The sand shifts around him as his eyes open, they form the shape of a woman.
"Jack."
Her voice crushes his heart like a tin can, making him feel frozen.
He can see her face and it's a bit gray, whether from the shadows or something else he doesn't know. It doesn't matter because it's Elisa.
Elisa whose beautiful features are scrunched up as she repeats his name, looking for all the world like someone filled with a painful, disdain
filled hatred.
The face is directed at him and his dented tin heart is shot with arrows and daggers from her eyes.
Something is thrown at his feet and it's flowers, frosted and frozen white with his good-bye kiss.
"How dare you!" her voice shouts, sounding as twisted as her face and warped to echo and screech in his ears.
"You frozen nightmare!"
Her arms, pale and leading to bony wrists, are visible in the dark shadows, raised and aimed to strike at him.
He cowers before his first love, her ugly, rage filled face and her limbs ready to lash out at him.
He steps back and he hears more than sees her first attempt to hit him.
"I don't love you!"
His heart finally cracks in to broken fragments and it's like the ice breaking beneath his feet as he stumbles for a second.
"E-elis-"
"Don't!" she hisses, lips peeled back to sneer at him, "I don't want you!"
He flinches back and turns flying away.
"Just leave Jack!" she howls at his back.
The wind blows in his ears as he hears her final words to him.
"Just leave!"
Jack
Jack
Jack...
Jack sits up gasping, eyes wide and hollow with fear and pain. His mouth parts open in a silent jagged gasp.
The winds blowing, knocking the windows against the wall loudly.
It blows in his face and he whispers an automatic 'I'm fine' to it, forcing his body to relax.
The upheaval of his emotions is a dump so he just decides to drop it. He clenches his eyes shut and tries to clear his mind, tracing intricate frost fern patterns and forming perfect little snowflakes.
When he opens his lids those soft perfect snowflakes are falling into gray fur and the frost is travelling down jagged icicles that dare anyone to come close.
Except someone did.
Bunnymund eyes him with a hard concerned gaze.
The Pooka's body is shivering and Bunny, not normally one to ignore his discomfort, just says nothing.
Instead he watches Jack's face steadily.
Jack's eyes, in contrast, are frantic as panic fills him again. The wind picks up. Snowfalls in flurries.
A paw comes to rest on his arm. It's tender gesture and not one Jack is used to.
It's nice and sends a shot of comfort from the touch, spreading warmth to his heart.
The fragments feel of it feel like the pieces are falling and slotting together and the falling flakes slow to a gentle fall and the wind stops all together.
He reaches his arms out to touch along fur and trace tattoos with meaning not yet known to him.
Bunny moves and he feels the ice and frost almost encasing him cracking and breaking as he is lifted out of the bed.
He clings to Bunny as they go to the hope filled creature's room.
Jack smiles into the fur, even as frozen tears fall and coat his face in a mess.
Elisa may have broken his heart but there is always hope for a feeling such as love.