I grew up in the north. There is an unspoken bond among us northerners across the globe: winter is our secret. There is some magical truth hidden in the winters that we endure. Most who visit our regions don’t understand why we are cold and distant people. Visitors may decide that we are not intimate people. They may think we live very separate lives.
This couldn’t be further from the truth. We have endured many cold seasons together. We have a bond that does not need to be maintained by pleasantries. We always remember that when the cold comes, we will brace it together.
I walked through a flat forest. The trees were like thin needles, and it was snowing. I was dressed for the weather so that I was warm and could appreciate the bitter winter air that kissed my cheek. It was very still and very quiet. The path was long and wide, and I knew my way. Eventually, I came to a bend in the trail, and there he stood.
At first, I remembered that he created a fracture in me that will never heal, at least not properly. Then I remembered how he kissed me with love and forgiveness. But no matter how strong my memory was, I knew that he had broken my heart. These contradictions lingered in my mind as I walked to him.
In the stillness, we listened to the crunch of snow under my boots. The snowflakes that fell around us almost looked to be suspended in time. They drifted downward but never appeared to land on the bed of snow beneath them.
His warm skin and midnight hair stood out against the sea of snow. Without ever turning to face me, he pushed his elbow out with his hand still in his pocket. In a familiar motion, I took his arm in mine, and we walked together.
This time, when we met in this place, we met as equals. We were calm, and we were honest.
He asked in his thick accent, “How are you? Are you doing well?”
I told him the good and the bad, and that made him happy.
I then asked him, “How are you?”
He said, “You know me. I’m good; tired but good.”
And I knew that he was doing well. I told him that I needed to ask him something. He waited patiently for the question.
“Did you love me?” my voice didn’t crack because, for once, I wanted to know his answer.
He squeezed my arm tight and said, “I did love you. But not the way you wanted.” he sucked in cold air. “I loved you for what was inside. Not the outside.”
I laughed and asked him if he was calling me ugly.
“I couldn’t love the way the world made you,” his breath was heavy and filled the air with gray smoke, “There was so much to love about you, but there was so much unfixed stuff on the outside.”
My voice strained, “Like what?”
He didn’t look at me; he watched the path ahead. But I couldn’t look away from him. A layer of snow had collected on top of his head. It made him look as if he wore a crown of midnight sky filled with stars. My hand moved from his arm to the warm depths of his pocket, and I held his hand in mine.
“I loved the parts of you that were you. You know?” he would say after a while.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. I loved that you prayed.”
I laughed, squeezing his hand, “Oh, you’re into pious girls!”
“No, no. I loved that you prayed for me. It was almost like you prayed because you loved me.”
I said nothing.
“I know you weren’t sure if you believed in it, and you always struggled with faith. But you prayed because you believed in me. You followed Allah for me. It was so unlike you, and you got so serious about it, but you did it because you loved me and because you trusted me,” he exhaled through his words, “I had never seen a love like that before.”
A tear blurred my view of him and his crown.
“Please don’t start that. I don’t want to make you cry.”
I laughed and wiped my tears away, “What did you mean before about how the world made me?”
“You know what I mean. You were scared all the time: always suspicious, always trying to protect yourself. And in the worst ways!” he laughed.
“I was not! I was just being careful,” I said as I bumped my shoulder against his.
“Being careful? Yallah!”
“I had to be! I never knew what was going on in that head of yours.”
“Yes, you did. You always did. The only thing in my head was you.” He paused and asked gently, “The real question is whether you loved me?”
My answer came fast, “Oh my god, I loved you. You know I did. Don’t doubt that for a second,” I adjusted my beanie with my free hand, “I will admit, though, it was also hard to love how the world made you.”
He chuckled and rolled his eyes.
“No, really, the world messed you up good too! You always wanted to hide in your room, party, and never take life too seriously. All you wanted was to get away from it. I always wished that you didn’t.”
“I guess I did, too,” he admitted.
“But we were happy for so long. There were a lot of great times, too; lots of delivery food and some interesting delivery drivers. Some really, really great nights grilling and talking and watching the stars.”
“Don’t joke about that delivery guy!” he laughed, “It was all great, even when it wasn’t.”
“Yeah? What happened then?” I goaded.
“What happened was that you got tired of me.”
“I did not get tired of you. I did get tired of fighting, though.”
“Exactly. I never wanted anything from you, only your time and love.”
“What are you talking about? You wanted so much from me. You wanted me to want nothing. That’s still wanting something,” I bit my lip hard and looked far ahead of us.
“My mother would never understand. We were better off how we were.”
His response had been cold, and I understood. We both stared toward the ocean of frost before us.
“I wanted to meet your parents and still be how we were,” I paused and searched for the words I needed, “You did want something from me; you just couldn’t see it.”
He loosened his grip. “That isn’t wanting something from you. That’s wanting a life with you. We would never be the same if you’d met them. Everything would have been different.”
I lifted my head to the sky, and icy tears flushed my pale cheeks. I stopped walking, and so did he. The snow still hovered around us, suspended in the dense air.
“I love you so much,” my voice shattered against my will, “I can leave my parent’s God behind for you. I can leave my own beliefs behind for you. But I cannot leave myself behind. I won’t. Not for you, not for anything.”
I watched his face. I searched for any hint that he might finally agree. But he had his own thin and strangled tears. He lifted his hands to my cheeks, cupped my face, and looked at me hard through his eyelashes. He leaned and kissed my forehead. “I know. I always knew. We both did.”
My hands found his as they fell from my face, and I held on to them because I knew this was the last time my cold hands would be warmed by his. I smiled and fought the part of me that wanted to go back to our old routine. I let go of his hands and nodded.
We had stopped at a fork in the road. It was no less painful to be here on agreeable terms. I turned to take a right, and he turned to take a left. Two sets of footprints became one. The paths that divided us made the trek colder, and above me, the sky churned.
I thought back to my northern roots. Winter makes people grow closer. We hold hands. We cling to each other, and we seek refuge in warm pockets and interlocked arms.
As I made my way home alone, I realized there was more to this northern secret; who you brace the cold with is crucial. You must confront winter together, not just alongside one another. What hurt the most was not that our paths separated here in the forest. What truly ate at me like frostbite was that we could not brace one another’s cold and desolate winter. Our cultures were vastly different, and our perspectives were separated by deep and churning oceans.
Throughout knowing him, we had been through enough. We had survived loved one’s deaths, we had survived fights, and we had survived incomparable lifestyles. But in the end, that was just flurries compared to the coming blizzard. The closer we grew, the more the storm swelled.
In the end, it was still hard. I was willing; he was not. I faced the cold and steadied myself for whatever was to come, and he loosened his grip under mine. I understood. The cold was too much, and I was not the one that he could face it with. So, for now, I braced the cold alone.
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Lydia Hagen is a junior at The University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She studies English and Philosophy, which contributes significantly to her youthful arrogance. When Lydia’s nose isn’t buried in a book, she enjoys hiking and watching horror movies with friends.
© 2023, Lydia Hagen
Halfway Down the Stairs 