the boy with the blue hands

[asakiyume]

I came across a boy leaning over the edge of a snowy chasm, his chin in the snow and a magnifying glass in his hand, looking at the leaves and feather flowers of hoarfrost and snow...



"They're a little like ferns or the notched needles of certain cypresses," he said, his speech clipped, as if he were very cold--and he ought to have been very cold, lying there in the snow. "They're like them, but much more beautiful. I could look at them forever."

I got down on my knees to look, but he pushed me away. "You're too warm!" he said. "You'll melt them with your breath, if you don't knock them with those clumsy mittens."

I saw his hands were blue and his fingertips practically black, and his thin, sharp nose and the lobes of his ears, too.

"It's not good for you to be so cold," I said.

"It's perfect for me to be so cold," he said. "Perfect. . ." And he moved his magnifying glass over to another fringe of hoarfrost, once again lost in contemplation.

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Set your mind at ease--the part about the boy is an imagining that came to me later, looking at the photos. Really when I got on my knees to take those pictures, there was only Molly with me.

Forgive me for worrying you?

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

If you will forgive me for being a twit in need of a cluebat.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Do you remember the thing you wrote for Down the Rabbit Hole a couple years ago? I read like most of the way through it before I realized what was up--so I would never laugh at someone for misunderstanding!

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Hey, I worked hard for that very effect! *g*

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I guess I like mine to be borderline too (yay, liminality)--but I *don't* want to distress people!

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

Ah. I couldn't figure out whether the boy was literal or metaphorical (or both!) myself.

Lovely story.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Thanks. The character Kay in The Snow Queen really made an impression on me as a kid--he takes form in my head in different ways at different times, and I guess this is one.

[jmeadows.livejournal.com]

I think asakiyume is too much of a mom to let that happen to a real boy. :)

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Thanks J!

Yeah, if I saw someone even beginning to get that blue, I'd carry him kicking and screaming out of that place.

[jmeadows.livejournal.com]

I hope that anyone would...

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

(srsly)