His eyes used to remind her of the sky and ice somehow mixed together and compressed into two dazzling sapphires that never stopped sparkling. Even when he was sad, they still held the glint of mischief and a joy that she once believed nothing would ever be able to stifle. She loved to watch the way the wind played with the soft wisps of his silvery, tousled hair, and loved it even more when her fingers took over that role. His smile was infectious. It made her insides feel like they were melting into a dripping puddle while at the same time filling her with a fervid energy that made her believe she could fly to the sun if she wanted.

But now that image was permanently tainted red. She doubled over again, head touching her knees, that precious scrap of paper clutched too tightly in trembling fists against her chest. And the only sound for miles was the tortured screaming of a heartbroken girl who knew nothing but misery.

"Watch this, Punzie!"

She swung the picnic basket back and forth gently at her side while they walked, long blonde ponytail whipping around in the cool spring breeze. Jack had offered to carry the basket, of course, but she held onto it stubbornly, knowing he would thoughtlessly jostle it too roughly or maybe drop it all together, and she wouldn't risk having the cupcakes she'd spent so long baking the night before ruined. Instead she'd handed him the heavy blanket, which he'd tossed over one shoulder.

She lifted her sunglasses to the top of her head and raised a wary eyebrow at his lanky form. But he wasn't watching. He let the blanket fall to the ground and nimbly hopped up onto the picket fence that lined the sidewalk, then began to walk it on balls of his feet, thin arms held out at his sides. He leapt from stake to stake as deftly as if there were springs on the bottoms of his shoes.

Rapunzel picked up the blanket and rolled her eyes, unable to keep a smile off her face. "Jack, come on. Let's just get to the park already."

His only answer was to spin around and give her an impish grin as he started to walk backwards at a pace much too fast for her comfort.

"Jack, get down from there!" she demanded, but her voice lacked seriousness. It was hard to be serious around Jack, especially when he smiled like that.

"One second." He stopped long enough to flip the brim of his baseball cap to the back of his head and turned to face forward again.

Rapunzel hurried to catch up with him. His eyes were narrowed in determination and his tongue poked against the inside of his cheek like it did when he was concentrating hard. When she looked in the direction he was glaring at so intensely, the smile faded from her face.

"Oh, no," she said. "Don't, Jack. You're going to hurt yourself and ruin the picnic."

"No I won't," he responded playfully. "I've done this dozens of times."

"That doesn't mean—"

Her protests fell on deaf ears. Before she'd barely gotten out those three words, Jack took a running start and vaulted off the fence toward a thin tree branch hanging out over the sidewalk. Rapunzel felt her stomach drop as his arms reached out to grab it and he used his momentum to swing the rest of his body up toward the sky. His feet barely avoided crashing through the leaves above before they came falling back down and landed skillfully on the fence posts. His upper body followed and suddenly he was standing upright again, safe and sound.

Before Rapunzel had a chance to say anything, Jack hopped off the fence and back onto the sidewalk. He spun on his heel to face her and gave a ridiculous bow. "You were saying?"

She rolled her eyes. "You know I just worry about you."

His self-satisfied smirk morphed into a tender smile. He stepped forward and took the blanket from her, folding it with care before tucking it under his arm. Then his free arm snaked around her shoulders. "I know. I'm sorry. I don't mean to worry you." She felt him press a kiss to her temple.

"Then stop being so reckless, Mr. Daredevil," she responded and poked him in the side.

Jack flinched away from her hand, laughing. "All right, all right. Now come on! We need to get to the park while there's still daylight." He proceeded to grab her hand and pull her along behind him as he ran down the sidewalk, taking long strides on his gangly legs that she had trouble keeping up with on her significantly shorter ones.

When they reached the park, Jack spent a good five minutes picking out just the right spot to have their picnic. He insisted it had to be "perfect", though Rapunzel couldn't figure out why he suddenly cared so much for the life of her. Jack had never been what she would call picky, and yet there she was, watching him move from knoll to knoll searching for a place that earned his approval. Finally, he found it in a shady patch of grass under a maple tree.

With a flourish, he whipped the blanket into the air and spread it on the grass. "Here we go," he said, patting the blanket with his hand. "Let's eat."

The pair kicked off their shoes and settled onto the blanket. The meal passed with little conversation. Rapunzel had brought ham sandwiches (Jack's favorite), fruit salad (which he liked less but ate anyway because she made it), potato chips, and, of course, cupcakes for dessert.

At some point through the meal, Rapunzel started to notice Jack becoming tense and jittery. He answered her questions with terse words and started picking at his food halfheartedly, as if his mind was miles away. When she asked him about it, he merely smiled and said he was just distracted. Rapunzel frowned at his odd behavior, but didn't push him to talk. She'd tried that before and it resulted in him clamming up and refusing to say anything at all.

She was worried though. They'd been planning this date for a while and he'd seemed so excited. And after all the fuss with choosing the right spot to eat, she was thoroughly confused when his ecstatic demeanor suddenly took a turn.

Jack was playing with the wrapper on his cupcake, not actually having eaten any of it, when he set it down on the blanket and shifted his body to face her.

"Uh…Rapunzel?"

Rapunzel raised her eyebrows inquiringly, her own cupcake sinking into her lap. "Yes?"

Jack cleared his throat nervously and quickly pulled the baseball cap off of his head, bending the brim back and forth for a moment before he tossed it aside. "I—I made you something. Well, actually I wrote it. It was a really long time ago but I wanted to give it to you now because—" He huffed in frustration. "Well…here." He reached into the breast pocket of his button-up shirt and pulled out a piece of paper folded into fourths.

She took it from him a bit uncertainly, heart suddenly pounding against her chest. Already she could feel her cheeks heating up and wasn't sure why.

