I'm sick and therefore stuck at home on a Friday night; I got bored, I updated. Don't expect updates this quickly all the time, haha. Thanks so much for all the positive feedback! It's so sweet, seriously. This chapter's pretty boring, I know, but stick with me, I swear it'll get better.

I don't own Inception or any of the characters, etc. etc. I wouldn't mind owning JGL, but sadly, I don't.

December 1st, 1995

It's snowing. I know for a fact that present day Ariadne hates the snow. She says it just makes her uncomfortable, and she never liked the cold anyway. And it really is fucking cold right now, so I immediately start glancing around for the clothes I told her to leave, thankful to find them just a few seconds away from me, neatly folded. It's a pair of slacks and a button-up shirt, and she's had the sense to put a jacket with it. The fact that she's thinking about making sure I'm not cold makes me smile as I trudge through a deep snow bank around the back of her house, wondering if she always felt that way about the cold and snow, or if I might find her frolicking (while I can't particularly envision her frolicking exactly, the word seems to fit and I don't find the time to correct myself) around building snowmen or snow forts.

I can't help but smile to myself when I see that I'm right.

She's in the middle of trying to lift the head to her snowman up, but she's small, and she can't quite manage. I'm about six paces away from her, ready to help her, when she loses her grip completely and the head smashes on the ground. She looks as though she's going to cry before she glances to the side and catches sight of me, a cautious smile widening across her previously depressed face.

"I didn't think you were going to come."

"It's the day I wrote down, isn't it? December 1st?" For a moment, I'm a little startled, wondering if I've mixed the dates up and I'm late, or I'm early.

"No, it is," she says tentatively. "I just didn't think it was going to happen."

"Do you need some help?"

For a moment she doesn't understand what I'm asking to help her with, and she looks at me, puzzled. But then she follows my gaze to the snowman standing headless behind her, and she sighs dejectedly. "It's too heavy."

I smile warmly down at her and she beams back up at me, and she reaches to grab at my hand, her mouth turning to a frown when she realizes I'm not wearing mittens. "You're going to get frost bite," she tells me sagely, looking up at me with a face that mothers use to reprimand misbehaving children. I'm about to reply and tell her it's her fault I don't have mittens anyway when she shakes her head and turns back towards the house.

"Wait here. I think my Daddy has some mittens that will fit you." She starts back up towards her house, but suddenly turns and pauses. "So… stay."

The fact that she's acting as though I'm a dog is enough to make me chuckle, and in a flash she's turned back around and darting through the yard and into the house. I vaguely wonder if her parents even know she's outside; she's told me before that her father wasn't ever around much, something about being a surgeon, and her mother wasn't ever very maternal. She had a nanny, or a nana, or something. I'm having trouble remembering, and for a moment that bothers me, but then she's reappeared with a pair of large gloves in her hands, holding them up to me expectantly.

"Now you can help me," she says with a firm nod, reaching for my hand again and pulling me towards the headless snowman. The bottom and middle parts are perfectly sculpted balls of snow; at seven, she's already a perfectionist. I vaguely wonder how much time she's spent on it, but I'm distracted when she starts rolling the start of the head around in the snow to make it larger.

"Do you need help with that?" I offer, not wanting to intrude, but at the same time not wanting a repeat of a few minutes ago.

"No," she tells me indignantly, almost admonishing me. "I can roll it, I just can't lift it."

I smirk and nod, shoving my hands in the pockets of my jacket and watching her carefully spiral the ball around and around the yard. It takes her about two minutes to be completely satisfied, and she's ended right at my feet, balancing her weight on her knees and looking up at me through the curtain of hair that's only gotten longer since the last time I've seen her.

"You can lift it now."

I obligingly stoop down and lift it gingerly in my hands, making my way over to the snowman as she trails behind me, mumbling things under her breath, believing I'll drop it and all her work will have been for nothing.

"How come you didn't visit me for so long?"

It's out of the blue and startles me slightly, and I glance behind me. She's stopped in her tracks, an odd, puzzled look on her face as she watches me silently and gently settle the head on the rest of the body. I'm expecting some sort of smile or praise, but she continues to just stare at me, expecting an answer.

"I can't control the times that I come to see you," I begin slowly, trying to figure out how to explain this in a way that a seven year old could comprehend.

"But you knew exactly what day you'd come back," she retorts, irritated with me.

"Because I have a list."

"But… a list of what?"

"A list of days that I've come to see you before."

I can tell I've confused her, because her eyebrows are furrowing and I can practically see the wheels spinning viciously in her head.

"I don't understand."

"It's... complicated, Ariadne."

"You can call me Ari. You did last time."

"Alright. It's complicated, Ari."

This doesn't satisfy her, and for a second I think she's going to huff and storm off, and I'm sure the amused smile that comes to my face does nothing to pacify her. After a few seconds, I sigh and plop down in the snow. She mimics me, expecting a long-winded explanation, I'm sure.

"You see, I'm from the future," I start, watching her face. I can tell she doesn't believe me.

She laughs, but it's more of a disbelieving bark than anything else. "That's not possible."

"Of course it is."

"No, it's not."

I ignore her.

"I'm from the future, a future where you're much older." I pause, let her digest it. "You're 22 when I meet you for the first time. Well, the first time that I remember you - the first time all of our chronology just... naturally converges. I'm 29 then."

I've lost her, and I think about stopping, but she opens her mouth.

"You're not 29 right now?"

"Well, yes. But I'm... time traveling, like I said."

"This isn't making any sense."

"I told you, Ari, it's complicated."

She sighs, chewing on her lip, her eyes flickering repeatedly from me to the hands folded politely in her lap.

"In the future, you have this… pad of paper. And it has all these dates in it."

The wheels are turning again.

"They're dates that I've come to see you, before I'm 29 and you're 22."

"You mean the pad you wrote in the last time?" she asks, excitedly, like she's sort of starting to understand. She won't fully understand until she's older, and I know that, but she's smart for a seven year old.

"Yes. And, you see, I've memorized the dates from that pad. Then you'll know when I'm coming."

She's about to ask another question, but I hear someone calling her name from inside her house.

"I have to go. My Nana's calling me."

Right, Nana. Not a nanny.

"August 2nd, 1997."

She pauses, unsure of what to make of that, before the realization dawns in her eyes. "Okay."

"Make sure you write it down on your pad, okay? August 2nd, 1997."

"I will. Promise."

With that, she's bounding through the snow and back to her house. I smile fondly at her retreating form, glancing back the snowman and vaguely wondering if she's going to come back out and dress him up like my sister always enjoyed, but I disappear before I can start imagining it.