The snow piles into mounds of frozen water outside, almost to the brim of our windows, and covers the entire house into a white, winter wonderland. The inside of our house is warmer, the fire crackling in the living room — and I help mom make churros in the kitchen, the only thing we know how to make. The house carries the scent of the cold, coffee, and cinnamon — the most perfect moment in molecular space and time entity.

Jasmine and Janet Lee are coming home for two weeks on Christmas break, though Jasmine is planning to celebrate Christmas with her dad and all her old friends up in her hometown. She stills gets to spend her first week on break here with us, so mom and I decide to celebrate Christmas a little early this year.

Mom also wants to go to Christmas Fest downtown — a month-long tradition of Tolfer Peak’s, though Christmas only lasts a day. Tolfer Peak indulges in the celebration of Christmas all too much, especially with the number of visitors wanting to spend their Christmas in a quiet place. Mom and I have never really been the religious group, but she still says it's important and pay our respects and wish Jesus a happy birthday. I laugh and tell her that’s not how it works in response, especially since we’re not even celebrating Christmas on the right day.

We make enough churros to give each family in Tolfer Peak at least a bag, a newfound tradition brought upon by us, and figure we’ll just buy the rest of the food from the supermarket since it’s not actually Christmas, and the supermarket won’t be closed.

The door rings just as I shrug my coat on, and I step in my boots, opening the door just the slightest as to reduce the tremendous winds making their way into the house and the shovels of snow that will inevitably pile in as well.

The aftermaths of living in the epicenter of Connecticut snow.

Connecticut is its own singularly molecular solar system in the winter — as cold and stormy as Neptune.

“Hey, Sarah.”

The vast expanse of my solar system fails to perform its basic functions for the smallest of time entities.

I blink and swallow and swallow, but I can’t seem to get the molten sludge out of my throat, though it seems impossible for molten sludge to exist in such conditions. Tom Henderson, battling candidate for the ruler of Tolfer Peak High School’s Social Hierarchy is standing before me, one of his hands wrapped around a warm cup of hot chocolate, and another wrapped around a small present, topped off with a bow.

Do the rules and regulations of Tolfer Peak High School’s Social Hierarchy still apply when you’re out of High School?

“Tom,” I state blandly, though it’s not much to go by. His surprise visit still fogs my mind, and the only thing I can think is, he's coming here to say another dreadful spat to my face again — a venom that can only be spewed out of one from the top tier of Tolfer Peak High School’s Social Hierarchy.

The aftermaths of being their indulging factor for so many long years.

He swallows and his cheeks brighten, though whether that’s from the cold or from his visit is still left to be discovered. “Uh,” he says, and I look down at my shoes — black leather Doc Martins I let myself indulge in with my job money — and he clears his throat. “Look, I just wanted to give you this.”

He hands me the present, and I handle it like a ticking time bomb because, for all I know, it could be.

“Should I open it now?” I don’t know why I ask that, for it could only speed up the time left in this killer time machine.

“No, no. Leave it for Christmas morning,” he says and waves his hand. “That’s how it works right? You open presents on Christmas morning?”

“Yeah, yeah it is.” Tom Henderson, being a Jewish, celebrates Hunnakah, instead of Christmas, so the machinery of the holiday may still rob him blind. My own solar system is erupting with its own volcanic disruptions, a shift in tense and gravity at this not only sudden visit, but kindness as well.

There has been not one crude or remorseful remark leaving Tom Henderson’s mouth.

“Okay,” he says, and he begins to make his way out into the dreary cold.

“Wait,” I ask, not able to stabilize the disruptions without a sense of closure. “Why are you giving this to me?”

He smiles, his hands shoved in his coat pockets, and his nose buried deep into his scarf, the shade of pick from the cold climbing up to the arch of his nose now. “I don’t know, Sarah,” he admits. “Take it as an ‘I’m sorry’ gift — cause I really am.”

I blink and this time my entire inner universe rumbles with a sudden shock wave. Is Tom Henderson, the leading ruler of Tolfer Peak High School’s Social Hierarchy, traveling all the way across town in the dreary snow to come to give an apology present to me?

I don’t know what to say.

I don’t know what to think.

“Okay," I say, and shove my own hands in my coat pockets. “Thanks, Tom.”

Maybe some things do change.

Maybe they do.

“Merry Christmas, Sarah.”

I smile. “Happy Hanukkah, Tom.”

Maybe Tolfer Peak High School’s Social Hierarchy forbids its way in now — maybe now it’s a thing of the past.

