HOME | DD

Description
body div#devskin0 hr { }

    Billy and Zoë were always said to be good kids, not getting in fights, making the sports team, honor roll, debate team, cheer squad, chorus and band. Both moderately popular jacks-of-all-trades, they managed to make prom king and queen even though they were just friends, and got scholarships to the same college. Billy played sports year round, but managed to talk about other things, mainly debating, singing or playing clarinet. Well, not when he was doing those things, as they involved his mouth. He had a tall, muscular build, his features seemingly mismatched. He had soccer legs and basketball feet, baseball arms on a football torso, which his head was thankfully not too small for, his white blond hair contrasting with his frequently red face. Zoë’s body, however, seemed more perfectly constructed. She had toasted mocha skin and shiny black hair, large brown eyes, long willowy arms and legs rippling with muscles and small, athletic breasts that did not get in the way when she cheered, played the flute, lacrosse, tennis or cricket. Both frequently smiled, especially when the life-long friends found out they were going to college together.

   "Ah, Christmas!" Zoë exclaimed. "So full of traditions! Holly! Snow! Carols! Aliens invading London!"
   "What?" asked Billy.
   "Girls' cricket team. Overnight trips. Show with hot British guys. Work it out for yourself."
Billy grinned and shook his head. He'd been friends with Zoë for ten years, but sometimes he still couldn't understand what she said. She smiled back and punched him affably in the arm.
   "So what are you doing for Christmas this year, Billy?" Zoë asked, coming round to sit next to him on the sofa. He shrugged and turned his attention back to his book.
   "Same thing I do every year, I suppose." he answered. Zoë blinked curiously.
   "..what's that?" she asked vaguely. He laughed.
   "Come on, Zoë. We've been friends for years. You know what I do for Christmas every year!"
   "...I know. We're always hanging out." she said slowly. Zoë placed her hand on Billy's book and lowered it, forcing him to look her in the eyes.
   "So what is it we do every Christmas?" Zoë asked seriously. Billy laughed, but slowly, his smile faded and his expression because that of dismay.
   "...I ...don't remember, Zoë."

   The snowglobe shook, and little white particles filled the air. Slowly, they began to drift down, covering the two figures in a fresh blanket of snow. Billy and Zoë were continuing their argument.
   "You're a nerd and I am ashamed to be talking to you right now. Please stop, you are embarrassing both of us."
   "He plays cricket and he looks like a golden retriever! I regret nothing!" Zoë laughed.
   "Well, then. I suppose this is why I have a girlfriend and you don't have a boyfriend."
   "...Billy?" Zoë asked curiously. "Remind me who you're dating?" Billy laughed in disbelief.
   "C'mon, Zoë. We hang out together all the time. You remember my girlfriend..." he trailed off, looking confused. "Gloria? Or was it Chrissy? Chrissy or Christine? Zoë, what is my girlfriend's name?!" Panic seeped into his voice.
   Zoë shook her head, wearing an expression as if she wasn't sure if she wanted to pout or scream.
   "I... I don't know..."
   "Come on, Zoë." he begged. "You must have met her."
   "I know! I know!" she gasped. "But... I know I met your girlfriend before the first week of December, right?" Billy nodded.
   "And it's December right now, right?"
   "Of course it is." he agreed. "It's almost Christmas."
   "Can you remember anything from before the first week of December?" she asked. Billy paused thoughtfully, but the harder he tried to remember the less he could. Slowly, confusion began to give way to fear.

