And so December ended, Christmas and New Years came and went, and I found myself participating in all of the festivities involved in aforementioned holidays despite my serious lacking of Holiday Cheer. Luke was invited to every major party throughout the season, and as his official girlfriend, I was vicariously invited as well.

Officially.

And so I forced myself to suffer through the sociality; armed with a fake smile, stagnant perfume and a large purse full of antidepressants.

The only thing that kept me from leaping in front of a speeding Greyhound at any given time during winter break was the abnormal lack of snow.

Abnormal as in, I lived in Manhattan. Snow was more common there than rancid, inappropriate sunburns at a nude beach.

And 'during winter break' as in, four days back into the school routine, we were hit with a Bumble of a snow storm.

So the first day of February, I squatted at the edge of my back yard, tying the end of a roll of heavy-duty twine to the pole of my old swing set.

The crunching of boots on snow behind me barely deterred my attentions as I practiced a crude rendition of a Clove Hitch knot.

Hey, I might have been an M.I.A. Girl Scout, but I had recently become engrossed in the Boy Scout Manuel.

Well, I got through the table of contents anyway.

"What are you doing?"

I didn't need to look up to recognize Alex's voice, "Setting up a trip wire." I answered, twisting some of the thick wire around my finger.

"What for?"

The wire cut into said finger. I shook it off and stuck my finger in the snow, "Snowmobilers."

"Snowmobilers." Alex repeated.

"Snowmobilers." I said again, wrapping the wire around the pole three more times.

Alex squatted down beside me, "May I ask why?"

"Of course, but I can't guarantee that you'll fully comprehend the answer."

"I expect no less."

I grew frustrated with the Clove Hitch and resigned myself to the much less difficult 'mess-of-regular-knots-and-nicked-off-flesh' Hitch.

I lowered my voice menacingly as I gave him my reason, "I despise them."

"Snowmobilers?"

"Snowmobilers."

Alex reached forward and picked up my large roll of thick twine, "How come?"

"They sound pollute the air within my ear shot."

"Savages." Alex sighed, turning the spool around in his hand.

I searched the snow bank for a moment before realizing he had pilfered it. Grabbing it from his hand like a toddler grabbing back his favorite Lego, I nodded my head, "Exactly."

"So what happens when they hit the tripwire?" Alex asked, resting back on his heels and folding his hands in front of him thoughtfully.

"They die." I answered nonchalantly.

Alex made a contemplative and understanding face, "Tragic."

I stood up, finally satisfied with my cluster-fuck of knots and headed across the alley, "I suppose."

"Does Luke snowmobile?" Alex asked from his perch back by the swing set.

As I crouched down again, pulling the line tight, I paused to gaze at the bright blue sky, "I never considered that."

Alex stood and took a few steps to lower himself onto a damp wooden swing, "Maybe you should find out before he cruises on over here and disfigures that pretty face of his."

"Ahh, wouldn't that be unfortunate?"

"You're dating correct?"

I glanced up at the insinuation in his tone, then returned my attention to the new mess of sharp string and specks of precious knuckle blood I was creating around my neighbor's chain link fence, "Is that what you kids are calling it these days?" I shook my head, "I'll never keep up."

I heard the swing creak as Alex pushed himself backwards with his foot, "When did this happen?"

"You tell me. You've obviously been paying better attention than I have."

"Are you crazy?"

The twine sliced into the skin on my palm, "Define crazy."

Alex got up and trudged his way through the two feet of snow piled high in my backyard due to malicious snow plows, "Soph, come on."

I looked up at him and bit back a laugh as he stumbled into a cleverly disguised chasm, bringing him knee deep in gravelly snow.

He grumbled and attempted to lift his leg out of the hole, resulting in an awkward sort of Weeble ballet.

I like to call; Swan Weeble . . . Weeble Lake . . . or maybe, The Weeblecracker.

Whatever you call it, poor Alexy ended up drenched and dirty and even less receptive of my humorous forestalling.

After he sent me a rather malevolent glare, I managed to camouflage my laughter as a hiccup and paused in my rabid trap setting to sit back on my heels and smile up at him innocently.

"Alright, we started going out a little over a month ago."

"Why?" Alex asked almost absently as he dusted snow from his pants and hat.

I shrugged, "I don't know . . . because he apologized." I laughed and slapped my hands down on my thighs, "All he did was call me a name. I was wrong, technically, and he apologized and P-" I cut myself off, choking on the name before it came out.

Alex had ceased his mad arm flinging and was staring down at me sympathetically, "I'm sorry, Soph."

I shook my head, partially to discourage his pity and partially to discourage my own. I turned back to my wire, "I just want a shot at being happy, ya know?"

"How's that going?" Alex asked softly, gesturing to my knot-tying but meaning my pursuit of happiness.

I scrunched up my face as I tried to free my pinkie from a particularly nasty accumulation of wire, "Not extraordinarily well."

It was true of both.

Alex sighed and bent down to help me. It took him a matter of seconds to unwind the sharp twine from around my finger, and as I stuck it into my mouth to nurse it back to it's maximum utility, he gazed at me directly, making me feel unpleasantly exposed.

"But you're going to stay with him."

I hesitated before picking up my spindle of wire and wrapping even more around the fence, " . . . for now."

Alex shook his head disapprovingly, but didn't utter another word against my decision. Instead he arched his neck to look behind him at the tight line of string that ran across the alley.

"Wow, " He mused thoughtfully, "You really set up a tripwire."

I let out an overdramatic sigh, as if his lack of automatic belief in me was draining, "I told you, I despise them."

He reached forward and gave the wire a pluck, "Obviously."