"Don't open it yet," Jack urged, placing his hand on hers. "I have something I want to tell you." He then took a deep breath and took both of her hands in his. They felt so small enveloped in his palms. "Rapunzel, I…I'm not very good with words but I want you to know that…that I don't know what I would do without you. I've barely known you for a year, but already I can't imagine my life without you in it. I used to like being alone and I never thought I'd feel this way about anyone, but I love being with you. And I hope we can be together till the day that I die." His sapphire eyes bore deep into her emerald ones, speaking much louder than his words ever could. "What I mean to say is…Rapunzel, I love you." A timid yet joyful smile flitted across his features for a second. "I've never been in love before, but I'm sure of it."

For a moment, the world had stopped. For a moment, everything was perfect. And for a moment, Rapunzel was bursting with a joy she'd never felt before and would never feel again. It took her a while to realize that there were tears brimming in her eyes. She blinked, causing them to spill down her cheeks.

Jack reached up and brushed them away with his thumb. "Punzie?"

A wide smile as bright as the sun split across her face. She leaned her head towards his and whispered, "I love you too, Jack."

And then she closed the gap between them by pressing her lips against his with so much force it knocked him backward. They spent the rest of the afternoon that way, lying together on the blanket under the maple tree with a golden sky above them. The little piece of paper stayed tucked away in Rapunzel's pocket, forgotten in those few hours of bliss.

It was not forgotten now. Now it was her lifeline, the only thing she had left of him that she could cling to. Those memories of that one perfect afternoon when she thought they were invincible, when nothing could go wrong, when life was better than she ever imagined possible, had warped into nightmares that came back only to taunt her and draw more tears from her eyes right when she thought she'd finally run dry.

She would never forget the screeching sound of the brakes, the crunch of shattering glass, the squeal of metal meeting metal, Jack screaming her name. They became like background music that played constantly when she was asleep and awake. But the thing that haunted her most was the crack that resonated louder than everything else when his body was flung forward by another violent jolt and his skull met the dashboard with shattering impact.

She was safe. She'd been saved. Somehow he'd managed to undo her seatbelt and push her into the backseat. She would never understand how. A miracle, perhaps. Or maybe a curse.

Because she was safe and he wasn't. She was alive.

He wasn't.

And somehow she was expected to go on living.

One day. She'd experienced the moment that brought the peak of her happiness and the one that had sent the world crashing down around her in one day. The only thing that gave her any kind of consolation was the fact that Jack had gotten his wish. They'd been together till the day he died.

Through her thick, heaving sobs, Rapunzel wailed, "I told you not to be reckless, Jack! I told you! You're so stupid! You never listen! I hate you! I hate you!"

She wept and wept for what seemed like ages. When her tears finally began to run out, she found herself curled up in a ball on her bedroom floor with a pounding headache. Slowly, she relaxed her muscles, sore from being tensed up for so long.

Then she unclenched her fist. The paper was crumpled, but thankfully not torn. She unfolded it and smoothed it out, sniffling as her crying quieted. But as soon as she glanced at it, tears suddenly flooded her eyes again. She didn't know whether to hold onto it for all it was worth or tear it up and burn the scraps. All she knew was that it was the last thing she had of Jack's, and as long as she kept it, it would serve as a reminder of both the wonderful afternoon they'd shared and of the hellish night that had taken him from her.

So she ended up locking it away, not daring to destroy it but completely unable to look at it.

There, in a little box beneath her bed, laid the last thing she'd received from Jack Frost, just a piece of wrinkled notebook paper with his scrawling handwriting and a photograph taped to it. The picture had been taken on their first date with Jack's phone camera. It showed the two of them at the state fair, smiling like the innocent kids they were. Jack's arms were full of cotton candy and boiled peanuts, while Rapunzel's were hugging the giant stuffed chameleon he'd won for her. The quality of the photo was grainy and a bit blurred, but the happiness on their faces could easily be seen.

And underneath it, he'd written a message to her:

Dear Punzie,

Well, we've been dating for two months now. And I honestly think they've been the best two months of my life. School just let out for the summer and I can't wait to spend it with you (before we become seniors!). We're going to have a lot fun, I know it!

I guess the real reason I'm writing you this letter is because I don't know if I'll ever have the guts to say this otherwise. I'm not poetic or anything, so I hope you don't think I sound completely stupid. You probably will though. Anyway, here goes.

I think you're the most beautiful girl in the whole world. You're fun to be with and you always know what to say. I just love when I get to spend time with you because you make me really happy. I know we fight sometimes, but that doesn't matter because nothing you say will make me not want to be with you. And if I ever accidentally hurt you…I hope you'll forgive me. I would NEVER hurt you on purpose.

I just want you to know how much you mean to me. And that I'll always be here for you, no matter what. I think I'm falling in love with you, Punzie. And I hope you're falling in love with me too, because you're like my sunshine and I don't want to live without you.

I hope that didn't sound too corny. I just wanted you to know how I feel. I meant every word. (Now I just have to work up the courage to give this to you, haha.)

Love,

Jack

Rapunzel read the letter exactly one time in the twelve months following his death. For a long time, she couldn't bear to think of it. He'd written it a little less than a year before that fatal day, back when they hadn't been dating very long. It seemed like ages ago now. So much had happened since then.

On the one-year anniversary of the accident, she found it within herself to unlock the box that hadn't been touched for three hundred and sixty-five days and unfold the crinkly, brittle paper. Her heart was still tender and ached at the sight of his boyish face and lopsided grin, so full of love and joy and mischief. But another part of her was able to smile at the memories the letter brought. She couldn't have that year with him back, but she wouldn't trade it for anything.

"Jack Frost, I'll love you till the day I die."