Maybe.

When I get back from the supermarket, my body so cold it’s almost numb, the and cold inevitably seeping in from the pile of snow dropped on my shoulder after walking under a tree, I notice Jasmine and Janet Lee are already settled on the couch, coats off, and a warm drink in their hands, engaging in an everlasting conversation with my mom.

I dump the sweets and Christmas decorations on the living room table, and shrug off my own coat, relieving myself from the melted snow, but adding a profound aura of cold around me now.

“Oh, Sarah!” Mom jumps up and rushes over to me when she notices me walk in the door. “What happened?”

“Nothing, nothing.” I sniffle and carry the bags deeper into the house, sneezing two times on the way. The aftermaths of a dreary cold dump on my shoulders — a snowing dark cloud looming over me. “Here, I couldn’t find apple pie, so I got pumpkin instead ‘cause that’s all they had.”

Mom, Jasmine, and Janet Lee excuse me to a warm but quick shower, the last two eager to talk about their college experiences.

But, I don’t know if I want to hear about it — their new friends, their new responsibilities, their new experiences — experiences I’ll never get to have.

College seems like that hazy, unclear goal I can’t seem to wrap my mind around.

A force resisted by the bindings of my solar system.

I hurry back into the dining area with everyone else, and take up a warm cup of tea, settling down and wrapping my hands around it to heat them up. To avoid premature scalding, I blow on it the first few times though it’s been sitting there for a half-hour — the aftermaths of an everlasting scalding every time I drink tea.

I figure everything might be awkward, the looming cloud of distance hinging our magnetic fields farther from each other, but as soon as I settle in, Janet Lee launches into conversation about her new screenwriting project.

“It’s this murder mystery kind of film — a little too bloody and gory for my taste,” she explains, swishing her teacup around without actually spilling a drop -- a function granted to only the machinery of her universe. “But it’s a good start, for the first screenwriting project. Of course, I want to do children’s movies — specifically for Disney or Nickelodeon, but I don’t have any time right now, so it’s good I’m doing something.”

Janet Lee has always been a child at heart.

“One of my friends, Eliza, she kind of gets to do a children’s movie in her class, though it has swearing — but still much closer than what I’m doing.” Janet Lee pauses to take a sip of tea — green herbal tea, with an underlying taste of lemon. “I swear, in the movie I’m making, I’ve seen more blood than any sane person should be seeing.”

We all laugh at that — Jasmine’s laugh the brightest and the loudest, and Janet Lee finally settles down, a loopy grin stretched across her face.

Maybe distance doesn’t fracture the strength of our magnetic pull, not anymore.

Maybe not.

“It’s nice to be home,” Janet says, her cheeks flushed pink from an overload of joy. “I still kind of miss this place, even though I’m right here. Is that weird?”

I don’t get how that works — the weight of an absence when it’s really right in front of you— but I’ve felt it too.

Everyone gets kind of silent at that, but a nice kind of silence, one that you can wrap a blanket around and hover under forever. The tea chimes in my mouth, sour and sweet all at the same time, everyone shuffles under the weight of this new, profound atmosphere.

Outside it snows and snows and snows.

Maybe some things don’t change.

Come around late evening, around seven, we decide to open our gifts before heading down to first get some of Hal’s infamous grilled cheese sandwiches, then to complete the day’s orbit, heading down to Christmas Fest. Mom suggests we stay for the whole event, but because of the unruly long duration of it and the fact that Jasmine and Janet Lee got home today and would like to spend some time with their families, we come to a comprise to leave after going on the Ferris wheel. Besides, a whole night to celebrate a bittersweet Christmas might be a little too much, even for me.

All four of us gather around the Christmas tree — one of those fake ones we bought in Walmart a couple of years ago — and wiggle our presents out from under it.

Christmas presents proved to be a bit of a struggle for me — as most of my money was going toward college, but I let myself splurge a little this time.

The first one I give away is addressed to Jasmine,  a pair of boots I remember her talking about a couple of months ago — black fishermen with a tight lace-up that closes around the ankle.

It’s not much, but Jasmine’s face lights up when she pulls them out of the box. “Sarah!”

My hands fidget with the bindings of my jeans. “Jasmine.”

“You remembered!”

I smile and shrug.

I remember everything Jasmine Goodwill says.

Jasmine gets a new pair of skates from Janet Lee and a book from my mom — one of her all-time favorites. Janet Lee gets a new sweater, a whole set of notebooks, and a tape recorder for her screenwriting projects, and mom gets socks and sweaters from everyone.

