A Single Preserved Snowflake

A boy named Charlie follows a map of paper snowflakes through frozen city streets, hoping to find his lost brother.

The door was stuck. Not locked, just stuck. The old wood had swollen in the cold and the latch wouldn't click open. I jiggled the knob, putting my whole body into it, my shoulder bumping against the hard paint. It smelled like dust and old socks in the hallway. I had to get out. The map said so.

My fingers were already getting cold just thinking about it. I squeezed my right hand into a fist. Inside my pocket, my other hand was wrapped around the glass ball. It was smooth and heavy and perfect. Sam gave it to me before he left. He said, 'Look, Charlie. A real one. It'll never melt.' Inside the glass, a snowflake was trapped forever. It had six arms, each one like a tiny frozen feather. It was the only piece of him I had left.

The door finally gave with a loud groan, the sound echoing in the empty apartment behind me. I didn't look back. I just slipped out and pulled it shut, listening for the soft thud that meant it was closed for real. Four floors down, my feet barely made a sound on the worn-out carpet of the stairs. My boots were too big. Mom got them at the second-hand store and said I'd grow into them. Right now they just made my feet feel clumsy and far away.

Outside, the wind hit me like a slap. It stole the air from my lungs and made my eyes water. The sky was the color of a dirty plate. I pulled the crumpled paper from my coat pocket. It wasn't really a map. It was just a piece of greasy brown paper from a bag of fries, but on it were the shapes. Sam's shapes. He used to draw them all the time. Little stars, like snowflakes. One big one was circled. 'Our spot,' he'd called it. Underneath, he'd drawn smaller ones, with little lines pointing. A secret code. I knew it was from him. I found it tucked under my pillow this morning. He was telling me where to go.

The first snowflake on the map was easy. It looked like the sign on the old bank building down the street. The one with the big clock that was always stopped at 3:15. I held the paper with my mitten off, my fingers turning red and stiff in seconds. The wind tried to rip it from my hand, but I held on tight. I shoved my bare hand back in my pocket, my cold fingers touching the colder glass of the paperweight. It was like holding a piece of ice that would never warm up. It kept me brave.

I ran down the sidewalk, my boots scuffing on the thin layer of grey snow. People hurried past, their faces hidden in scarves and hoods. Nobody looked at me. I was just another little shape moving through the cold. I reached the bank and looked at my map. The next snowflake had a little box drawn around it. I looked around. The theatre. Its sign was a big box of lights, all of them dark now. It was closed for good, Mom said.

My breath came out in big white puffs. I felt like a steam engine. I followed the line on the map, turning down an alley I wasn't supposed to go down. It smelled like garbage and frozen pee. The bricks on the walls were dark and crumbly. Another snowflake symbol pointed me toward the big train bridge over the river. The wind was louder here, whistling through the steel beams. The river below was a long, white scar of ice. I walked along the path, my boots crunching. The cold was starting to hurt now. It felt like little needles poking into my cheeks and the tips of my ears.

My pocket felt heavy. The paperweight was my anchor. Sam was at the end of this. I just had to keep going. The last snowflake on the map was the biggest. It wasn't a building I knew. It was just a shape, a big, square shape with a jagged line on top, like a broken roof. It was near the warehouses, where the trucks rumbled all night and the buildings were just dark, empty boxes.

I found it. A huge brick building with boarded-up windows and a roof that sagged in the middle, just like the drawing. A big metal door was slid open just a crack, a slice of blackness in the grey afternoon. My heart was thumping like a drum. This was it. This was the spot.

'Hello?' I called into the dark gap. My voice sounded small and stupid.

Something moved inside. A shadow detaching from other shadows. A man stepped into the sliver of light. He was tall and thin, and his face was all angles and darkness under a wool hat. 'You got the map?' he rasped. His voice sounded like rocks grinding together.

I held it up. My hand was shaking so hard the paper rattled.

'He sent that,' the man said. 'Sam. He's waiting. But he said you had to bring him something. To prove it was you.'

'I did,' I said, my voice catching in my throat. I pulled the paperweight out of my pocket. The light from the doorway caught it for a second. The snowflake inside seemed to glow. It was so beautiful. The last perfect thing.

'That's it,' the man said, taking a step closer. He didn't look at my face, just at the glass ball in my hand. 'He's just in the back. Give that to me, and I'll take you right to him.'

Sam. He was here. He was just in the back. All I had to do was give him the snowflake. It was just a trade. The snowflake for Sam. It was an easy choice.

I held it out. The man’s hand shot out and snatched it from my grasp. His fingers were dirty. He held it up to the light, turning it over and over. He grunted, a satisfied sound. Then he looked at me.

'Wait here,' he said. 'Don't move.'

He stepped back, melting into the deep black of the warehouse. I waited, shivering, staring into the dark where he had gone. I listened for Sam's voice. I listened for footsteps coming back. But the only sound was the lonely whine of the wind outside and the frantic, stupid beating of my own heart. He wasn't coming back. No one was coming back.

The cold from the concrete floor started seeping through the soles of my boots. My pocket felt empty. Lighter than it had in months. The hole he left was huge and freezing, and it was right inside my coat. It was right inside me.