I stomped through the snow in my tallest winter boots and it still spilled over the edges and soaked my shins. Underneath my coat I was still wearing the ripped jeans and black velvet top I wore to the party. If I was going there to be open and truthful, I was going as myself. I would not dress the part of a 1950s prospective girlfriend like I had that summer.

I felt electrified. Every part of me was prickling with anticipation, and cold, and maybe a little bit of fear. I wondered if Eric was right, that this was a huge mistake. I reminded myself that I could return to the present in a second if necessary.

I closed my eyes, turned my face to the sky and felt the snowflakes land and melt on my skin. I tried to imagine Pete in the cabin, warm yellow light and life illuminating the dark, empty house in front of me. When the pressure lifted, I was standing on a shoveled path instead of in a snowdrift. Yellow light shone through a curtain in the front window. These small changes seemed proof enough that it worked.

I knocked on the door. After a minute, it's cracked open and revealed the backlit shadow of a silent, tall figure. I held my breath and took a step back. Then a light over my head switched on, the door swung all the way open and Pete was standing there in front of me.

His shoulders were broader, his face was a little thinner and his eyes were burning like a fever as he gazed down at me.

"Hi." I wasn't sure if I said it out loud or simply opened my mouth.

Pete reached for my face, but as soon as his hand touched my skin, he startled and pulled his hand away.

"Shit!" He stumbled backwards. "Shit. Holy shit. I'm sorry," he said breathlessly.

"No, I'm sorry I scared you."

Pete blinked hard and shook his head. His dark eyes glanced over my face, while avoiding contact with mine. He opened his mouth and closed it again without saying a word.

"Can I come in?"

"Yes. No." He grimaced. "Of course. Give me one minute."

Pete pushed the door closed and I turned to face the dark night. I exhaled deeply and watched my breath condense into a rising cloud. A sharp wind swept away the cloud, stung my face and made my eyes water. It was so cold that I could feel my lashline tighten as the fresh tears crystallized. The feeling of being swallowed up by stress was taking over me; my heart was pounding, my ears were ringing, and sweat dampened my feet and hands despite the frigid temperature.

Swirls of snow rose from the crests of the drifts lining the shoveled walkway. I took a few steps away from the house and craned my neck to look up at the sky. An unbelievable number of stars scattered the sky, more than I'd ever seen. I was used to scattered stars, but these were like spilled platinum glitter. While I gazed at the breathtaking view, I pressed my overlapped hands to my wildly thumping heart and breathed deeply and waited.

When it had been long enough that I considered knocking again, Pete opened the door and gestured for me to come inside.

The door opened directly into an open room, with a kitchen and dining table on one side and a living area with a couch and chair on the opposite side. I glanced around the room and wondered what he was doing while I froze outside. The house looked neat and minimalist. There were books stacked on the end table next to a plaid upholstered chair and a guitar on a stand in a corner. I gravitated toward the warmth radiating from a cast iron wood burning stove in the living room area. Next to the stove there was a drying rack draped with clothes: socks, undershirts, an empty space, a work shirt, gray pants. Something was missing.

"So you left me out there in the cold so you could hide your underwear?" I joked.

"I guess so," he mumbled.

Pete was still standing near the door. He was wearing a plaid black and white flannel over a white t-shirt and gray pajama pants. I had no idea what time it was. The winter solstice was days away and it was Northern Michigan and it was dark outside. It could have been any time between four o'clock in the afternoon and eight in the morning.

"I'm sorry, did I wake you up?"

"I might have dozed off while I was reading. I guess I thought I was dreaming. This is a bit of a shock." His voice sounded gravelly and tired.

"Are you alone?" I asked as I peered around the room, searching for signs of a feminine influence, though I wasn't exactly sure what I was looking for. Bras strewn about? A frilly apron hanging in the kitchen? Some chick lit tucked into the pile of books?

"Yeah." He pressed his palms to his eyes and dragged his hands down his face and shook his head in disbelief. "What in the hell are you doing here, Vanessa?"

"I wanted to talk to you and um, clear some things up." When I took a few steps toward him, Pete backed away until he bumped against the end of the kitchen counter. As if I repelled him somehow.

"Alright, go ahead," he said, waving me on.

"Well, first, after that accident I made it home, thanks to you. And I'm okay."

Pete winced and then closed his eyes as he said, "That's good to know."

"And that night, you know, Frank came out of it okay, too. Stan thought, we thought, if you knew we were both fine and you didn't do anything wrong, you might want to go back home."

His eyes popped open as he scoffed. "Frank's not fine, he's dead. And I already told Stan I won't be crawling back to Palmer with my tail between my legs now that Frank's gone."

"Okay. I also wanted you to know that I'm not still mad at you like I was that night my grandma- well, you know, Rose- disappeared. I was really stressed about not being able to go home and Rose supposedly drowning. And I didn't fully understand what happened with Grace yet, so I thought you lied to me." I took my mittens off and shoved them in my coat pockets. My hands were so sweaty. "I overreacted and assumed the worst of you. At the end there. I'm sorry."