   The snowglobe shook, and the little storm started up again. Fat, lazy flakes made their way to the ground, collecting and covering the bare surface.
   "Alright, but explain the celery." Billy demanded. Zoë looked at him with confusion.
   "What celery?" she asked. Billy blinked, his face adjusting from frustration to dismay.
   "...celery?" he asked. "I think... I think we were just arguing about celery, but I don't remember any of what we were saying... I don't remember any of this conversation before I asked you about celery." Billy ruffled his short hair, trying to think. He turned to Zoë.
   "Do you remember what we were talking about?" he asked.
   "...no." she answered, slightly worried. She frowned, then shook her head. "Don't you hate it when that happens? When you know that you were doing something but you can't remember for the life of you what it was?"
   "Yeah." Billy nodded, beginning to smile again. Zoë smiled back, greatly reassured by her friend's understanding. She shook out her hair and stood up.
   "I've got to go shower."
   "Really?" asked Billy. "At three in the afternoon?" She strode into the bathroom, glancing over her shoulder.
   "Yes, Billy. At three in the afternoon. Got to get ready."
   "Ready for what?" he pressed, suddenly aware of every crumb of prepackaged gingerbread snack cake on the front of his shirt. If Zoë had remembered something important and he had forgotten it again... well, it scarcely bared thinking about.
   "My date, you doofus." she replied, sticking her head and one bare shoulder around the edge of the door. "I'm going dancing with Balder tonight."
   "Right, Balder." he nodded, resuming his slovenly posture and intending to enjoy it. The name brought to mind a familiar figure: a handsome young man with long dark hair who was currently employed as a professional ballet dancer.
   "I've always wondered what the heck kind of name is Balder. Balder than what?"
   "Not much." she answered. She twisted her hair into a cord. "His hair's longer than mine, remember."
   "Is it?" he asked idly. "I didn't know, not sure if I've met the guy..."
   "What?! Of course you and Balder have met! You remember Balder, I met him five years ago at a production of the Nutcracker."
   "Wait, wait... You met him five years ago, and you're eighteen. So you started dating him when you were thirteen?"
   Zoë's face wrinkled in confusion. She had met Balder five years ago, they had decided to be together the same night that they met, but there was something about Billy's version of events that didn't sound right. She wasn't thirteen at the time. She was eighteen. Just like she was right now.

   "Zoë..." Billy began to hyperventilate. "We've been college freshmen for ten years! We've been college freshmen for ten years and we've never had a spring break!"

   The snowglobe shook again, and like an etch-a-sketch the world became a fresh sheet of uncorrupted white.
   "They always said we were good kids," said Billy, pacing the floor, "not getting in fights, making the sports team, honor roll, debate team, cheer squad, chorus and band..."
   "I'm really getting sick of hearing that." said Zoë. Billy blinked.
   "But it's the first time I've said it."
   The two of them stared at each other for a moment, both aware that something wasn’t quite right but unable to put their feelings of unease and déjà vu to words. Their uncomfortable reverie was broken by a bird flying down the chimney and out of the fireplace in a great cloud of soot. Both students screamed. Billy managed to stop screaming quickly, whereas Zoë threw herself to the ground with her arms over her head.
   “Get it get it get it get it!”
   “Since when do we even have a fireplace?!” Billy exclaimed in dismay. He stumbled backwards, arms flailing, tripped over his collapsed friend, and fell on his backside. Zoë pulled herself into a smaller ball and started screaming again.
   "Get it get it get it!" Zoë shrieked. Billy clambered clumsily to his feet.
   "You seriously need to get a boyfriend. I can't go chasing after birds for you forever."
Despite his grumbling, Billy managed to stand up and open a window, which the bird found after circling the room two more times. Billy breathed for a moment, staring out of the window.
   “…what was that? A bluebird?”
   “A blue jay.” Zoë whimpered, raising her head.
   “An unusual side effect of aviaphobia. You are now a fully qualified bird spotter.”
   “That’s not funny.” She grumbled. “I have a legitimate fear of birds.”
   “I never said it wasn’t legitimate.” He answered, helping his friend to his feet.
   “You would not be laughing if you’d seen those geese, Billy.” She frowned.
   “The geese. I think I remember you mentioning the geese.”
   “I should hope you do! I still have nightmares about those geese.” She shivered. “All of those geese, surrounding me, more than I could count and screaming at me so I could see their teeth…”
   “Hang on, was this before or after you developed a fear of birds?” Billy asked, confused.
   “Well, after, because I was so scared of the birds that I hurt myself trying to get away from them.”
   "So what you're saying is..." Billy said slowly. "You had a traumatic experience with birds... you freaked out and injured yourself. ...because you were afraid of birds." Zoë blinked several times. Everything Billy had just said was true. But it didn’t make sense. It couldn’t. She stared up at her friend in dismay.
   “Zoë, try to remember what happened last Christmas.” Billy said quickly, trying to keep the terror out of his voice. “Try to remember what happened last Easter. Zoë, remember! Remember because I can’t!” he gasped. Zoë clung at her friend’s arm, shaking her head rapidly.
   “I- I can’t remember! Last year—last year, we were seniors in high school, right?”
   “Don’t assume, remember! Remember last year, Zoë!” Billy screamed, taking her arms in his hands. Zoë’s eyes swiveled about rapidly as she tried to remember what had happened last year. As she tried to remember anything before December the first.
   “Last year—last year—last year I… we spent it together… we went to midnight mass… I chopped off all my hair…” she reached up and touched her long, black hair. It was more than one year’s worth of growth. There was no way she could have gotten a pixie cut last Christmas and have it be past her collarbones this year. She knew her hair didn’t grow that fast. She thought back and tried to remember why she’d done it. Her already large eyes grew even wider. Hair being cut, skin being cut. She could remember her own death. Several of them. She stared up into Billy’s eyes and shuddered. She’d seen those eyes with the white film of death over them. And yet here he stood, trying to remember why he felt so nervous right now.
   "I've died five times...” Zoë gasped, “…and so you have you!"

