Frozen

Louise awoke with a chill. Her slightly rounded, yet petite face struck with confusion before she became aware of her surroundings. A familiar cold sweat lightly coated her brow and her throat rasped; body jerking as she coughed her lungs clear, squinting from the pain.

Laying her head back on the pillow, she closed her eyes, and memories of a dream beckoned her. Though the edges of the dream were hazy, the core bore an eerie vividness. Louise observed herself; sat, legs bent beneath her, in a wheat field in the warm sun. The tall crops waltzed and her hair (light brown, with natural blonde highlights) fluttered in a light summer breeze. Her steel-blue eyes followed loose debris on the wind, drawing her white summer dress into view as it flowed loose around her slender figure. She ran the rim of the dress through elongated fingers, topped with teal blue nail polish, matching her scant eyeshadow.

This wardrobe surprised Louise as she detested dresses – to the point where she had only recently – and begrudgingly – started wearing skirts, at the insistence of her mother; in order to make her more ‘ladylike’ and less of a ‘tomboy’.

Her dream self inhaled deeply, and upon release, noticed her breath turn to frost. Her breath froze in mid air. Louise felt her eyes – her real eyes – tingle, and opened them. She saw her breath was frosty. The central heating had been so the room was pleasantly warm. The tingling in her eyes – which seemed to be concentrated in her pupils – increased.

Blinking repeatedly, Louise shook her head in an attempt to clear it; when she looked again her breath was once again invisible and the tingling had ceased. After a few bemused moments, she checked the time on her tiny purple alarm clock. She still had a few minutes before her alarm was due. Turning off the alarm function, Louise pulled herself up and stretched her arms over her head and curled back her toes as she released a long yawn. Throwing off the plain baby-blue quilt, she slid her legs over the side of the bed and her feet into her fluffy beige slippers.

Resting her head in her palms momentarily, she gave herself a wordless pep talk and stood up. Autopilot guided her into the undersized en suite and she reached into the shower and started the water flowing. As the water heated up, Louise looked in the mirror.

She saw her loose beige negligee fall over her curves. Though she knew some boys her age found her attractive, like many seventeen year old girls, she was self conscious. She had been complimented on having ample curves for a slender girl, but the way she saw it, she was uneven; with breasts and a waist too big for her figure.

One thing Louise did like about herself was her freckles. She felt they gave her an air of innocence. Relatives and family friends told her this when she was growing up, and she always enjoyed hearing it. A nostalgic smile crossed her face as she slipped the spaghetti straps from her shoulders – the negligee flowed down her body and onto the cold tiles – before stepping into the shower.

As the hot water cascaded into her hair and down her body, Louise breathed a deep sigh. She adored the feeling of hot water streaming down her skin; finding it very therapeutic. Sometimes she would set her alarm early in order to have more time to just stand beneath the water and feel her troubles rinse away.

After a few sensuous minutes basking in pleasant numbness, Louise picked up the bottle of lavender shampoo and began massaging it into her hair. She inhaled deeply and gently rocked back and forth between the balls of her feet and the heel.

Taking her purple shower puff in hand, she applied a generous amount of lavender and camomile shower gel and smiled a childish smile as she rapidly squeezed it under the water, and was rewarded with a plethora of pink tinted suds.

Slowly lathering her body, Louise closed her eyes and thoughts of the dream came to her mind. As she casually wondered about its meaning, she once more felt the tingling in her eyes. Not wanting to detract from her relaxation, she chose to ignore it. This proved somewhat difficult when the tingling intensified, until it reached discomforting levels.

Louise opened her eyes as it began to border on painful. She shivered as she realised that the water falling over her was now cold. Turning to the shower controls, she turned the heat up and shook her head in an attempt to dispel the discomfort in her pupils.

