When I stepped out into the cold, white wonderland, the last thing I expected to see...was you. I had tried for days to chase you out of my head. To squelch the memories that wrapped me in their warm blanket of bliss. It had been so hard, but I did it. Yet, somehow, you came back. Not in my memories. No, this wasn't a figment of my imagination. This was real. You were standing in front of me, holding two hot chocolates. I could see the steam rising from the plastic Starbucks cups. A breeze blew across the invisible bridge that was keeping us apart. Your brown hair was slightly spiked and shone with new snowflakes. Your blue eyes twinkled with an unseen humor that you always possessed. Your cheeks were kissed pink by the sharpness of Old Man Winter.

“What do you want?” I asked, attempting to sound careless.

“I came to bargain. I miss you.”

“Yes, well, I missed you when you decided to go off with my best friend.”

“I'm sorry.”

You looked so sincere. I wanted to cry and run across the snowy yard and hug you forever. But I couldn't. I restrained myself.

“You can't just expect to come onto my land with hot chocolate and an apology and assume that I will take you back. It doesn't work that way.”

“I know. I was shallow and stupid-”

“Yeah, you were. But I got over it. I got over you and your stupid ways.”

I think I heard my heart shattering into millions of tiny pieces that needed to be swept up and thrown in the garbage.

“Look, can't you just give me another chance?”

“No! I can't and I won't. It took me so long to get over you!” The tears started pouring down my cheeks. They froze into little tiny icicles. “I have never let anybody, not even my best friends, see as much into me as you did. You saw what nobody else saw. And I let you. I opened myself up to you because I thought – no, I knew, I could trust you. But all you did was take my heart, throw it on the ground, stomp on it, and left it there while you walked away.”

I seriously felt like fainting. Your eyes lost their humor and grew watery with tears.

“I was scared! I had never felt like that before. You made me see something in myself that I have never seen before. I ran away from you and my feelings because I couldn't handle it, okay?”

“No, it's not okay. It will never...be okay.”

“Claire-”

I turned and slammed the door in your face as you uttered my name. I collapsed in a heap in front of the door and began to cry and cry and cry. I never felt that way again. I was never able to trust another man. I always thought they would hurt me like you had. I couldn't put up with that heartbreak. So I cut myself off from them. I spent the next twenty years investing myself into my college studies and eventually, into my job. I didn't mind it. Until the day you came back.