The snow falls with drowse, and the lights of the street are soft. Shapes and colors - which, are generally the structure and reality of the world - are forsaken into static, like that of an old TV. And if you would only watch for a second more, you might notice the bobbing outline of a woman walking down the sidewalk.

The city is dark, and so it is quiet. Such is the way when the mothers and fathers come home from their 9 to 5 and sit down for dinner with their sons and daughters. And because of their perfect 9 to 5 schedule, there is not a single soul outside tonight. Except for the woman. Ah yes, the one bobbing down the sidewalk. Perhaps she spilled her coffee and missed her bus, or perhaps she made a stop at the grocery store. I wouldn't know.

I do know that she kept her chin tucked into her coat, and kept her slim hands wrapped tightly around an umbrella handle.

Could it not have been more perfect for a gentle gust of wind to settle a snowflake upon her lip? So quietly it stole warmth from her that she seemed to wake. So intimately had it melted upon her lip, that for a second, it seemed she was awake.

Stood still under the streetlight, she reached a pale finger up to press on the spot.

She kept her eyes downcast, and a tender thought arose in her mind. She lifted her chin ever so slightly and was instantly met with the uncomfortable cold drifting up against her neck. More of the same street ahead. More of the same street looking back.

What if she wasn't real? Perhaps she is a character, and all of the other characters were being tucked into their beds according to schedule. Perhaps she had been accidentally overlooked. Miswritten.

There were so many people in the city, so many details for the great author to include, and yet, such a simple function for each to follow. What if a single word was forgotten when the author wrote her? Was the woman a fluke? How could it be that she was always a half-hour behind the schedule, and always a half-thought from the clarity to form a full question?

But, though she had been touched by the snowflake, and the ignition grasped at her, she lowered her eyes and quieted the discomfort. She continued her walk. And the question grew fuzzier the further she walked until it had been as brief of a question as the snowflake was sharp on her conscience.

The woman would be stopped here or there by a snowflake, or a ray of sun, or a lazy blink of a cat. And the distorted whisper of a question would resurface, much like a forgotten memory from childhood.

She could never make it home when the rest of the city did, nor could she enter her home. You see, the problem being written a half-hour late means that the door is already locked, and dinner has already been put away. So every night, the woman attempts to turn the doorknob, and every night, she glances in through the window to see her husband reclined in front of the TV. He kisses the air beside him and stares tenderly into empty space as he tells nobody how much he loves her.

And since her car won't start until the morning, the woman turns back down the steps and begins her walk back to her office. Which she will reach a half-hour too late the next morning. She will wait outside the building until night time, and then begin her walk back home.

She was to be forever led to the churn of a question, but she was not quite written as the right character to find the answer.

So it was, that she will continue to walk from the snowflake under the streetlight.