IIIII

Chapter One: The Snowflake

IIIII

In a chilly town in upstate Vermont, a small child was sitting at a piano, his father watching carefully behind him. Every time he missed a note his father would wince slightly. Years later, he had had enough wincing.

"Gabriel."

The teenager said nothing.

"Gabriel I'm speaking to you."

"Yes father I heard." Gabriel murmured. At seventeen Gabriel looked like the son every Denings banker could want. He had ashy blonde hair and was tall, with blue eyes like his fathers. He'd spent his whole life inside reading, so he wasn't that muscular but was still lean. But that was the key word, looked, not was.

"You were caught hurling eggs at a poor mans house. Why would you do such a thing?"

Gabriel fidgeted with some of his dinner, "Rickerts thought it'd be fun. I dunno...seemed funny at the time."

"Funny? We've been this town's bankers for over a century, and you want to tarnish such a good name with hooliganry?"

"I apologize for my actions father." Gabriel mumbled while looking into his lap.

"Well here is your punishment." His father fixed his tie and stood up out of his chair, "We've had the money to send you to Welton for ages. Your mother always insisted you shouldn't but I have had enough. Enough of your B's in school, enough mediocrity. A Denings must always be a gentlemen. Now you will learn the true meaning of being a man in this family."

Gabriel didn't even protest, he knew that complaining would be pointless.

"I'll drive you there to be enrolled tomorrow."

His son nodded and left to his room truly curious about how the next couple of months would play out in this new predicament of his.

IIIII

John Keating's voice filled his classroom as he spoke to the boys holding a book, "But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun. That thou, her maid-"

"Uh-I'm sorry am I in the right classroom?" Gabriel asked in his soft voice, knocking on the doorway's arch with a confused look on his face.

"Um, I don't know are you? Boys is he?" Mr. Keating looked around the room, making his students snicker suddenly while staring at the new tall boy.

"S-Sir I-"

"Please." Mr. Keating smiled warmly, "Come over here to the front of the class son." Gabriel obliged and took his spot uncomfortably in front of the entire class, the boys' eyes following him the entire time as he walked past the rows of desks, "Now Mr..."

"Denings. Gabriel Denings."

"Now Mr. Denings. Please continue to read the passage." Mr. Keating picked up an apple off his desk and threw it into the air, letting it land in his palm while sitting on the edge of it. The English teacher passed the boy his book and nodded.

Gabriel cleared his throat, his ocean blue eyes darting around the classroom quickly, before dropping down to read from the text, "All right then. Art far more fair than she. Be not her maid since she is envious. Her vestal livery is but sick and green, and none but fools do wear it. Cast it off! It is my lady. Oh, it is my love. Oh, that she knew she were! She speaks, yet she says nothing. What of that?"

"Now, without looking at the front of the book, from what play is this Mr. Denings?"

"Romeo and Juliet of course sir. What is your name sir?"

"Mr. Keating, call me Captain please Mr. Denings."

"Of course Mr. Captain." Gabriel shook his blonde hair in the air nervously again as the classroom chuckled from their seats, "I-I-I mean Captain."

"How do you know this passage so well?"

"I performed it. In last years rendition of this work."

"Hey I saw you in that! I remember now!" A boy exclaimed and pointed at the blonde out of his seat, making the class snicker again as Mr. Keating leaned forward and tilted his head to the side a little.

"It is not your turn to speak Mr. Perry." The kind man smiled.

"Sorry Captain." The thespian shrunk back into his desk.

"Now Mr. Denings. What is the passage about?"

"The passage in particular sir?" Gabriel asked, as Mr. Keating rose off the edge of his desk and walked around him in a contemplative pace.

"Yes, what is the passage about?" Mr. Keating repeated, rolling a hand forward to indicate he wanted Gabriel to keep speaking while appearing at his left side.

"Love sir. Love."

"Good!" Mr. Keating nodded and raised a sudden eyebrow.

"It's about Romeo's love for Juliet."

"Indeed it is. Which is why I want you all to write three full length poems about love." Mr. Keating nodded to the class, "Find something that inspires you." He started to pace towards the class in front of Gabriel, raising a vigorous hand forward, "Find something or someone you love and write a poem about it." He checked the silver watch on his wrist, "And that is all the time we have for today."

The class filed out with their textbooks in hand, chatting to each other in a loud buzz. Then Mr. Keating motioned over Gabriel to his desk while sitting at it, waving towards himself with a pair of fingers.

"Son, how often do you find yourself writing poetry?"

"Sir?" Gabriel asked.

"How often? Daily, weekly?"

Gabriel bit his lip tightly, "Father never allows me to write poetry. He said acting was enough."

Mr. Keating chuckled, throwing his nose to the hallway, "If you are indeed an actor as you say you are, go speak to Mr. Perry, I'm sure you two have a lot to talk about."

"Yes sir. Thank you Mr. Captain." Gabriel nodded before breathing in tightly and widening his eyes frustratingly, realizing his mistake.

The man chuckled once more, leaning back in his desk chair and throwing an apple into the air as Gabriel walked off to do as Mr. Keating said, almost as if it was an order. Mr. Keating withdrew an old notebook from inside a dusty drawer, and flopped it on to the desk.

He flipped past numbers of old poems before reaching a blank page and reached for a pen sitting in a cup at the edge of his desk where he always loved to sit. As the ink ran from its silvery depths and onto the paper, brilliance sprung forth like a fountain from Mr. Keating's mind.

When a single snowflake lands on a nose, that chill of a touch must kiss like no other. The fairest maid nor the brightest star may match its power, for its unique taste cannot be acquired any where else.