The house smells like coffee and cinnamon, and everyone’s here, laughing, smiling, and everything in my solar system fuses together to create one cosmic explosion — an extraneous supernova for a perfect moment in space and time entity.

“We got something for you Sarah,” mom says, getting up from her seat. “All three of us chipped in.”

My entire solar system rings with a shock wave of excitement — the aftermaths of an unexpected good. I clutch my gift to my chest — a book and a pair of weights from a flustered Janet Lee who didn’t know what to give me — and I smile.

What more could I possibly ask for this Christmas?

“You guys didn’t have to,” I say — the required formalities to be performed by the person on the receiving end.

Janet Lee rolls her eyes in exasperation. “Shut up Sarah, and just wait.”

I laugh, a full one with my head thrown back and rumbling from the ends of my throat, and stand up to help mom carry the gift. It’s pretty huge, similar to the height of a five-year-old, and mom carries it carefully, straight, and with the careful precaution of bumping into runaway objects.

The aftermaths of a fragile object in a cluttered household.

I tried to clean up before Jasmine and Janet Lee came over — a fractional attempt to hide the fact that mom and I don’t clean. With the back and forth business trips that come with being a lawyer and my classes for the hunt to a perfect college, everything else seems small and unimportant.

The aftermaths of a messy head: a messy house.

I stare at the gift for a while longer, stuffing my hands into my coat pockets and wondering if it’s okay to open it now. The dark cloud of anticipation looms over me.

Jasmine smiles — a teasing one, powerful enough to send a comet flying out of its orbit. “Open it, Sarah.”

I breathe out.

“Okay, yeah.” I stand up and peel the wrapping paper — red and gold with the words ‘Merry Christmas’ looped around it and watch it flutter to the floor. When I open the top, a lone lens stares at me — large and round like an eye and I smile — a soft one of realization. “You guys!”

Janet Lee, Jasmine, and mom stare at me, their smiles stretching wide enough to split their face in half.

The entirety of my solar system shakes under the release of cosmic explosions.

“A telescope!” I peek inside again, just to confirm my sightings. I let out a deep sigh, and a warm, fuzzy feeling settles over me, like being drained with hot chocolate. “Thank you! This is so cool!”

Jasmine shrugs and Janet Lee shuffles her feet in place — a minor failure in her containment resistance. She comes to a standstill, but still smiles that loopy grin that’s been on her face throughout the entirety of the day — one that I don’t think is going to go away. “We knew you’d like it.”

Mom shakes her head in agreement. “Yeah, and you’ve been taking that astronomy class, right? It’s all I hear about, every week.”

“Yeah,” I shake my head, the warm, fuzzy feeling settling deep into my bones and staying there, ingrained. “Yeah, I like that class. You guys — this is seriously amazing. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Jasmine stands up and wraps her arm around me, small and fluttery and she smiles this big, wide smile reserved only for Christmas Day. “You’re welcome. When are you gonna use it?”

I shake my head. I’m not even worried about that right now. Right now, I’m not worried about anything. “Probably when it gets dark outside. We can set it up on our roof.”

We all smile.

Mom and Janet lee walk away, mom muttering something under her breath about Christmas Fest and getting ready, and Janet Lee complaining about my poor taste in wardrobe and how now I have nothing to wear.

You’ve got to love those two.

Jasmine smiles and keeps her arm around me, resting her head on my shoulder. I breathe her in, her hair, her skin — a smell of coffee and the stars.

I don’t think I ever want this Christmas to end.

Not really.

Tolfer Peak’s Annual Christmas Mass begins at six in the evening, starting off at the town square and stretching out to the local park — closing off much of the roads and highways intertwining within Tolfer Peak — much to mom’s grievance.

Still, we walk downtown later, around six-thirty and Janet Lee sighs, a skip in her step. “I love being in a small town again. LA traffic kills.”

I blink and swallow and swallow, but still keep my containment resistance contents within itself, tightening in a never-ending spiral, and I force a laugh up my throat.

I kind of wish Janet Lee would stop talking about college.

Just a little.

She’s right, though. I don’t think I want to live anywhere but Tolfer Peak. There’s a strange comfort in living in the same, small, shaggy old town your entire life. Comfort in the machinery of the town I know so well, a comfort in the familiar routine, and comfort in seeing the same faces all day, every day.

Tolfer Peak feels like Home.

Finally.

I breathe the air in — cool and crispy, like the cold gush on a perfect winter night. The entirety of my solar system — a system much too large for me to handle in the first place falls into the windings of the universe, now just another galaxy in its wide expanse.

