Painting our Life - 6 Colors

I'm on the couch watching television with Dash. I don't know what we're watching. The screen is blurry. It doesn't matter because Dash and I are having a nice conversation. A wave of coldness hits me. I shiver and tell Dash to wait a second. Running up the stairs, I feel colder and colder each step. Something must be wrong. I throw on ten sweaters but they don't change anything. What the heck is going on? I dive under my blanket, trying to warm up. No additional heat comes. No HEAT comes. And the cold is sudden unbearable. I'm going to die like this. No. Please, no.

   A hundred shivers are sent down my back. My eyes jolt open. Just a dream? It seems so, for I'm in bed. In bed with no blanket or anything covering me except my pajamas. The window is wide open and cold wind must've blown in.

   I get up and walk over to the window. Snickers are heard from outside my bedroom door. Why am I not surprised? As I approach the window, I notice that it's very bright outside. Rushing forward, I look out to see nothing but white. Thick sparkling snow cover the ground and rooftops. The snow on the road looks at least a foot deep. This happened overnight?

   The door swings open and Dash barges in, grinning. She tosses my blanket back onto my bed.

   "School's cancelled today, so I figured I'd let you sleep in." She winks. Sleep in? Waking me up with cold air is NOT letting me sleep in. At least there's no school today.

   "Yeah, if your idea of sleeping in is five minutes more of sleep," I point out. Dash chuckles and she points out something else. Literally points out something. She points at my digital clock.

   It reads 11:07 AM.

   "Sounds like Mr. Sunshine is still a bit sleepy." I grumble and shoo her out of my room so I can change into my clothes for the day.

   Downstairs, I find Dash playing PS3. It's a bit early but I suppose there's nothing else to do on a snow day. The snow outside is way too deep for us to walk through, and this is only the beginning, the first day of winter.

   I grab a a slice of bread and pop it into the toaster. Then I pour myself a cup of orange juice and bring my breakfast to the living room where Dash is playing Call of Duty: Black Ops. I nibble on my toast as I watch Dash make headshot after headshot from her camping location. She's amazing at this game, but sometimes I wonder if it's too much for her. I mean, she did grow up in a land where they keep harmony in check and violence rarely happens.

   "Erm, how can you stomach shooting these people and still not be able eat meat?" I ask.

   "Because one, it's just a video game and two, you don't see me eating the dead bodies of the people I kill."

   I'm just glad Dash is smart and doesn't take video gaming too seriously. Sure she is really, really competitive while playing, but other than that, she doesn't let her mind run wild on nothing but video games. She doesn't like losing though. So I suppose it's sort of a perk that I suck at every sort of video game. She can beat me all she wants, and still get that great feeling knowing I'm trying my hardest to win. Of course, there has been a few times I cheated by peeking at her screen, but I haven't even gotten five kills on her in a single round before.

   I finish my food and Dash passes me a controller. "Up for some Zombies?" I nod. This is the only game mode where I don't bite the dust against her while playing. I think of her as more of a do-all-the-work ally during Zombies. But she thinks of me as that-person-you-must-steal-kills-from type of ally.

   We spend the rest of the morning shooting zombies and surviving through multiple rounds. Eventually, we get tired of playing. Dash yawns, and tosses the controller aside. "One sec, Ky." She grins. "I have a surprise for you." This is either going to be really good or really bad.

   "Does it include going outside?"

   "No." She leaves the room and heads to the kitchen. Sounds of her opening the fridge could be easily audible from where I am. Slam. Then it's nothing but silence. Ten seconds later, I hear a huge crash. The sound was loud enough to make me jump. I hop off the couch and quickly rush to the kitchen to see what's going on.

   "Dash, are you-" I barely make it through the kitchen door before something wet and cold hits me in the face. The substance drips off my face and I wipe the remainder off. Snow? I wipe my wet hands on my pants. "What's going o-" A wave of snowballs hit me in the face, some drip down my neck into my shirt. I open my eyes to see Dash beside a pile of snowballs on the kitchen counter. The mischievous look in her eyes tell me that, well, I'm screwed. She picks up another snowball and is about to throw it. I raise my hands, as if someone had just pointed a gun at me. "No, wait, I'm not ready." She shrugs and throws it anyways. I duck, but not fast enough. Like the ones before, it hits my face dead on.

   "Like I'm going to give you time to prepare!" She begins to laugh.