The snowglobe shook, but something was wrong. Billy and Zoë clutched at their heads, trying to keep their minds and their pasts from falling out and being swept away in the snow.
Zoë pulled at her long dark hair, rubbing at her eyes and trying to remember why she was so scared. Why should she be scared? They always said she was a good kid, she didn’t get into fights, she played lacrosse, cricket and the clarinet. She opened her eyes, tears of confusion and fear pouring down her face. She was in a white field of snow, shivering in her only slightly tacky holiday sweater. No sun was visable, but the world was all a bright white. The sky was as white as the field, which stretched out indefinitely in all directions, with thick heavy flakes spiraling around in all directions. It was all but a white out, the snow flying about so thickly the entire world seemed cloudy.
There were a few black, skeletal trees against the skyline in the far distance, too far to run to and only barely close enough to make out at this distance. Zoë clutched herself for warmth, trying desperately to remember how she got here and why she wasn’t dressed for the cold. She spun in place, ankle deep in the snow.
“Billy?!” she called, squinting to see past the flying snow. “Billy?!” Zoë tried to start running, but found herself bogged down by the snow, stumbling with each dent she made in the field.
“Zoë?” came the faint reply. She spun about in place, trying to figure out from where she had heard her friend’s voice.
“Billy?!” she shouted, running as best as she was able, although none of the trees seemed to be growing any closer. Somewhere between the trees and the range of her vision, a small twist of red and cream turned into a blond man in a Christmas sweater.
“Zoë!” he called, stumbling towards her. The two friends met and broke their momentum by grabbing one another’s arms.
“Billy, what’s happening?”
“I don’t know Zoë, I don’t know!” he screamed. There were terrified tears rimming his eyes, for once as red as his flushed cheeks.“I don’t know how we got here! I don’t know where we are!”
   The both of them turned their heads, trying to make out anything but snow and the distant trees.
   “The trees…” Billy whimpered.
   “I know, Billy.” Zoë shivered.
   “They aren’t any closer… or further away…”
   “They didn’t move for me, either, and we came from different directions.”
   “Are they moving?” he asked.
   “Maybe the trees are where they belong and we’re just not moving…” Zoë guessed, turning her head around.
   “What does that even mean?!” he yelped.
   “I don’t know!”
   “Don’t say that if you don’t know! You’re just freaking me out!”
   The two friends turned in all directions, clutching at their hands, each afraid that the other would disappear again if they let go. Zoë’s eyes grew wide again. Her bluing lips trembled, and Billy began to focus on the new terror on her face. He hated seeing her shock and fear, it made him feel ill, but he was more afraid of seeing what she saw. What had given her that terror. Zoë opened her mouth as if to speak, but no sound came. At length, she raised her hand and pointed to a spot behind Billy. Perhaps if the top of her mittens hadn’t been pulled back he wouldn’t have known that she was pointing, but with her fingers exposed he had no choice but to turn around.

   Ten figures trailed out of the snow in two rows, unblinking, staring ahead and moving with no haste, unburdened by the blanket of snow that spread out before them. They were there. Five of each of them. Five Billys, five Zoës. Ten deaths in ten years, when they had only ever lived for one month in their first year of college.

   The first Billy was wearing a slim black coat and a scarf, but no hat. His cheeks were drawn and his lips were blue as his eyes. Frost had formed on his face, totally wan for once. No cold, nor embarrassment nor anger flushed his commonly rosy cheeks. It was so strange to see himself like that; Billy was barely like Billy at all. But then, he couldn't have been Billy. Billy was standing in front of the ghosts, quite alive. Billy hadn't frozen to death dancing in a clearing of trees. He couldn't have. If he'd frozen to death in a clearing of trees, how could he be standing here, looking at his ghost?

   And if he had frozen to death in a clearing of trees, he couldn't possibly have died in a sled crash, but there was another one in a coat. He was covered in snow all over and wore heavy boots. Blood poured down the side of his face from a blow to the top of his head. Looking into his own eyes, Billy could remember the pain of hitting the tree. He could remember how badly he'd wanted to just shake it off and walk away. But he couldn't shake it off. He could almost feel the pain again, watching the blood pour down his own face.

