December started with a bang. At 3:17 in the morning, Braxton Hicks matured into full-blown contractions. Safiya's screams woke up everyone, even Cairo who was out like a rock on the couch downstairs. Alyssa ran a couple of stoplights since the streets were empty of traffic despite Harmony telling her how much her fine would be if she got pulled over. Cairo upheld his promise. In the modern living room-esque hospital room, he held Safiya's hand during every contraction and instructed her how to breathe. Not to be outdone, Harmony rearranged Safiya's pillows, dabbed beads of sweat off her forehead, and fed her ice chips from a spoon like a toddler. Lela paced in front of the flat screen TV counting down until the next contraction while Alyssa read the monitors calling the nurse every time the baby's heart rate dipped. Around 5:39 AM and eight pushes later Ameera Grace entered the world with an exuberant holler.

     "Where's my parka?" Lela yelled. She forged through her closet color-coded like a new carton of crayons. She knew it was there. She took her box of winter wear out the storage days ago when she packed. "It's not in here!"

     Alyssa pranced in the all-white room cradling a bowl of cereal that was mostly milk, "What the hell is a parka?" She lifted the spoon to her mouth.

     "A jacket," Harmony answered poking her head in the door. "It's in your suitcase." She pointed to the black bags sitting by the pink paisley comforter covered bed. Lela turned around with far-away eyes. "It's going to be fine." Harmony's voice was softer, empty of its playfulness. "Take a breath."

      Lela inhaled slowly watching a ray of the sun wash over Alyssa's face. She told them she had OCD. It was the calmness of the hospital room that made her feel like talking. Harmony hugged her like she was about to go off to war and Alyssa typed the initials in her phone to ensure she knew everything about the disorder. Lela still didn't know if Safiya actually comprehended what she said because she was still plagued with the exertion of childbirth.

    Alyssa used her spoon to point to the orange translucent bottles on the dresser, "Take a pill." She suggested during chews.

      Lela released her breath. "Did that two minutes ago." She hunched up her shoulders.

       Safiya walked in looking thrown together in stretched out sweatpants and bleach splattered yellow tee. She yawned without covering her mouth before saying, "Isn't snow your trigger?" Lela nodded trying to shake the anxiety out of her hands. "Then why are you going to Aspen?"

     Lela stopped shaking her hands, "To slay fear."

      Lela began slaying fear the day after Thanksgiving. She let Trevor pay for her car to get towed back to Austin. It wasn't like she had a choice. He made the call without asking her. Wrecked with fear, she watched her orange mini cooper be unhooked from the tow truck in the parking lot of Harvey's Chevrolet Dealership. The used mini cooper she bought with the money she earned after working two jobs, a waiter at a barbecue joint and the neighborhood babysitter. 

It was the first big thing she bought for herself. When she was released from the Oakfall Mental Hospital for the third time her parents were divorced and didn't buy her a bus ticket home. Sylvan picked her up at the gate of Oakfall explaining why her parent's needed a little time. Sylvan tried her best to make an eighteen-year-old Lela feel at home but that night as Lela sat on the floor in the guest room she vowed to take care of herself that way she wouldn't be disappointed.

*****

     Lela knew Trevor was rich but she didn't know how wealthy he was until they pulled up to the hangar housing the private plane chartered for their winter escapade. She laughed when he suggested they all go to his family's cottage in Aspen since no one wanted to go home for the break. She was flat broke after paying her last tuition payment. He told them it would be free and it was his birthright so, she reluctantly signed on after her friends said yes instantly.

       Lela grew tiresome on the plane; she fidgeted in her seat like a kindergartener with a bladder problem. Then the turbulence grew too much for her so she took another Xanax, plugged her earbuds in ears, closed her eyes and repeated the Serenity prayer over and over in her head. The last thing she remembered before drifting off to sleep was Trevor's hand slipping into hers.

       The Voss Aspen cottage was anything but a mere dwelling. It was a three-level mansion; six fireplace bedrooms with covered balconies, seven marble-floored bathrooms, a quaint library tucked away on the first floor, a kitchen any chef would give their right arm to cook in and a backyard with snow covered hills as far as the eye could see.

