delilah { d2 . fin

delilah.

I've always dreamt of snow.

Frost against my skin, falling to me like very own stars with the night's moon illuminating my face - Hayden says I'm obsessed. How could I not be, with the autumn kissed air and the citrus laced skies, my very own galaxy among us. Just the two of us at nine p.m., holding my knees to my chin as I think of ten years time while it tick, tick, ticks, away like heartbeats as she counts down to curfew. 

The house is adorned with snowflakes and crystals and cosmos, etched on every door way I can reach and the baseboards between and- Harvard gets upset on occasion. In the eight years I've made this house my own, he's always made me paint over those lines with thick white paint. And every year I carve back my galaxies and my ice kingdom, and a simple H.D. above the doorway of our rooms. 

We've always shared rooms.

Rooms, windows, stars and cardigans - Hayden & Delilah. She reminds me of citrus, the spring kissed air and knit sweaters for a ten year old me; my first week she held my hand through the rainstorms as I was branded a new family, a new name, a new future. I lost my mother in a storm, and my father left me to one. 

She was a big women, with a last name disregarded, "those don't matter when you're married, Lilah," she always said to me, "Yoon is a name to the wind, and a man will find his own for you." And she read to me stories at night, and I fell asleep in her porcelain arms as she told me of The Peach Boy, and I- my father told me it was nonsense. That rivers held nothing but dragons and fairy tales carried nothing but whims.

In my closet, between the pictures of Hayden and I from the first month I arrived and polaroids from weeks ago if, there's a framed photo of my mother holding my hand, with the name Carrie carved into the back of it. We had the same nose, and I cut my hair short to my neck when I was six to try to look more like her, but I always had my father's eyes and cheeks. 

And I like staring at that photo of us, where my father's scarf covered my pale face up to my eyes and my mother's greys matched the snow in the background. 

It isn't much of any importance in my life anymore, my father leaving me at the Harvard the day I turned eight and my mother leaving the two of us a year before. I don't think they ever loved each other, my first family, and I've since regift that scarf to one of the newer girls. One of the younger ones who don't do much; most of them are doe eyes and rosy cheeks and ask too few questions that matter. 

"Why are there birds on your collarbone?" As she taps her collars gently.

"Because Ophelia, I simply like birds-"

"Why do you draw everywhere- Can I do that!"

"Harvard makes you repaint it immediately though Ophe-"

"What was your family like?"

"Well." It's winter castle breath, and I think, "Ophelia."

I lay her on the ground and tickle her stomach with ear-grinned giggles, "I think Hayden is a lovely lady."

And then we'd exchange good nights after I kiss her forehead like the older girls did with me eight, seven, six years ago while they counted on their hands the minutes left until they left the Harvard. I'd kiss her soft forehead and leave back to my room, counting in constellations the girls that have left - peacekeepers, trainers, career moms and prostitutes. 10 p.m. and Hayden and I whisper good nights between muffled laughters and talks about the moon and baking heart cookies for Mr. Harvard all while I carve our names into my bed frame. 

I think she's lovely. 

Then we'd sleep, I always fall asleep first and she says that I've always talked in my sleep and snored for the past eight, seven, six few years, but I'd dream about snow. The frigid around us in our castle, and the heat from my cheeks would be enough to keep us warm. 

I've always dreamt about our snow.

♔