Frostbite of the heart. It’d be easy to be insulted by that, wouldn’t it? Pride is one of my many faults, and Ariel’s always known where to stick that particular knife. You’re a cold f*****g bastard, she’s saying. I could let that anger me.
Or I could do what she’s telling me to do: step outside of my own skin for one f*****g second and look through her eyes instead.
So I do. What do I see?
I see a tall, dark-eyed, miserable son of a b***h who’s clenched his jaw for so long that every smile feels like cracks skittering in the frost, dangerous cracks, the kind that come right before the iceberg sinks underwater, never to be seen again.
Giving up my rage and my past is a kind of death, yes.
But it’s the only way to make room for life to come in from underneath.
Ariel freezes mid-tirade