   There was a smaller figure beyond that one. He looked like a little boy, but he knew it was himself. In a flash, there was the little boy staring up at Billy, then there he was, staring back at himself. Footie pajamas with trains on them blinked to pajama pants worn without a shirt, then back again. Billy's eyes ached as he tried to understand how a figure so small could also be a nearly six feet tall at the same time. There was the little boy, and there was Billy. They were the same. They were the same, and if one of them was dead the other had to be as well.

   This ghost was dressed for indoors, wearing a college sweatshirt and jeans. There were a number of small cuts on his body, but nothing that would account for his death. But he was dead. Billy knew, staring into his own eyes, that he was looking at a dead man. He wasn't sure how he knew it, it wasn't just that he wasn't breathing, but something in the glassy way that he stared. The stiffness with which he held still. There was a mess of broken glass caught in his hair and clothes, and a single glass snowflake dangled from his hand, spinning in place with increasing speed.

   The last of Billy's dopplegangers was wearing a pair of tattered red pajamas. The ghost himself was covered in red welts and small cuts, bruised and beaten and staring forward with shadowy eyes. A man who had been beaten to death. With tiny little sticks, hitting him again and again, drumming away on his flesh without his protestation. Beaten until his body couldn't take it anymore and died. A man who had been beaten to death ten years before but was only too happy to wake again every Christmas and move forward as if nothing had ever happened.

   The first Zoë wore a knit hat over hair pulled into pigtails and a thick white parka. Her skin was pale and tinted blue. Her boots were thick with snow, but that was only to be expected. She had spent the night dancing in a snowy clearing, dancing until she was too cold to move. Dancing until she fell to the ground and let a fresh layer of snow cover her.

   Behind her, a second ghost followed with eerie, halting, stiff movements. At first, Zoë thought that this was a function of being dead, and then she glanced down. This ghost was on pointe, hair in a bun and wearing a theatrical nightgown, dancing with her arms spread slightly. Yes, Zoë remembered, she had learned how to dance on pointe seven years ago, but she had never needed to since. Why was that? That was absurd. To learn to dance like that was a lifetime vocation, and she never practiced. Zoë ought to know, she was a ballerina herself. She'd been learning ever since she was seven. Zoë's eyes widened in terror as two conflicting childhoods ran through her memories. Or was it more? It was so hard to tell. She was an only child, and then suddenly she had sisters. Suddenly, she had always had sisters. Suddenly, she had always had a last name.

   White opera gloves covered in sequins, a full white dress made of layers after layers of tulle and sequined veiling, capped with a long veil embroidered with little snowflakes, the girl would have looked like a bride if she hadn't been wearing a dark blue wig made of tinsel. Her face was painted with white and metallic blue, and more of the tinsel stuck around her mouth. Yes-- as she looked at the ghost, Zoë could remember having the wig ripped from her head and shoved roughly in her mouth. She remembered the terror as the man hand his hands over her mouth and unceremoniously smothered her on the damp floor of a public restroom.

   The next girl dripped heavily into the snow. Her black hair was plastered to her face with water, and ice was forming on her lips. Her lips were black with frostbite, and her eyes were dark and too sunken to open. She wore a down coat and snow pants, both completely soaked and draining onto the ground at a prestigious rate.

The last figure to enter the room was the last of the ghosts of Zoë.
   This girl was wearing a white lace nightgown, the lacings of its bodice trailing along the ground. Her torso was freakishly distorted by the dress, a shape perfect for an hourglass but totally inappropriate for a young woman. At the smallest part of her waist, her own delicate hands could touch thumbs and ring fingers around it. It made Zoë retch to look at it.

   Looking at these walking corpses was only more disturbing because they were her. Her own face pinched and drawn, paler than she could even imagine herself. Five identical faces she'd only ever seen in a mirror before. Five dead faces. And she knew how they died. She knew how she died. She remembered.
   "...I've died five times..." Zoë repeated, her voice made into unearthly echos by the ghosts of herself speaking dispassionately along with her.
   In that moment, turning their eyes from each of the ghosts, making eye contact with themselves, they remembered each death they had ever suffered. The feelings of freezing and beatings, and a heart just stopping for no reason whatsoever.

The snowglobe stood on some forgotten mantelpiece, a dramatic base of black skeletal trees creeping up the sides of the clear water-filled bulb. In the center, two figures clutched at each other, staring out in dismay as snow and ghosts spun around them. The snowglobe shook, and the white flakes turned up into the sky again. Once again, Billy and Zoë were always said to be good kids, not getting in fights, making the sports team, honor roll, debate team, cheer squad, chorus and band.

