”

Betty nodded with understanding. After a few moments of silence, she whispered, “What if they see us? This is the first year there are actually people inside.”

“Who cares? This was ours first.”

“Okay, you may be stubborn, Jill, but this is next-level weird.”

Through the windows, I watched figures dancing across the shadows. They were smiling, joyous. To think that had been me, my mother, and my sister once was soul-crushing. To think it all ended because of me was unbearable.

“Do you think running away from Plainfield will solve your problems?”

“I can’t drive down that road anymore, Betty. I can’t deal with snow anymore,” I admitted. Tears formed in my eyes—from frustration at my sister, at myself, at the world. “I honestly can’t even stand being here right now. I lost everything. Everyone lost everything because of me.”

Betty shook her head. “That’s not what Mom would have wanted.”

“What?”

“She wouldn’t want you blaming yourself for what happened.”

“How could I not blame myself?” I asked. I felt the ten years of suppressed anger begin to rise. “You’re all I had left, and you treat me like a stranger. You don’t even look at me the same way you used to.”

The music inside the house stopped.

“We still have each other,” she said softly. “You have me. I’m here.”

“Oh, please, you dodged my calls every chance you could get. I haven’t seen you since the funeral. We haven’t spoken in a decade!”

Betty pointed to her chest, to her heart. “I lost my mom,” she whispered. “I couldn’t bear to lose my sister.”

Here it was. Years and years of resentment and anger finally at the surface. “I needed you, and you abandoned me.”

Tears slipped down Betty’s cheeks before she seemed to notice. She wiped them away quickly and closed her eyes in shame. At the admittance, as painful as it was. “I was trying to protect myself. And you.”

I stared at her blankly. Waiting.

“I knew the weight you carried,” she continued. “I knew how heavy the guilt felt. I knew it was eating you alive—to the point where…I knew you didn’t want to be here anymore.”

I held my breath.

“I couldn’t cope with mom dying. How could I have coped with losing you, too?”

I shook my head. “Don’t. Don’t make this out to be some virtuous act, like you saved me. You destroyed me.”

“You destroyed me.”

My gut twisted. I lowered my head in disgrace. How could I ever make amends with her? “I don’t know what you want me to do, Betty,” I admitted. I shook my head as tears continued to well. The dread, the hopelessness, it flooded me, and it ached. How desperate I was to go back in time and say, Give me the keys, Mom. I’ll drive.

I should have taken the car keys out of her hand and driven myself. I should have realized she was in no condition to drive after all those glasses of wine. I should have told her to get in the passenger seat instead.

I should’ve done any of the right things. Any one of them.

“But it’s not your fault, Em. It took me a long time to realize it and…accept it.” She reached for my hand. I felt her warmth through the wool mittens. “I hoped I would run into you here at some point. I’d been a coward and afraid that you would hate me too much to accept my calls.” She stroked my hand with her thumb, squeezing tight. As if she were afraid to let go. “Please don’t leave.”

My heart raced. My sister was actually here, and she was holding my hand, and she wanted me to stay. I couldn’t accept it. I didn’t deserve it. “I have to, Betty.”

Her beautiful brown eyes, which I’d grown up with and gazed into with admiration all my childhood, looked at me deeply. Sincerely. “Let me come with you.”

My breath caught in my throat. “What?”

“Wherever it is, let me come. I want to be there for you. I want to help.”

I looked at her like she was crazy. “You want to go to Florida?”

She looked at me and then back at the house. She sighed, still holding my hand. “Wherever you go, I’ll be right there with you.”

The front door of the house swung open, and a head peeked out. “Do you ladies need help with something?”

“No, sorry! We were just walking by.” Betty yanked me down the sidewalk, giggling the same way she did when we got in trouble as kids. Maybe this was the beginning of going back to the way we used to be. Maybe we could restart and repair our relationship day by day.

As I watched the snow fall gently, giggling alongside my sister, I thought maybe, one day, with her by my side, I wouldn’t be afraid of snow.