Is this what Home feels like?

Jasmine and Janet Lee and mom walk beside me, all silent and drowning in the tides of their own solitary thoughts. Their hearts, their cores, their existences intertwine with the core of my solar system, and I don’t think I can imagine who I am without them.

I love them so much.

I think this is what Home feels like.

The very core of my solar system rattles and fuses out.

My containment resistance reaches its breach — the aftermaths of a new, profound feeling and I laugh, feeling the warmth take over my body and settle in. The sky is a hazy blue when we get to the town square, the sun dipping down earlier when during winter nights, but Tolfer Peak still looks as magical as ever.

“Wow,” I breathe out, even though I’ve been to Christmas Fest at least a thousand times before.

Some things never get old.

Janet Lee laughs beside me, smiling and looking up. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone smile that much before. “Yeah, wow. I forgot how beautiful this place looks right now.”

She’s right, of course — the Connecticut snow, the fairy lights, the festival games and banners, and the stars — an immaculate surrounding of serendipity I’ve only seen this time of year.

The square is still fully packed when we get there, people surrounding every inch of it, until there’s barely any room for me to even wiggle my toe — the aftermaths of a large population and a small area. Mom makes sure everyone stays close like we’re five-year-olds that are going to wander off at the first chance we get, and Jasmine, Janet Lee, and I have to loop our hands through each other’s as to stay together.

I still love every aspect of it, despite its drawbacks.

Mom insists we stop by Church, which proves to be more awkward for Jasmine and me, as we are the only ones who hadn’t been raised in a religious household. Janet Lee knows every word to every prayer they’re singing, a trait for a person with virtue, and I stand next to her, my hands clasped in prayer, and piece together what I can remember out of my foggy memory. Abuela is an extremely religious person, and Sunday Church was a priority in mom’s house, accompanied by fancy dresses and ribbons tied to her hair, but mom never passed this over to our household.

When everyone goes silent, I indulge in my own little prayer. I still don’t know if there’s a God, and even if there is, I still don’t know what I would say to him. All these years by far, it’s been my mom, my friends, and me against the world — the entirety of my solar system based upon these oasis building blocks, something that can’t be undone.

My entire life has been this solar system — the series of supernovas followed by the downfall of volcanic eruptions.

But right now, I don't know -- I’d say I want to welcome it all. I’ll embrace the good days — the days where the entirety of my solar system rests in peace, the gravitational pull shifts everyone I love closer to me, and boundaries of my solar system restrict anything else from coming in, an oblivious flight from the dark, yawning black hole about to consume me whole — a day just like this. And I’ll tackle the bad days head-on with my fists up and my face bruised. The days where my containment resistance has reached the ends of its capacity, to the point where my entire body feels numb, and the volcanic explosions keep exploding, one after another — the days where everything working against my odds.

I want to feel it all.

But right now I don’t want to think about anything else, not anything but this moment. Snowflakes fall on me, intricate designs that fall apart and melt on my nose, my hair, my face. The smell of food — all kinds of food from everywhere in the world surrounds this nirvana, and the warm, fuzzy feeling is back — a feeling I grasp onto tightly, holding on to it and no matter what, not letting it slip under my hands (I want to feel everything).

Dear Jesus,

Happy Birthday… and thanks, I guess.

Silent prayers chant around the room like a mantra, people muttering under their breath and whispering small sayings and wishes at the footstep of the church. Jasmine clasps her hands in prayer, but doesn’t say anything as I stand right beside her, wondering when it’s a good time to open my eyes.

The muttering stops when someone starts to read a hymn.

The aftermaths of a powerful force.

Mom grabs my hand and we walk out of the church just as the hymn starts, and Janet Lee and Jasmine follow. I wonder if it’s a bad thing to leave the church just as the actual prayer is starting.

The fresh air tackles my nose, cold and clear — void of any mystique dark clouds. Janet Lee and Jasmine stand on either side of me, their eyes closed, their noses pink and their breaths foggy. Food lines the sidewalks of the town square, people setting up stands to give out free food. In the background, a soft grainy voice plays from the traditional Christmas movie. Mom gets everyone some popcorn, and we settle down before the movie, 'It’s A Wonderful Life' — a classic holiday favorite. Janet Lee takes notes, as she does while watching any movie, and Jasmine intimates the grueling voices of the characters, puffing out her mouth and hunching her back.

I laugh.