Description
body div#devskin0 hr { }

    Billy and Zoë were always said to be good kids, not getting in fights, making the sports team, honor roll, debate team, cheer squad, chorus and band. Both moderately popular jacks-of-all-trades, they managed to make prom king and queen even though they were just friends, and got scholarships to the same college. Billy played sports year round, but managed to talk about other things, mainly debating, singing or playing clarinet. Well, not when he was doing those things, as they involved his mouth. He had a tall, muscular build, his features seemingly mismatched. He had soccer legs and basketball feet, baseball arms on a football torso, which his head was thankfully not too small for, his white blond hair contrasting with his frequently red face. Zoë’s body, however, seemed more perfectly constructed. She had toasted mocha skin and shiny black hair, large brown eyes, long willowy arms and legs rippling with muscles and small, athletic breasts that did not get in the way when she cheered, played the flute, lacrosse, tennis or cricket. Both frequently smiled, especially when the life-long friends found out they were going to college together.

   "Ah, Christmas!" Zoë exclaimed. "So full of traditions! Holly! Snow! Carols! Aliens invading London!"
   "What?" asked Billy.
   "Girls' cricket team. Overnight trips. Show with hot British guys. Work it out for yourself."
Billy grinned and shook his head. He'd been friends with Zoë for ten years, but sometimes he still couldn't understand what she said. She smiled back and punched him affably in the arm.
   "So what are you doing for Christmas this year, Billy?" Zoë asked, coming round to sit next to him on the sofa. He shrugged and turned his attention back to his book.
   "Same thing I do every year, I suppose." he answered. Zoë blinked curiously.
   "..what's that?" she asked vaguely. He laughed.
   "Come on, Zoë. We've been friends for years. You know what I do for Christmas every year!"
   "...I know. We're always hanging out." she said slowly. Zoë placed her hand on Billy's book and lowered it, forcing him to look her in the eyes.
   "So what is it we do every Christmas?" Zoë asked seriously. Billy laughed, but slowly, his smile faded and his expression because that of dismay.
   "...I ...don't remember, Zoë."

   The snowglobe shook, and little white particles filled the air. Slowly, they began to drift down, covering the two figures in a fresh blanket of snow. Billy and Zoë were continuing their argument.
   "You're a nerd and I am ashamed to be talking to you right now. Please stop, you are embarrassing both of us."
   "He plays cricket and he looks like a golden retriever! I regret nothing!" Zoë laughed.
   "Well, then. I suppose this is why I have a girlfriend and you don't have a boyfriend."
   "...Billy?" Zoë asked curiously. "Remind me who you're dating?" Billy laughed in disbelief.
   "C'mon, Zoë. We hang out together all the time. You remember my girlfriend..." he trailed off, looking confused. "Gloria? Or was it Chrissy? Chrissy or Christine? Zoë, what is my girlfriend's name?!" Panic seeped into his voice.
   Zoë shook her head, wearing an expression as if she wasn't sure if she wanted to pout or scream.
   "I... I don't know..."
   "Come on, Zoë." he begged. "You must have met her."
   "I know! I know!" she gasped. "But... I know I met your girlfriend before the first week of December, right?" Billy nodded.
   "And it's December right now, right?"
   "Of course it is." he agreed. "It's almost Christmas."
   "Can you remember anything from before the first week of December?" she asked. Billy paused thoughtfully, but the harder he tried to remember the less he could. Slowly, confusion began to give way to fear.