Pete slowly nodded, silently agreeing with my checklist of transgressions, and then raised his eyebrows impatiently, like he was waiting for something else. I felt ridiculously stupid when I realized I'd already covered essentially what I needed to say. It had seemed like so much and it only took a couple of minutes.

And it may have made no difference, anyway. If he wanted to be stubborn and refused go back home, at least I'd tried. But I could not shake the guilt from knowing that it was my fault the trajectory of his life had changed.

"I'm sorry for showing up like this," I said.

"You might as well take your coat off. And your boots, too. They already made a puddle on the floor, though," he grumbled. "Unless you're done," he said, giving me that irritated, expectant look again. I wasn't sure what else he wanted me to say, but I wasn't done. Not at all.

I shook my head and he pulled out one of the chairs at the table. "Sit."

I set my wet boots on the rug by the door and took off my coat. I used all my strength to pull out a different chair for myself, like I wanted to silently prove to him that I was stronger than I'd been when he knew me. If he wanted to be surly and tough, I could, too. I was the queen of surliness.

Pete sat across from me and I noticed a new curved scar on his forehead. He chewed his lip and fixed his gaze somewhere behind me. I used to kiss those lips, and the scar that ran through his eyebrow, and the coffee-colored freckles scattered across his cheek, in what seemed like another life.

I felt closer to him in my dreams that I did then, sitting right across from him.

"So, you're still doing your traveling to the past thing, then, huh?" he asked. "If you talked to Stan?"

"Yeah, a little bit."

"What for?"

"A few different reasons."

"Didn't you learn your lesson last time?"

"I did, but then I learned that this is a lot more complicated than I thought."

"It already seemed pretty complicated," he pointed out.

"You have no idea," I said with a small laugh.

"Yeah you're probably right. I'm sure I'm not smart enough to understand it either."

"That's not what I meant. There are so many ways things can happen in life. I think you should consider going back to Palmer. You got a second chance, and I wanted to make sure you know you can still go back and have the life you imagined."

"This isn't a second chance, it's an exile."

"Self-imposed," I muttered.

"Thanks to you," he finished sourly.

"Thanks to me? I'm sorry you thought Frank was dead, and that I was possibly dead and that you needed to leave town. That's why I'm here, to clear all that up so you can go back. I wanted you to know you did nothing wrong."

"None of it would have happened if you weren't with him!" He raised his voice and pounded his palm against the table. "You were mad that I insinuated that you were...morally loose, and you went and proved my point." I trembled and the room swayed as he continued, "If you weren't with Frank that night in the first place, none of it would have happened and I would never have had to leave."

"You're pissed about that? That was one-hundred percent him. I did nothing to..." I paused as I considered what it may have looked like to Pete when he spotted his stepfather pawing at me in that parking lot. After he'd witnessed practically the same thing happen with Frank and his ex-girlfriend, Grace, his mind must have immediately gone there. But Grace had been a willing participant and I was not. "You've been thinking all this time that I would do that to you?"

"I haven't spent all this time thinking about you."

"Sure, of course not." I gripped the edge of my chair and blinked back angry tears. "I hope you believe me though. I was only trying to get Rose home that night. She was there, too, don't you remember? Why would you think I was out with him when Rose was missing and all I wanted to do was get her back? I used the phone at the bar, and Frank followed me in the parking lot and he kissed me and it was horrible and I said some stuff he didn't like and...it was scary, okay? And if you hadn't come-" I shivered.

"Hey," Pete said softly as he reached out and touched my hand. I breathed in sharply and he quickly drew back and folded his hands on the table. It shocked me that he felt so warm, when he was acting so cold. "I should've known. I probably did know, but I...it's hard to explain."

What was so hard to explain? I certainly wasn't perfect, but I couldn't believe he thought I was the kind of person who would do that to him. He came out of rage that night. He didn't come to help me. He came to hurt someone. I felt sick.

I drummed my fingers on the table top.

"I have time," I said. "If you'd like to explain."

He stood up, walked to the window and drew the curtain aside.

"Did you drive here in your time or mine?" he asked.

"Mine. My friend is waiting for me in his car, in your driveway, in 2016."

"You'd better get back to your friend then."

"He knows it might be awhile."

"How long has it been for you?" he asked. "Since you last saw me."

"Three months."

His face softened and his forehead wrinkled in an expression of something like pity. He probably pitied me, because his heart had enough time to heal, or harden, but mine hadn't.

"It'll get better," he assured me.

"This is your 'better?'" I asked doubtfully.

He looked around the room and back at me. "It's not so bad. What's enough for me is different than what's enough for you. You made that clear before." He took my coat from the back of the chair and held it up for me. "You should go."

"That's not what I meant. I meant you, not the house you live in."

He sighed. "I know it might seem like it right now, but I'm not a miserable person. My life here is fine and I don't need you to show up and-"

"Screw it up again," I finished.

He shrugged helplessly. When I stood, I made the mistake of letting my eyes meet his and they were at odds with what his words and his body language were saying. They radiated warmth and sadness and through them I saw a glimpse of the Pete I knew, the one whose smile would light up his entire face when he saw me, before he wrapped me in his arms and spun me around. But he was trapped inside this tense, angry version of himself. Then his gaze hardened and the Pete I'd known was gone.

