wynter

two boys are playing in a living room. toys are strewn about; building blocks, trucks, playthings. outside, small leaflets of snow are falling down. tiny announcements of the cold, piling up. two inches, three inches, eight.

the boys play mindlessly, the way that children do. unaware that life might continue around and outside of them. children care only about themselves and they aren't afraid to hide it. it's later that they learn to disguise and pretend. they are pushing tiny cars and making tiny noises.

"i dare you to go outside"

one boy says this to another. one boy has blonde hair, the other brown. the snow continues to fall.

the boy who dared knows this is too much. that this is a storm of historic proportions. white coming down for six days straight. their childhood, North of Kristiansand, was full of these warnings; that the outside was dangerous, that the cold could kill you. the second boy looks thoughtfully out of the window and says,

"do you think this is it? do you think this is the apocalypse?"

six days straight. bundled and round, well-fed and settled, their voices deadened in the landscape of long-pile carpet

"everyone wants this really. wants to be the last. we've been fantasizing about The End since the dark ages."

a moment of silence and then,

"the earth is like a woman. we can't imagine her with anyone after she's been with us"

the first boy glances but doesn't respond. they know eachother too well. their thoughts and sentences are just ways to pass the time. snowflakes falling and piling.