       The cottage was empty. Everyone had gone off on their own endeavor after rooms were picked. Trevor handed off his and Lela's bag to the butler so he could show her the grounds, his words not hers. A sauna was on the bottom floor; Lela didn't care because she wasn't going to use it. She'd seen too many shows where people met their demise in a malfunction hot box. A heated swimming pool, gym, movie theater, and game room were throughout the house. Nonetheless, Lela stood in front of the picturesque windows in the living room. The stone floors numbed the feeling in bare feet. The crackling of wood from the fireplace made her heart pound faster. She pulled the cowhide-patterned blanket around herself tighter becoming a human tamale.

        "Are you cold?" Trevor sidled next Lela with two mugs in hand. 

      "No." Yes, she was but she didn't want to tell him. He would just feed more wood in the fireplace. She loosened her grip on the blanket to pull one of her hands out. The hot ceramic mug sent a wave of warmth through her hand. She could tell he took a shower. His blonde hair was several shades darker and pulled to his head in a ponytail. A small space in the corner of her mind envied him as he stood there sipping cocoa in the gray knit sweater and jeans. The lazy smile he gave her after he lowered the cup from his lips. She wished she could be as carefree as him. She held the cup to her chest. She turned back to the window watching the snow fall like raindrops.

        He caressed her cheek and she moved her face closer to his hand. "Do you want me to put it out?" He nodded to the stone fireplace that was erected as the focal point of the room. "I can put it out. Just crank up the heat." His hand slid from her cheek, down her neck to settle on her shoulder.

        Lela held the mug up to her mouth letting the steam hit her nose, "I need to do this." She took a big swallow letting the cocoa burn the delicate skin of her throat hoping it would distract her from all the rouge thoughts she prepared to have swarmed in her mind.

     "But all at once?"

      "Yes."

      "Okay." Trevor squeezed her shoulder tight once then dropped his hand. "Just tell me if it gets too much and we'll leave.... go somewhere with less snow and more sand."

       She kissed the rim of the cup with closed eyes. "You checked everything, right." She faced him letting the blanket slip from her shoulders. "No snow on the roof, the chimney is clean, new batteries in the fire alarm, carbon monoxide detectors on...."

      "Lela." Trevor sat his mug on the side table. He took her face in both his hands. "Phillip checked it all before we came."

   "Who's Phillip?"

      "The guy that takes care of the house and everything when no one's here." He wrapped his arms around her shaking body and pulling her into him. "The House's  caretaker."

      "I want to do this for us." Lela rested her head on his chest trying not to waste the cocoa, as she hugged him tighter than he hugged her. 

She was holding on for dear life but the thoughts were coming. "I want to confront this. Death haunts the cold. It rides in on the bitterness of the wind. Sweeping under the creaks of the door, seeping under the window. Seeking a soul to claim." She pulled away from him. 

Her mouth hung open with horror. The way he looked at her, stone-faced and confused made her want to hide under the stairs and never come out. "I've only been here fours hours and I'm talking crazy." Trevor reached for her but she backed away. "I told you I'm crazy."

      "I see what's going on." Trevor nodded to himself with a knowing look on his face. "I gave you two choices." He held up his fingers signaling the choices he gave. "Hawaii or Aspen. You picked this place on purpose."

       "You don't know me. You think you do but, you don't. This is me!" She stabbed her finger in her chest. "This is why I was sent away. This is why my parents got divorced." Her voice broke with sorrow. "This is why they don't want me...why they try to forget me." 

The tears she tried to hold in couldn't be kept down anymore. They poured down her face. She held up her hand trying to stop him from coming closer to her but he did anyway. His steady heartbeat pounded against his hand.

       Trevor placed his hand over hers, "I...want you." Lela shook her head at the words he spoke unable to believe it. So he repeated it. He cradled her neck with his other hand kneel over so they'll eyes were even. "You can't scare me away. I'm not your parents'. I know how it feels to be left.... abandoned and I would never do that to someone I love. So, don't try to run me off."

      She held the blanket bunched around her waist choking back a sob, "I...want to be upfront...because—" She half shrugged chewing on her bottom lip. "Because..." 

     The words got caught in her throat. She fear the words she was about to say more than death because when she said those words she would be giving him a piece of her soul but the way he looked at her like she was the only rose in a field of daffodils; the way he held her hand to his chest like it was glued to his body and the way her racing heart evened to the rhythmic throb of his heart. She couldn't stop those words from spelling out her mouth. 

      "I...love you." She breathed out. 

        Trevor backed away from Lela looking at her like he just received the secret of life. "Marry me?"