I shoved my hands in my pockets, gazing downwards at the snow-covered pavement. The cold bit at my exposed nose, at which I pulled my scarf up to cover it. In my right hand, there was book on mythology, which our class had discussed earlier today. A blue tab stuck out from somewhere in the middle of the book, marking my page. It was the section about this one personification of winter, Old Man Winter. However, today, he would be more commonly known as Jack Frost.
This Jack Frost was my assignment for school. All the students picked a myth this morning, and I had settled with this wintry one. Our homework over the weekend was to write an essay about our subjects.
The blare of a car horn snapped me out of my thoughts. I glanced up to find my mother waiting in her car and calling for me. I hurried over, shaking the snow from my jacket and settling in the passenger seat. My sister climbed in a few minutes later, and Mom pulled out of the school parking lot.
"Do you know anything about Jack Frost?" I casually asked, pulling my scarf down to free my mouth and nose. "We're just writing essays on myths in my class." I added on, to explain my question. Mom wrinkled her nose a bit, thinking.
"I never knew much about myths. Just a silly legend to make sure kids keep their coats on, or something." She replied. Jessica, my sister, peered over the top of my seat.
"Jack Frost? My friend wrote an essay on him last year." She told me as she settled back down in her seat. "I don't know much, though. Like what Mom said. I heard our neighbor telling her kids to wear their coats, or else Jack Frost would get them on the nose or something. Kinda dumb." The adolescent shrugged. I nodded in reply.
"He's just something parents use on their kids?" I flipped open the library book to my tabbed page. At the end of Jack Frost's section, I read, "In more modern mythology he is often the being that parents will warn their child of in frosty winter mornings before they go outside, as it is said he will pull tricks on them and cause their extremities to become cold."
"Think he's real?" Jessica inquired from behind me. I shook my head as the car stopped at a crossroads. The red light stopped all the incoming vehicles.
"No, not really." I replied, snapping the book shut. "It's a myth. Like everything else. You know, Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Leprechaun and whatnot."
A strange cracking sound resonates from my left. I can only describe it as the sound you hear when you pour water on ice, and the ice sort of breaks into chunks. A bewilderment filled my brain, for I did not see the window breaking, but frosting. Thin, icy swirls of frost curled about the window, lining the edges in beautiful designs. Mom or Jess hadn't heard or noticed, and I felt my mouth slowly opening. I looked back at Mom, who was beginning to move the car forward.
The red light blinked into green, and as the car moved forward and I turned to look back at the window, I could see a clean streak right through the frost, as if a hand had slid over it. I squinted, gazing curiously at the strange site.
I remained quiet for the rest of the car ride. When we arrived home, I dropped my book bag at the foot of my desk, and set to reading through the Jack Frost section of my book.
There wasn't must to be said of him, aside from other names and his origin. Nothing about frosting windows. I set to surfing the Internet, flipping open my laptop and opening a Google Chrome window. Through Google, I searched for information on Jack Frost.
Half an hour passed before I wondered why I was so hung up on this. Was I on the verge of believing in him? I mean, I had seen a relatively unusual occurrence earlier, while I had been discussing the person. I rubbed my eyes tiredly, leaning back in my chair. Was he real? There was no proof he wasn't. It was the same with all other 'myths.' There was no proof to their existence, yet no proof to their nonexistence.
With a sort of strange hope in my heart, I slipped into my jacket and wrapped my scarf around my neck and left the house. No one noticed as I closed the deck door quietly. Out in the cold air, I breathed slowly, feeling really weird. I cautiously made my way down the icy, wooden steps that led to the back door to my house, and as my feet touched down on the thick snow, a cool wind breezed by.
I sucked in a sharp breath of air, looking around. The sky was bright blue, devoid of the clouds that had caused this snow the previous day. The freshly fallen snow was powdery and not yet hard, and it sparkled cleanly. Looking up, I willed myself to speak out loud.
"Jack Frost?" I called out, my hands clenching at my sides. A few minutes passed before I was feeling painfully foolish. Oh well, it was worth a try. A slight disappointed welled up in my chest, and I tried to shrug it off. There had been many a time I had wanted something out of the ordinary to happen. Life was so boring, and I usually spent it in front of my computer, playing video games. I sighed quietly, turning around to head back inside.
