Snowman

The boy sculpted a man from the New Snow. A snowman. His lonely tears fell against the frost, a smear of blood from his bruises, the salt of his sweat, and warm breath that summoned life from the barren landscape, as frantic flakes swirled down around them. He wrapped his scarf around the stoic standing figure, tenderly as though this simple visage were his elder brother, and ardently wished for the company of a true friend. A floating spirit, who'd long been lost within a cracked lake's frigid waters, whose essence had become one with the winter season, he encountered this vessel crafted by the boy and found it to be a fine resemblance of his former self, a suitable resting place for his soul. Boy, spirit, and winter's magic coincided in that moment. The snowman shed a tear in tune with the lonely boy's sadness, and a small pearl of ice dropped onto the boy's head. His cold hands, like those of a corpse returned to waking, unfolded and hugged the boy with a comfort the child had never before known. "I am with you now" the young man whispered to the little magician. "I will protect you, and take you away from this place, to wherever you want to go." The boy looked up, amazed that his desperate dream had come true. He remembered then, the stories told of shaping a wish from the first snowfall. And now he believed in his heart that anything could be possible.