   The snowglobe shook, and the little storm started up again. Fat, lazy flakes made their way to the ground, collecting and covering the bare surface.
   "Alright, but explain the celery." Billy demanded. Zoë looked at him with confusion.
   "What celery?" she asked. Billy blinked, his face adjusting from frustration to dismay.
   "...celery?" he asked. "I think... I think we were just arguing about celery, but I don't remember any of what we were saying... I don't remember any of this conversation before I asked you about celery." Billy ruffled his short hair, trying to think. He turned to Zoë.
   "Do you remember what we were talking about?" he asked.
   "...no." she answered, slightly worried. She frowned, then shook her head. "Don't you hate it when that happens? When you know that you were doing something but you can't remember for the life of you what it was?"
   "Yeah." Billy nodded, beginning to smile again. Zoë smiled back, greatly reassured by her friend's understanding. She shook out her hair and stood up.
   "I've got to go shower."
   "Really?" asked Billy. "At three in the afternoon?" She strode into the bathroom, glancing over her shoulder.
   "Yes, Billy. At three in the afternoon. Got to get ready."
   "Ready for what?" he pressed, suddenly aware of every crumb of prepackaged gingerbread snack cake on the front of his shirt. If Zoë had remembered something important and he had forgotten it again... well, it scarcely bared thinking about.
   "My date, you doofus." she replied, sticking her head and one bare shoulder around the edge of the door. "I'm going dancing with Balder tonight."
   "Right, Balder." he nodded, resuming his slovenly posture and intending to enjoy it. The name brought to mind a familiar figure: a handsome young man with long dark hair who was currently employed as a professional ballet dancer.
   "I've always wondered what the heck kind of name is Balder. Balder than what?"
   "Not much." she answered. She twisted her hair into a cord. "His hair's longer than mine, remember."
   "Is it?" he asked idly. "I didn't know, not sure if I've met the guy..."
   "What?! Of course you and Balder have met! You remember Balder, I met him five years ago at a production of the Nutcracker."
   "Wait, wait... You met him five years ago, and you're eighteen. So you started dating him when you were thirteen?"
   Zoë's face wrinkled in confusion. She had met Balder five years ago, they had decided to be together the same night that they met, but there was something about Billy's version of events that didn't sound right. She wasn't thirteen at the time. She was eighteen. Just like she was right now.

   "Zoë..." Billy began to hyperventilate. "We've been college freshmen for ten years! We've been college freshmen for ten years and we've never had a spring break!"

   The snowglobe shook again, and like an etch-a-sketch the world became a fresh sheet of uncorrupted white.
   "They always said we were good kids," said Billy, pacing the floor, "not getting in fights, making the sports team, honor roll, debate team, cheer squad, chorus and band..."
   "I'm really getting sick of hearing that." said Zoë. Billy blinked.
   "But it's the first time I've said it."
   The two of them stared at each other for a moment, both aware that something wasn’t quite right but unable to put their feelings of unease and déjà vu to words. Their uncomfortable reverie was broken by a bird flying down the chimney and out of the fireplace in a great cloud of soot. Both students screamed. Billy managed to stop screaming quickly, whereas Zoë threw herself to the ground with her arms over her head.
   “Get it get it get it get it!”
   “Since when do we even have a fireplace?!” Billy exclaimed in dismay. He stumbled backwards, arms flailing, tripped over his collapsed friend, and fell on his backside. Zoë pulled herself into a smaller ball and started screaming again.
   "Get it get it get it!" Zoë shrieked. Billy clambered clumsily to his feet.
   "You seriously need to get a boyfriend. I can't go chasing after birds for you forever."
Despite his grumbling, Billy managed to stand up and open a window, which the bird found after circling the room two more times. Billy breathed for a moment, staring out of the window.
   “…what was that? A bluebird?”
   “A blue jay.” Zoë whimpered, raising her head.
   “An unusual side effect of aviaphobia. You are now a fully qualified bird spotter.”
   “That’s not funny.” She grumbled. “I have a legitimate fear of birds.”
   “I never said it wasn’t legitimate.” He answered, helping his friend to his feet.
   “You would not be laughing if you’d seen those geese, Billy.” She frowned.
   “The geese. I think I remember you mentioning the geese.”
   “I should hope you do! I still have nightmares about those geese.” She shivered. “All of those geese, surrounding me, more than I could count and screaming at me so I could see their teeth…”
   “Hang on, was this before or after you developed a fear of birds?” Billy asked, confused.
   “Well, after, because I was so scared of the birds that I hurt myself trying to get away from them.”
   "So what you're saying is..." Billy said slowly. "You had a traumatic experience with birds... you freaked out and injured yourself. ...because you were afraid of birds." Zoë blinked several times. Everything Billy had just said was true. But it didn’t make sense. It couldn’t. She stared up at her friend in dismay.
   “Zoë, try to remember what happened last Christmas.” Billy said quickly, trying to keep the terror out of his voice. “Try to remember what happened last Easter. Zoë, remember! Remember because I can’t!” he gasped. Zoë clung at her friend’s arm, shaking her head rapidly.
   “I- I can’t remember! Last year—last year, we were seniors in high school, right?”
   “Don’t assume, remember! Remember last year, Zoë!” Billy screamed, taking her arms in his hands. Zoë’s eyes swiveled about rapidly as she tried to remember what had happened last year. As she tried to remember anything before December the first.
   “Last year—last year—last year I… we spent it together… we went to midnight mass… I chopped off all my hair…” she reached up and touched her long, black hair. It was more than one year’s worth of growth. There was no way she could have gotten a pixie cut last Christmas and have it be past her collarbones this year. She knew her hair didn’t grow that fast. She thought back and tried to remember why she’d done it. Her already large eyes grew even wider. Hair being cut, skin being cut. She could remember her own death. Several of them. She stared up into Billy’s eyes and shuddered. She’d seen those eyes with the white film of death over them. And yet here he stood, trying to remember why he felt so nervous right now.
   "I've died five times...” Zoë gasped, “…and so you have you!"