He lifted my coat again, signaling that he wanted me to leave.

I was glad to turn away from him as I slid my arms into the sleeves. It gave me a chance to blink away the tears that were threatening to escape.

"I got your postcards," I said as I pulled on my boots. "And the letter."

He cringed and rubbed the back of his neck. "I'm sorry I sent those."

"Of course you are," I said bitterly. "I don't understand. If you were so mad at me why did you write?"

"Moments of weakness, I suppose."

"I see. Well, I wanted to write you back, but I couldn't really mail anything to you."

I pulled a folded envelope from the pocket of my coat and clutched it close. I didn't want to let it go. I didn't want him to have it anymore. But I knew this would be my last chance to tell him what I felt for him that summer, and I definitely wasn't going to say it out loud after how my visit had gone, so I held it out to him. He crossed his arms over his chest and impassively watched the envelope tremble in my hand.

"I think I might have written to a different person though. If you find him, pass this on, will you?" I tossed the envelope onto the end table. "I guess this was my moment of weakness. Sorry to bother you. It won't happen again."

Once I stepped out into the cold I stopped holding back my tears. They crystallized on my face as they fell, while I thought of how very badly I wanted to be home. My knees buckled and I let myself fall as I returned.

"What did you do?!" Eric yelled, as he waded through the snow toward me.

"I got closure," I grumbled. I stomped
past him to get to the car and get away from there as soon as possible. "Let's go."

"No, I mean-" He grabbed my shoulder to turn me around. "Look."

The cabin was gone. There was only a snowy clearing where it had once stood.

"That's not what it...it wasn't..." I whispered. "Oh no."

I ran toward the spot where the house had been and stumbled to the ground as gravity strengthened its pull on me. When the dizziness lifted, I smelled a noxious burning scent before I opened my eyes. One front window on the first floor of the cabin was filled with flickering orange light and there was a light on in a room upstairs.

I didn't hear any piercing beeps of smoke alarms and I hoped Pete made it out. But when I yelled his name, my calls were met with silence. If he was still in there, I needed something to throw at the upstairs window to alert him, so I quickly packed a snowball and aimed. It hit the window with a satisfying thunk. After throwing two more snowballs and seeing no movement, I decided to peek inside.

I was able to open the front door, which was left unlocked, and I covered my mouth and nose with my arm. The clothes drying rack by the wood stove was engulfed in blindingly bright flames and black smoke billowed across the ceiling. I yelled his name again, but I didn't see Pete asleep in the living room or on the floor passed out anywhere. The orange flames crackled as they began to climb the wall. I ran past the kitchen, checked the bathroom, and climbed up the stairs. Behind me, I heard a window shatter.

The black smoke over my head quickly swelled to fill the corridor. I crouched down and scrambled up the stairs while coughing and gagging. On the landing at the top of the stairway, there were two closed doors. I crawled toward the one with a slice of light at the bottom and reached for the door knob.

Once inside, I closed the door behind me and stayed close to the ground. The plaid shirt Pete had been wearing earlier was puddled on the floor. Smoke quickly crept through the cracks around the door and clouded the soft warm light from a bedside lamp. There was a human shaped lump on the bed, and I crawled toward it, screaming, "Fire! Wake up!" over and over. My hand knocked against an empty glass bottle on the floor before I reached up and shook the person on the bed violently.

I screamed, "Fire! Wake up! Pete, wake up!"

My voice was hoarse and he didn't move or respond. I scrambled up on the bed, shoved his shoulder down to turn him on his back, and held his face in my hands. He was wearing glasses, and for a second I was afraid I had the wrong person. "Hey!" I rasped and his eyes fluttered open. "Fire! We have to get out of here!" Pete gasped for air and coughed and closed his eyes again.

It was unbearably hot and I was struggling to breathe. I didn't think I could move him. Unless I could count on an adrenaline rush. I straddled him, shoved my hands behind his back and lifted. He was so heavy. I coughed and gasped and he fell from my arms, his torso landing back on the bed.

Through the thick smoke I could see the faint glow of flames through the cracks around the door, threatening to sweep in and engulf the room. If he didn't wake up, I'd have to leave him behind and jump out the window. I dug my fingers into his shoulders, shook him again and slammed my face into his chest in frustration.

"Come on!" I whimpered.

Then the floor gave out below us and we were falling.

Pete's body and the deep snow broke my fall. I heard distant yelling, the smoke was gone and the air was cold and fresh, but I couldn't manage to fill my lungs with it. Pete's chest quickly rose and fell as he gasped and wheezed beneath me. I lifted myself off of him, but it didn't seem to help either of us. I was suffocating. I grasped at the zipper of my coat and yanked it down. Pete's eyes were open and frightened as he gulped for air. He reached up and wrapped his hand around my neck and moved it down until it was pressed over my heart and then his eyes closed again.

By the time he made it over to us, Eric was already on the phone with a 911 operator.