The feeling dissipated quickly, but before Louise could breathe a sigh of relief she screamed as scalding hot water rained down on her. Jumping from beneath the flow she turned down the heat to her normal setting. Waiting a few moments, she cautiously checked the temperature of the water with her fingertips. It had returned to her usual comfortable level.

The relaxation disturbed, Louise rinsed and quickly exited the shower. Once dried, she wrapped the towel around her under her arms and made use of her travel-sized hair dryer. Sighing slightly, she thought about how she always got the smaller versions of things: clocks, hair dryers, bedrooms, and so on.

Once her hair was dry, Louise proceeded to get dressed. She chose a pair of worn jeans and a tight white t-shirt. Grabbing her schoolbag and phone she hurried downstairs to the kitchen. Putting the bag on a chair at the round wooden table, she took out a glass and proceeded to half fill it with orange juice.

When she opened the small freezer in her fridge, she saw that the ice cube tray was missing. Looking around she spotted it on the draining part of the sink. Picking it up, she noticed that it has just been refilled with water.

“Damnit Karen” she muttered.

Just then she heard her older sister rushing down the stairs. Turning to look through the open kitchen door she saw the front door slam before she had a chance to give out. Annoyance filled her and she felt the tingling in her eyes suddenly flare up, only to disappear of its own accord a couple of seconds later. Louise opened her eyes and moved to place the tray in the freezer only to see that it was full of ice.

Louise stood there for several seconds; the tray in one hand, the freezer door in the other. She could’ve sworn it had been filled with water moments earlier. The more she thought about it, the more she convinced herself she had just been seeing things. Just then her phone buzzed with a text message from Amy telling her that they would meet at the school gates because her mother was giving her a lift to school. Louise took three cubes for her juice and poured a small bowl of sugary cereal.

Quickly washing up, she left her dishes to dry on the sink and grabbed her long navy coat from the hall before pulling on her schoolbag and heading out the door.

The school was a 10 minute walk from her house – 15 minutes for Amy – and she whittled away the journey with thoughts of history homework that was due that afternoon. As she rounded a corner she saw Amy leaning against a pillar at the gates. Picking up the pace, Louise returned Amy’s smile as they met and turned to walk together into the schoolyard.

“Did you finish the History essay?” Louise asked.
“No, but I’m nearly done. I’ll finish it at lunch.”
“Amy!” Louise mockingly scolded, “You’re always leaving things until the last minute: one day it’s going to come back to bite you!”
“Well I do like to be bitten...” Amy teased.

The two girls chuckled as they entered the economics classroom and took their seats in the middle row.


As the day progressed, Louise felt the slight tingling in her eyes. It remained slight for over an hour and began to cause a mildly throbbing headache. At the beginning of the class before lunch, Louise felt the headache intensify and asked to be excused from class to get some fresh air and splash some water on her face. The teacher told her to be quick.

Hurriedly making her way to the lavatory, Louise turned the brass cold tap on the middle of the three plain white sinks to full flow. She placed both hands on the edge of the sink to hold herself up as she began to feel faint. After a few deep breaths, she moved her shaky right hand under the water, and lowering her face she splashed the cool water onto her now sickly-pale skin.

Louise felt her stomach begin to lurch and froze where she stood in an attempt to prevent herself from vomiting. Her hand lay under the strong flow of water. Hanging her head low Louise cautiously began to take slow deep breaths. She felt the tingling flash with intensity and suddenly her hand felt ice cold and restrained.

Looking up, Louise saw that the water coming from the tap and flowing over her hand was now frozen solid; trapping her hand in ice. The tap was also frosted over, with the area of the sink around it now coated with an icy sheen.

Panicking, Louise began to hyperventilate and tugged her arm to try free it from its icy cuff. After three attempts Louise pulled her whole body away from the sink and the ice finally gave way. She hurtled backwards onto the cool tiles; her head smacking the bottom of the radiator. Groaning, Louise felt darkness cloud over her and for some reason snowflakes flittered in her mind before she lost consciousness.