[I used hopscotch as something small that has a big meaning behind it. I don't know how I explain. Enjoy!]
"Let's play a game. We'll play hopscotch, like we play every day."
Month One
She couldn't play anymore. Just doing a simple act - running - brought back bittersweet, golden memories of the time before that one cold winter where everything went wrong.
She couldn't laugh anymore. How was she to laugh, when guilt pounded her every action to the ground? After all, it was her fault that she was still warm and breathing, and her brother was cold and unmoving. Everything she did reminded her of him; the village resonated with his laughter, their house held mirages of him, cocky smirk upon his face.
People tried to ease the ache. Empty words of comfort were casually tossed towards her like little pebbles meant to draw attention from a large gash.
People tried to make her play. They showered her with presents, a new rubber ball, a brightly colored wooden tip. But how could she toss the ball when her brother wasn't there to catch it? How could she spin the top when her brother wasn't there to knock it over?
She couldn't - and wouldn't - skate anymore. She doubted she ever could. Every winter she had only reminded her of another one her brother had missed. Every Easter egg or Christmas present she got was just another reminder of what her brother didn't have.
She couldn't - and wouldn't - play hopscotch again. Every single chalk square, every smooth pebble thrown only made her think of cracking ice and biting cold, every sensation so vivid she nearly felt the crack beneath her skates again, the breathless fear. She swore shed never play hopscotch again.
Month Five
She watched from the shadows as five young children laughed and nudged each other, as they went one by one for their turn on the hopscotch squares. They had no idea what that game meant to her, to her parents, to the village that her brother had affected. He had left a gaping hole in all of their worlds, especially hers.
A ray of sunshine drifted gently from the sky to land on her face, and that was when she left, shielding herself from the sunlight that shouldn't be there at all, not when her brother wasn't there to appreciate it.
None of the children her brother would have surely loved noticed her absence, their laughter echoing in her ears as she scooted off. She was just as insignificant to them as she was to everyone else.
"You're not invisible, little lady. You're just too quiet."
He should have had so much time left. He should have been able to court a girl he liked, married and start a family. He should have lived to see at least sixty more summers. He hooks have been there to tease her about her husband, her white hairs, her cooking. He should have been there to play with her children and tell them stories of Sir Jack. But he wasn't. And in a way, she hated time, because her brother didn't have enough.
Month Ten
It was almost scary, the resemblance between him and her brother. She had first spotted him on one of her long journeys from the village back home, gone to collect a few random trinkets for her father. She remembered feeling so cold, even with her cloak and shawl, and hating winter so much her hate left a metallic taste in her mouth. Then she had seen him.
Snow white hair and pale skin, clothes much like Jack's last, features identical to her brother's. He was almost an exact replica of her brother, and if his eyes and hair were brown, and skin tanned, she would have thought her brother was still alive.
The next time she was him was as she relaxed by the frozen lake, tending to clumsy stitches with numb fingers. It was incredibly and uncomfortably cold, but her brother had always loved the cold and this particular pond, and it brought her peace to still have a connection with her big brother and be close to him.
The first time she had looked up, she noticed the boy with frozen features. He had been skating on the pond in long, graceful, strides, and as she watched, mesmerized, ice formed beneath his feet and underneath the staff he dragged beside him.
She saw him multiple times after that, but only in winter, and no other season. Soon after, she knew that the boy was a reincarnation, or a spirit of her brother. It gave her comfort to know that her brother a athlete to protect her, dead or alive, and she vowed to keep his memory alive forever.
Year One, Month Three
As she continued to see her brother's spirit - or reincarnation, - she began to wonder what exactly he was. She imagine that he was something magical, or perhaps was an angel or something.
Her brother had always been the 'superman' for her, and now she did not doubt his magical properties.
Her family was worried, thinking that she were insane, perhaps, but she didn't care. They could ship her off to a hospital and she wouldn't have minded, so long as she could still see her brother something-or-other.
Lately, she began to write. She had found one of her brother's unfinished journals, and took it upon herself to finish it. She wrote of his death, and her helplessness. She wrote of her pain, and how her brother's death had affected everyone. She wrote of the endless sobbing she and almost every one else had done, but it was only he who had continued to weep even after her tear had run dry. She wrote down random memories that had just resurfaced, and when one notebook was used to the last scrap, she wrote in another.
As she grew, she realized that the pain of the blade was slowly dulling. Every ounce of pain was poured into each page, and she had nothing else to give. She was an empty jar, contents emptied into her journal. Gradually, she was beginning to let him go.
When she dreamed, she dreamed of her brother, being himself again before his death. She dreamed of him growing wings and sprouting a glowing halo above his head, as he joked, "Mr Neckelson was wrong about me going to Hell, huh?"
Sometimes her brother was serious, sometimes he was joking and teasing. He told her never to give up her belief nor her innocence, teased her about being single forever, told her about who he had become - the white haired boy who spread winter and fun across the world. He told her he'd always be there, and he's never leave unless she wanted him to.
And she listened. Under his cheerful guidance, she became him. She laughed, and played pranks, and ran around as if she were on a sugar rush like her brother often had. She caused so much trouble it was like her brother were still there.
"My little lady," he said, and she punched his shoulder.
He was her best friend, and she was his.
Year One, Month Eleven
Her brother never stopped visiting, and neither did his real-body self. She believed in her brother just as he had told her to last, she believed in him and what he could do.
She waited for winter to come, waited for the boy who was her brother to come, and when he did, she ran out to play with him.
"Y-you can see me?!" He gasped when she called out to him, and replied, "Jack Frost," when she asked for his name.
"Do you want to play?" He asked her, and she said yes. They played, and every winter as she grew older, they skated upon frozen water. She was never scared, because she knew her brother was Jack Frost and she believed in them both.