   I scoop a handful of the leftover snowballs that I had wiped off my face off the ground and pat it down into a round ball. With all my might, I chuck the snowball straight at Dash. It's a bullseye, right in the face. The shock of being hit causes Dash to take many steps back. She shakes the snow off and rubs her eyes... and reaches for her pile of snowballs...

   "Ooh, you're gonna get it now."

   Parts of the snowball I threw at her got into her hair somehow and melted. The six colors now glisten brightly in the kitchen light. Six. Probably more than the number of seconds I have to escape.

   I run out the kitchen, and a wave of snowballs are sent flying towards me. I slam the door close on the way out and luckily none of the snow makes it out the kitchen. It'll be less of a mess to clean up later. I could hear Dash fumbling with the kitchen doorknob, and most likely she's carrying an armful of snowballs. I quickly run for the bathroom, dive inside and lock the door. She knocks on the door. Not knock actually more like pounding.

   "Open up."

   I grin, finally safe from the icy cold projectiles. "No thanks." I sit against the door, listening to Dash's breathing.

   "Pssh, the snowballs are melting."

   "Eh, where did you even get those anyways?"

   "Outside, duh. I got up early this morning to collect them while you were asleep."

   I cough. "Tryhard."

   "What'd you just call me?"

   "A beaut."

   Minutes pass, we sit in silence. It seems now Dash is just waiting for me to come out so she can hit me with a snowball. I can stay here for the rest of the day, I mean, there's a toilet in here. And a shower. All I need is food and I can never leave. Maybe if this drags out too long I'll have to make a run for it, or eat toothpaste to prevent myself from starving.

   "Ky?"

   "Yeah?"

   "My legs are suddenly crampy, wanna come out here and massage them?"

   "Who'd wanna rub your stinky legs?" I laugh. I'm just joking of course, I don't know what her legs smell like. That'd be just weird... and creepy.

   "That's not cool man."

   "It's as cool as the melting snowballs in your hand, or what's left of them."

   "Whatever, I'm gonna go rest my legs." I hear shuffling and footsteps. The coast is now clear and I can leave my hiding spot in the washroom.

   But I don't want to.

   I sit here, thinking about my life with Dash. I do that a lot. Especially these past two months. I almost forgot that I'm really over thirty years old. Maybe Twilight will come soon. Maybe. I haven't heard from her in like forever. It'd be nice to get an explanation on why Dash and I were transformed to be young again.

   I'm suddenly exhausted. I don't know why, but my eyelids slowly droop down. It feels so peaceful right now, sitting against the door on my bathroom floor. My mind shuts off and I fall into dreamless sleep.

   My eyes flutter open. I groan and stand up. My feet are asleep. I can't believe I dozed off in the bathroom. The house is engulfed in silence. I strain my ear to hear any sounds that can be audible but nothing except my soft breathing reaches my ear drums. I grab the doorknob above me and pull myself up. A few stamps of my feet causes the blood to start moving again and the dull feeling leaves.

   I unlock the door and walk out into the hall. I look out the window. Night has fallen and darkness blankets everything. The snow shimmers in the moonlight. It's beautiful.

   I fish my iPhone from my pocket. My finger clicks down the power button and the screen lights up. The time reads 10:33. Holy cow. I was asleep on the floor for nearly ten hours? How the hell did this happen? Apart from that, I'm still feeling a bit groggy right now. I sigh and make my way to the living room. Maybe I can sleep on one of the two couches. Thank god it's Friday and there's no school tomorrow.

   I walk into the living room. But it didn't felt like walking, I felt like I was swaying like a drunk person. I'm just really, really, really, really sleepy right now. I don't know why because I slept in this morning and had an extra ten hours of sleep after that.

   I notice something on the couch I was about to sleep on. Someone to be precise. Dash. Her hands are under her head, like a pillow, some strands of yellow, orange and red hair cover over her face and eyes and one of her legs is hanging loosely from the couch. I smirk. Maybe I should get a snapshot of this. It's almost sort of cute.

   I notice her left leg twitch. Once. Twice. Then it stops twitching. Weird. Maybe she twitches in her sleep, I don't know.

   I settle down on the other couch. I realize it's abnormal to sleep this much. Maybe I should look into getting myself checked at a doctor. Eh, doesn't matter. Dash mumbles something too quiet for me to hear in her sleep. I smile, shut my eyes and once again deep slumber awaits me.