I love those two — God, I love them. And I don’t want them to leave, but they’ll have to go in a few hours — the aftermaths of being a college student.

I can’t imagine a life without them.

The entirety of my solar system tenses from the absence of their weight, of their presence.

I know I’ll miss them.

When the movie rolls it’s ending credits, people chatter and get up, wandering about Christmas Fest, and Jasmine grabs my arm, pulling me up with her. Next to us, the festival is open — light up and running on the fuel of laughter. A chaotic routine settles in, and people idly walk by, chattering and excusing themselves when they bump into someone — the machinery of Christmas in Tolfer Peak.

The warm, fuzzy feeling returns.

“Sarah, I have to go soon — dad is expecting me,” Jasmine says, leaning into my ear and letting out white puffs into it. I try not to think about it too much — the fact that she’s leaving soon.

I don’t want this to end.

I think she notices the palpable tense change in the atmosphere because she smiles, so sweet and endearing I can barely stand it, and squeezes my arm. “But I think we have time for one Ferris wheel ride.”

I smile and wake Janet Lee — poor girl fell asleep in the middle of the movie — and ask her if she wants to come along.

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah, of course.”

She knows this is our goodbye.

The line to the Ferris wheel is short, as is the ride. Many of the kids want to play the games, and the adults are catching up with each other, so the Ferris wheel is not the peak of interest at the moment. We clamber onto one cart — four seats per cart at most — and we go up, up, up.

We don’t say a word, but we don’t have to, not to know what the other person is thinking -- and right now we’re all thinking the same thing.

I don’t want this to end.

But though this is not the end — Janet Lee and Jasmine will visit during spring break and summer — it’s not the same. It’s not the same as waking up and seeing their faces every day, being able to tell them anything, anytime.

Our solar systems are slightly out of reach now.

My own sends a corruption of floods under their absence.

When we get to the top of the Ferris wheel, it stops to a standstill and the town looks the most beautiful it ever has. Blanketed in the white of Connecticut Snow, city lights flicker and dim, the echo of laughter from the festival sounds up here, and the sky hugs the city — tight and lukewarm.

The stars hug my town — my Home.

“Pretty,” Janet Lee says, breaking our loud silence.

I chuckle, halfhearted but with full meaning. “Yeah, pretty.”

And we begin our descent.

Janet Lee and Jasmine hug me — a last bittersweet goodbye — before they part ways, walking to their parents' house to celebrate Christmas with their family. I expect to feel different when they leave — maybe more upset, but stronger — but nothing changes. I still have that warm, fuzzy feeling and the tides of my solar system come to a standstill.

But maybe I am stronger — maybe these things don’t hurt me as much as they used to.

I don’t know what to make of that.

Mom stands beside me, and she stays there the entire time — when they walk away, on our own journey home, and when we step inside.

I don’t think mom is ever going to leave.

We both crash on the couch as we settle into the warmth of our house. It’s late — the next morning already, but neither of us can go to sleep.

How can anyone sleep with the weight of an absence?

And this day is too good to end, anyway.

I don’t want this day to end.

“That was nice,” mom says, curling up into the couch, her feet tucked under her, and a cup of coffee in her hand. That has to be her third cup by now. “We should go to Christmas Fest more.”

I bow my head down. “Yeah, yeah we should.”

Mom frowns, her temple scrunching up and her lips drawn together, like she knows something I don't. “Are you alright, Sarah?”

I blink and blink and swallow. The warm, fuzzy feeling is ingrained in my bones now, and I pull it out, feeling it flood my chest and swallow me whole. I don’t mind it doing that.

“Yeah, mom I’m good,” I say, then after a pause, I ask, “Mom? Can we use the telescope?”

She blinks, then nods and staggers up, reaching out her hand as a message of help. I grab it and drag myself up, and together we drag the telescope through the house and onto the roof. I shift its weight under me, my hands burning with the creases it leaves behind, but go up with a sense of happiness flooding through me.

We climb out through a window that leads to the roof and I make sure to grab the pumpkin pie from the kitchen.

Mom and I set the telescope up, bundled in a heavyweight of jackets and sweaters, and we open the pumpkin pie — sweet and tangy all at once.

Mom sighs and looks at me, her breath coming out in a solid puff. Our universes are intertwined at the heart, at the core — a force so strong nothing can come in its way. I breathe out — finally.

Mom holds a cup of coffee in her hand. “Merry Christmas, Sarah.”

I smile and take a bite of my pumpkin pie. “Merry Christmas, Mom.”

And we look at the stars.