Something hard hit my back, and I stumbled forward, falling into a large drift of snow. The cold hit my face a lot more than the rest of my body, considering it wasn't covered at all. I struggled to get up, the wild hope flaring back up. A smile had put itself on my face as I recognized that a snowball had hit me. Maybe he's real. Maybe he really exists.
I still expected some random kid to be standing at the foot of hill, obnoxiously lobbing snowballs at anyone nearby. However, there was no one else there. I wiped the melting snow off my face, and hurriedly called out ago. "J-Jack Frost?"
I felt wild and childlike, curious and filled with a wonder I hadn't felt in a relatively long time as I sought a sign, something, anything to show that extraordinary things existed.
I looked down the hill all the way towards the bottom and found nothing. It was then I looked behind me and I saw my purple, plastic toboggan sitting there, ready to be ridden. I blinked and took a step backwards, in surprise. Was this the doing of Jack Frost? I couldn't wrap my mind around the fact that something magical was happening. Suddenly, something hooked around my foot and pulled it in front of me, effectively making me trip backwards. My eyes instinctively squeezed shut as I fell, and then I was sitting on my toboggan.
Somehow I was accepting this, that there was really a Jack Frost. And from the events that took place I had no way to ignore it. I was so willing to believe in it because I had wanted it so… I had wanted to see this sort of thing before. I was suddenly brought back to a time several , several years ago in which I had stayed awake in my bed, watching the window. A bowl of berries and sat on the sill. I was awaiting the flower fairies.
Sadly, I had eventually fallen asleep and then woke up disappointed. However, disappointment was not present in my mind now. I watched as the snow before me hardened into smooth ice, and lengthened into a long track, arching into a bridge as it reached the bottom of the hill and crossed over the street into the forest. I immediately went to settle myself properly on the seat of the toboggan. There'd barely been time to do so before I felt the something nudge at my back.
The toboggan went flying, scratching down the ice. My scarf came unraveled as I reached the beginning of the ramp. I held my breath as I went upward, the ramp curving backwards to make a loop.
Oh man.
An exhilarated whoop escaped my mouth. I felt almost as if I were flying. I held onto the toboggan rope tightly, the wind biting at my face as I turned sharply, crossing over the street. I had a split second to stare in front of me as I raced into the forest. My arms instinctively went up to shield my face; however, not a single branch touched me.
I peeked between my arms, and to my joy I found myself sailing through a sea of treetops. The ice track was appearing just as quickly as my toboggan was racing. Adrenaline coursed through my veins and then I let out another whoop. I raised my hands, a mad surge of dare taking over me. I screamed loudly when I suddenly felt the sled leave the track.
It felt like time slowed down for a brief moment, as the toboggan lay suspended in air. The track of ice had ended, and my sled made an arc through the air.
The toboggan came out from under me and then I was soaring through empty air. Terror quickly replaced the exhilaration I had previously had, and my yell of happiness comically turned into a strange yelp of fear. My arms began to flail wildly, sort of like a rag doll.
I suddenly felt a pressure close around my gloved hand, yanking me up just before I fell down to a painful death. Dangling by just my hand, I stared down at the frozen lank below me. I had reached a clearing in the forest that had contained a large pond of water, thought it had been frozen at this time in winter. I sucked in a few breaths, watching my legs sway a bit as I descended. It was then I realized that the only possible thing that could be holding me up was Jack Frost.
I looked up as my booted feet touched the ice, and was then greeted with the figure of a teenage boy. My jaw dropped a bit as I stared up into frosty blue eyes. So this is Jack Frost.
The boy was clothed in a blue sweatshirt, with snow and frost dotting the top. His brown pants reached down to mid-calf, black tape binding the hems to his legs. He had slightly wild, spiked hair that was just as white as the snow surrounding us. I blinked, watching as he touched down in front of me, letting go of my hand, which he had clasped in his own earlier to stop me from plummeting to a gory, icy death.
"Jack Frost?" I spoke first, awe coloring my voice as I absently rubbed the hand he had held. His mouth stretched into a grin, nodding.
"That's me." He replied, leaning on his staff. His voice hung in the air as I took in the fact that I was speaking to Jack Frost. The myth.
Thought, I guess he's not really a myth now.