The snowglobe shook, but something was wrong. Billy and Zoë clutched at their heads, trying to keep their minds and their pasts from falling out and being swept away in the snow.
Zoë pulled at her long dark hair, rubbing at her eyes and trying to remember why she was so scared. Why should she be scared? They always said she was a good kid, she didn’t get into fights, she played lacrosse, cricket and the clarinet. She opened her eyes, tears of confusion and fear pouring down her face. She was in a white field of snow, shivering in her only slightly tacky holiday sweater. No sun was visable, but the world was all a bright white. The sky was as white as the field, which stretched out indefinitely in all directions, with thick heavy flakes spiraling around in all directions. It was all but a white out, the snow flying about so thickly the entire world seemed cloudy.
There were a few black, skeletal trees against the skyline in the far distance, too far to run to and only barely close enough to make out at this distance. Zoë clutched herself for warmth, trying desperately to remember how she got here and why she wasn’t dressed for the cold. She spun in place, ankle deep in the snow.
“Billy?!” she called, squinting to see past the flying snow. “Billy?!” Zoë tried to start running, but found herself bogged down by the snow, stumbling with each dent she made in the field.
“Zoë?” came the faint reply. She spun about in place, trying to figure out from where she had heard her friend’s voice.
“Billy?!” she shouted, running as best as she was able, although none of the trees seemed to be growing any closer. Somewhere between the trees and the range of her vision, a small twist of red and cream turned into a blond man in a Christmas sweater.
“Zoë!” he called, stumbling towards her. The two friends met and broke their momentum by grabbing one another’s arms.
“Billy, what’s happening?”
“I don’t know Zoë, I don’t know!” he screamed. There were terrified tears rimming his eyes, for once as red as his flushed cheeks.“I don’t know how we got here! I don’t know where we are!”
   The both of them turned their heads, trying to make out anything but snow and the distant trees.
   “The trees…” Billy whimpered.
   “I know, Billy.” Zoë shivered.
   “They aren’t any closer… or further away…”
   “They didn’t move for me, either, and we came from different directions.”
   “Are they moving?” he asked.
   “Maybe the trees are where they belong and we’re just not moving…” Zoë guessed, turning her head around.
   “What does that even mean?!” he yelped.
   “I don’t know!”
   “Don’t say that if you don’t know! You’re just freaking me out!”
   The two friends turned in all directions, clutching at their hands, each afraid that the other would disappear again if they let go. Zoë’s eyes grew wide again. Her bluing lips trembled, and Billy began to focus on the new terror on her face. He hated seeing her shock and fear, it made him feel ill, but he was more afraid of seeing what she saw. What had given her that terror. Zoë opened her mouth as if to speak, but no sound came. At length, she raised her hand and pointed to a spot behind Billy. Perhaps if the top of her mittens hadn’t been pulled back he wouldn’t have known that she was pointing, but with her fingers exposed he had no choice but to turn around.

   Ten figures trailed out of the snow in two rows, unblinking, staring ahead and moving with no haste, unburdened by the blanket of snow that spread out before them. They were there. Five of each of them. Five Billys, five Zoës. Ten deaths in ten years, when they had only ever lived for one month in their first year of college.

   The first Billy was wearing a slim black coat and a scarf, but no hat. His cheeks were drawn and his lips were blue as his eyes. Frost had formed on his face, totally wan for once. No cold, nor embarrassment nor anger flushed his commonly rosy cheeks. It was so strange to see himself like that; Billy was barely like Billy at all. But then, he couldn't have been Billy. Billy was standing in front of the ghosts, quite alive. Billy hadn't frozen to death dancing in a clearing of trees. He couldn't have. If he'd frozen to death in a clearing of trees, how could he be standing here, looking at his ghost?

   And if he had frozen to death in a clearing of trees, he couldn't possibly have died in a sled crash, but there was another one in a coat. He was covered in snow all over and wore heavy boots. Blood poured down the side of his face from a blow to the top of his head. Looking into his own eyes, Billy could remember the pain of hitting the tree. He could remember how badly he'd wanted to just shake it off and walk away. But he couldn't shake it off. He could almost feel the pain again, watching the blood pour down his own face.

