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“Oh, looks like it snowed.”
Those were the words that Rose woke up to. Not that she registered them, since she choose to bury her face back in her pillow in an attempt to ignore the noise and light in the bedroom. Unfortunately for her, it didn’t work very well, as she could still hear her wife softly chuckling at her actions.
“Kanaya, dear, I love you, but do we really need to start the day so early?”
“Why? Don’t you wish to gaze at the sunrise as it blesses us with the first rays of light of the day?”
“First of all, the sun has risen at least one hour ago, so it’d be impossible for me to see any kind of sunrise right now. Second, no, not in particular. The only thing I wish is that I hadn’t woken up at this hour, without a wife to steal body heat from. It’s cold,” Rose replied, lifting her head up to face Kanaya, who was still holding the curtains she had opened a few seconds ago.
“What a dilemma,” Kanaya said, walking towards Rose, the carpet muffling her footsteps. Once she reached the bed, she sat down next to her and started to stroke her hair. “Looks like you’ll have to fend off the cold on your own now. Oh, how cruel of me!”
Rose hummed in response and unknowingly leaned into her hand. Perhaps Kanaya didn’t notice (or maybe she did) but her motions were gently lulling her back to sleep, the exact opposite of what she wanted. Not that Rose minded.
“You know,” Rose said. “It’s pretty cold and you’re only in your pajamas. Can I interest you in going back to bed and staying there with your lovely wife for a few more hours?”
“Oh, so we’re using the ‘it’s cold’ excuse today, are we? What happened to bribing me with morning cuddles?”
“Kanaya, I cannot believe what I am hearing right now. Are you perhaps insinuating that I am a one trick pony?”
“A what?”
“Besides, that stopped working two weeks ago, which, by the way, is quite a shame. I believe it’d be in your best interest to accept that preposition once again. ”
“I apologise, but as tempting as it sounds, I must not accept it. Anyway, breakfast’s downstairs if you ever decide to get up today.”
Kanaya kissed Rose’s forehead before heading out of their bedroom with a change of clothes. Rose took that as an opportunity to go back to sleep. However, she only lasted ten minutes before giving up. No matter how much she tried, she couldn't fall back asleep. Apparently Kanaya was getting what she wanted. Maybe closing the curtains would help but something told her it wasn’t very likely. She was too awake already. Nevertheless, she walked towards the window to do it but stopped in slight surprise when she stared outside.
“Oh, looks like it snowed.”
When Rose came downstairs, Kanaya was already in the kitchen, nursing her coffee mug. Upon noticing Rose, she motioned towards the still steaming coffee pot. Rose muttered a thank you before going to fill her own mug and grab a piece of toast along the way. As she went to grab the sugar and cream, Kanaya spoke up from her seat at the counter.
"Have you seen the snow already? The backyard looks quite beautiful, even if we can't see any topiaries or flowers.The way the snow glistened was kind of breathtaking, to be honest," she paused for a moment to drink from her mug. "I wonder how it’d feel to touch it. Well, besides cold."
“If you want to we can go outside so you can do it.”
“Oh, no, it’s fine. We have more important things to do.”
She had a point but Rose didn’t miss the way she longingly stared out the window every few seconds. Now that she thought of it, if they did go out, it would probably be the first time Kanaya had any contact with snow. Of course she already knew what it was, but Rose was pretty sure she still hadn't had the chance to be in it. Maybe… Maybe it’d be nice for the both of them to go outside and relax for a while.
“I suppose that’s true but wouldn’t you agree that these ‘important things’ we have to do aren’t as quite as entertaining as being in the snow would be?”
“And how exactly is snow entertaining?”
“Guess you won’t find out unless we do go outside.”
Rose masked her grin by taking a sip from her coffee, whilst Kanaya stared between her and the window, seemingly trying to make her decision. Her curiosity was piqued. Good. After a moment of hesitation, she settled her gaze on her wife and shrugged with a smile.
“Alright, you win. But we should get some gloves first.”
Rose agreed and followed her upstairs to their bedroom. After making sure they would be warm enough to stand in the snow, the two finally headed outside, hand in hand. The air was crisp and cold and everything was covered in a thick coat of snow. Kanaya gingerly kicked some of it out of their porch before sighing deeply and squeezing Rose’s hand.
“It’s beautiful in here, everything looks so… Enchanting, I guess. It must have been nice seeing this often on Earth.”
Rose shrugged, watching how Kanaya eyed her surroundings in wonder. The sights weren’t anything new or special, although it was true that they were pretty. However, nothing beat the way her wife’s eyes sparkled in amazement and how her lips were parted in slight surprise and delight.
“Yes, it was, though it wasn’t exactly the sights that made it so enjoyable.”
“Really?”
“I’m pretty sure almost every child would tell you what’s so wonderful about snow is what you do with it. Not that… Not that I had much to do on my own, but it was still pretty entertaining.”
“Oh, I see.”
Rose didn’t need to look at Kanaya to know that she was looking at her with an worried expression.
Great job, Rose. Way to ruin the mood, she thought, but before she could steer the conversation in a different direction, Kanaya asked her to describe what kind of activities humans did with the snow. Rose internally sighed in relief at the change of topic. Thank goodness Kanaya knew her so well.
