Day Five: Cold
Mirabel sat looking out of her fifth-floor dorm window at the white flakes falling from the sky. She cracked the window open and put her hand out. Little white flecks dropped onto her hand and immediately melted. Tia Pepa's snow would often melt before it even hit the ground, seeing so much of it in person was just fascinating. Still, the unstable weather patterns here made her miss her Tia, then her parents, then her abuela.
While she never experienced this much actual snow before. She'd read books about the stuff and yesterday the weather was nice, not too cold but blustery. Today… snow. Mirabel shivered when the wind swirled into her room, bringing some snowflakes along with it. The weather in this part of the United States was so unpredictable, and she noticed it was starting to cover the ground. Mirabel wondered how long it would snow for as she pushed the window closed.
It was quiet here, sometimes a little too quiet. She didn't realize just how much she would miss the random tile movements that had been a part of her life since she was a baby.
She didn't have any classes today, so went to her desk and turned on her laptop. She promised her Mamá she would write her an email every day. It would be nice if she could call, but cell service was sketchy at best in the mountains. She kinda regretted that promise, but being the youngest of her mom's kids, it was her cross to bear. On the upside, Christmas was coming, and she would be going home to Colombia soon. She hoped she'd be able to see them all, but Tío Bruno was in Mexico to pitch a movie. Isabela was somewhere in Chile doing plant surveys of endangered species for her postgraduate of something or other.
Mirabel clicked her email box and found she had a number of emails from Antonio. She smiled when she realized they had all been sent within minutes of each other. He did that whenever he had something to tell her that he forgot to put in the last one. She counted a total of seven from him, and she noticed she had one from Camilo. That almost never happened, before she could open it, there was a gentle knock on her door.
Mirabel got up and opened it to find Luisa standing there holding out a coat, some gloves and a knitted cap. Luisa lived off campus. She was set to graduate in the spring next year, and that was why Mira was at this university. When she was sixteen, she tested out of secondary school, so her parents decided she could go to university early but only if she went to this university. But if she had to be stuck in the middle of nowhere America, Luisa was the one she'd want to be stuck with.
"Come on, Mira. There's finally enough snow on the ground to make a snowman," Luisa said as she came into her room.
Mira took the coat, hat and gloves but said, "I was just getting ready to... "
"Whatever it is, do it later. It's getting late, and it'll be dark soon," Luisa said and handed her the boots they'd gone shopping for the month before. "Seriously, Mira, you haven't even taken the tags off."
"I like my regular shoes."
"Not in the snow, you won't."
Mirabel shrugged and took the boots. She glanced back at her desk and then at the window. She didn't like being out after dark, and these days it was dark by six o'clock. The snow was really coming down, and she thought, why not. So once she was geared up, they headed out into the winter wonderland and made a snowman.