   There was a smaller figure beyond that one. He looked like a little boy, but he knew it was himself. In a flash, there was the little boy staring up at Billy, then there he was, staring back at himself. Footie pajamas with trains on them blinked to pajama pants worn without a shirt, then back again. Billy's eyes ached as he tried to understand how a figure so small could also be a nearly six feet tall at the same time. There was the little boy, and there was Billy. They were the same. They were the same, and if one of them was dead the other had to be as well.

   This ghost was dressed for indoors, wearing a college sweatshirt and jeans. There were a number of small cuts on his body, but nothing that would account for his death. But he was dead. Billy knew, staring into his own eyes, that he was looking at a dead man. He wasn't sure how he knew it, it wasn't just that he wasn't breathing, but something in the glassy way that he stared. The stiffness with which he held still. There was a mess of broken glass caught in his hair and clothes, and a single glass snowflake dangled from his hand, spinning in place with increasing speed.

   The last of Billy's dopplegangers was wearing a pair of tattered red pajamas. The ghost himself was covered in red welts and small cuts, bruised and beaten and staring forward with shadowy eyes. A man who had been beaten to death. With tiny little sticks, hitting him again and again, drumming away on his flesh without his protestation. Beaten until his body couldn't take it anymore and died. A man who had been beaten to death ten years before but was only too happy to wake again every Christmas and move forward as if nothing had ever happened.

   The first Zoë wore a knit hat over hair pulled into pigtails and a thick white parka. Her skin was pale and tinted blue. Her boots were thick with snow, but that was only to be expected. She had spent the night dancing in a snowy clearing, dancing until she was too cold to move. Dancing until she fell to the ground and let a fresh layer of snow cover her.

   Behind her, a second ghost followed with eerie, halting, stiff movements. At first, Zoë thought that this was a function of being dead, and then she glanced down. This ghost was on pointe, hair in a bun and wearing a theatrical nightgown, dancing with her arms spread slightly. Yes, Zoë remembered, she had learned how to dance on pointe seven years ago, but she had never needed to since. Why was that? That was absurd. To learn to dance like that was a lifetime vocation, and she never practiced. Zoë ought to know, she was a ballerina herself. She'd been learning ever since she was seven. Zoë's eyes widened in terror as two conflicting childhoods ran through her memories. Or was it more? It was so hard to tell. She was an only child, and then suddenly she had sisters. Suddenly, she had always had sisters. Suddenly, she had always had a last name.

   White opera gloves covered in sequins, a full white dress made of layers after layers of tulle and sequined veiling, capped with a long veil embroidered with little snowflakes, the girl would have looked like a bride if she hadn't been wearing a dark blue wig made of tinsel. Her face was painted with white and metallic blue, and more of the tinsel stuck around her mouth. Yes-- as she looked at the ghost, Zoë could remember having the wig ripped from her head and shoved roughly in her mouth. She remembered the terror as the man hand his hands over her mouth and unceremoniously smothered her on the damp floor of a public restroom.

   The next girl dripped heavily into the snow. Her black hair was plastered to her face with water, and ice was forming on her lips. Her lips were black with frostbite, and her eyes were dark and too sunken to open. She wore a down coat and snow pants, both completely soaked and draining onto the ground at a prestigious rate.

The last figure to enter the room was the last of the ghosts of Zoë.
   This girl was wearing a white lace nightgown, the lacings of its bodice trailing along the ground. Her torso was freakishly distorted by the dress, a shape perfect for an hourglass but totally inappropriate for a young woman. At the smallest part of her waist, her own delicate hands could touch thumbs and ring fingers around it. It made Zoë retch to look at it.

   Looking at these walking corpses was only more disturbing because they were her. Her own face pinched and drawn, paler than she could even imagine herself. Five identical faces she'd only ever seen in a mirror before. Five dead faces. And she knew how they died. She knew how she died. She remembered.
   "...I've died five times..." Zoë repeated, her voice made into unearthly echos by the ghosts of herself speaking dispassionately along with her.
   In that moment, turning their eyes from each of the ghosts, making eye contact with themselves, they remembered each death they had ever suffered. The feelings of freezing and beatings, and a heart just stopping for no reason whatsoever.

The snowglobe stood on some forgotten mantelpiece, a dramatic base of black skeletal trees creeping up the sides of the clear water-filled bulb. In the center, two figures clutched at each other, staring out in dismay as snow and ghosts spun around them. The snowglobe shook, and the white flakes turned up into the sky again. Once again, Billy and Zoë were always said to be good kids, not getting in fights, making the sports team, honor roll, debate team, cheer squad, chorus and band.