"There were a lot of things you could do, actually. I think you mentioned you once saw me building a snowman when I was younger? That's one of them. You can make sculptures out of the snow. Oh, and snow angels-"
"Why would a child want to sculpt something so horrifying?"
"Not the Sburb kind of angels. Also, snow angels aren't sculptures, you just… Lay down and move your arms and legs to make the shape of the wings and etcetera."
There was a moment of silence, where none of them said anything, broken by Kanaya eyeing Rose warily before saying, "But your clothes would get wet. Why would anyone want to do that?"
"You think little kids cared about clothing when they were having fun?"
"No but… Their clothes."
"Clothes get dry eventually, Kanaya."
Her wife chuckled at her remark before telling her she knew that already. Still, it couldn't be good for someone's health to walk around in the cold with wet clothes. Rose simply shrugged in response. That was true but it wasn't like they could do anything about it except hope people were responsible.
"I guess you do have a point," Kanaya sighed and both of them fell back into silence. At least until Kanaya suddenly remembered something and her eyes lit up with a mischievous glint. Slowly letting go of Rose's hand, she asked her to "please continue explaining what else humans did in the snow, back on Earth". Rose didn't question it and resumed her talking, failing to notice how Kanaya was slowly crouching down and grabbing a handful of snow. Good, everything was going according to her plan. As Rose continued speaking, blissfully unaware of her wife's schemes, Kanaya approached her from behind, her eyes focusing on the back of Rose’s head.
“There were also sleds you could use to go down hills or other high places-”
Kanaya raised her arm, ready to strike, and then...
“I never did that though, so you’d have to ask anyone else how it feels, although I’m pretty sure they’d say- Hey!”
The snowball hit Rose right in the back of her head, interrupting her mid sentence and making her turn around, her mouth hanging open. Kanaya tried to stifle her giggles, but found herself unable to and broke into laughter.
“Kanaya? What was that?”
“I’m so”- she started laughing once again-”I’m so sorry, but the look in your face!”
Rose stared at her, still in shock, before smiling too. “I thought you didn’t know any winter activities, how come you knew about snow fights?”
“Oh, I saw this is in one of your human movies! You were getting a bit gloomy over there and I wanted to liven things up a bit, I guess.”
“Oh… I suppose I should thank you then.”
“It’s quite alright, you don’t need to-”
Kanaya was interrupted by Rose hurling a snowball at the top of her head. As she stood there in the shock, the only thing she could see besides snow was Rose grinning wildly at her, her arm still up in the air from throwing the snow.
“Why Kanaya, you look simply radiant this morning! Did you do anything to your hair?”
“Rose! I cannot believe this!”
For a moment, the two of them stared each other in the eyes, waiting for the other to make the first move before running out of the porch and rushing to grab snow the fastest, all the while laughing loudly. After exchanging a handful of snowballs each (and getting hit by some), the two were out of breath. Kanaya approached slowly Rose before leaning into her side and wrapping her arms around her. Unfortunately, the fact that they were both tired, plus their height difference, made Rose unable to hold on to Kanaya and the two ended up falling down, Kanaya on top.
“Ouch.”
“Sorry, I’ll get up now!” Kanaya smiled sheepishly before moving to get up. However, she was stopped by Rose grabbing her arm and pulling her back.
“Wait, let’s…Let’s stay here for a moment. I’m too tired to move.”
Kanaya nodded before dropping beside her and intertwining their hands. The two laid there for a while, trying to regain their breaths and staring at the sky, until Rose spoke up again, “I need to tell you something important.”
“What is it?”
Rose pulled her arm gently, urging her to stare at her. Her face was flushed and her hair was covered in snow. Kanaya raised an hand to remove it but was stopped by Rose, who licked her lips before continuing speaking, “I just… I’m really glad to have met you and to be able to share my life with you and… I know we didn’t get married recently so you probably know this already but I… What I’m trying to say is… You’re just really wonderful and I’m glad I get to be you with all this time. I love you.”
Letting go of her hand, Rose turned to lay on her back, unable to stare at Kanaya. “Sorry, that was kind of lame.”
“I thought it was very endearing. And for all it’s worth...” Kanaya suddenly got up and pulled Rose up with her, before embracing her. ”I love you too.”
With that, she pressed her lips to Rose’s and kissed her gently. Rose sighed happily into the kiss and hugged Kanaya tighter to her. Everything in that moment seemed so peaceful, so perfect, she almost regretted having to break it for breathing. But alas, if she ceased to breathe, there wouldn’t be any future kisses. Smiling, she let go of Kanaya, only to hold her hand again, and opened her mouth to speak. However, she was interrupted by something cold and wet falling on her face. The two of them simultaneously looked up at the sky, noticing it was starting to snow.
“Well, that’s a nice surprise.”
Kanaya nodded before replying, “Yes, but it’s starting to get a bit chilly, isn’t it? Maybe we should head inside. Our clothes are kinda wet anyway.”
Rose simply shrugged and the two made their way back inside.
“But don’t you want to stay a little longer? After all, it’s the first time you’ve seen snowing in real life and you kept mentioning how beautiful it was.”
Kanaya opened the door and motioned for Rose to get inside. After the two entered home, she finally answered. “It’s alright. Besides, there’s no sight more beautiful than you.”
Rose chuckled at that, before pulling Kanya down for one more kiss.