Dec 12th, 2022

It’s snowing again. 

Amanda had just finished her work at her Toronto downtown office and was getting ready to leave when she noticed it was snowing again. It wasn’t very surprising since it was December, but it still caught her off guard. This was the first time she had left her apartment in months. She had only left her house to make the journey into the office after she had checked the weather repeatedly to ensure there was no possibility of snow. She walked over to the big glass office windows and stared at the city outside. The fresh snow fell fast and quietly outside as it slowly covered the city in a blanket of white. How had she not seen this before? Was the meeting really that interesting that she forgot to look out the window? No, not really, Amanda distinctly remembers being bored, anxious and distracted. But, that’s who she has been for a while now. 

Ever since the accident last winter, she has found herself anxious, on edge and constantly distracted. She doesn’t like to talk about it but she remembers every detail of the accident. She was driving up to her parent’s house from a Christmas party and she was quite tipsy. The city had seen snow flurries all day and it had turned into a significant snowfall as she got behind the wheels. In hindsight, Amanda thought ruefully, that was not the smartest decision. She can still see it happen as if she was not in the accident but a bystander, witnessing the whole scene unfold. She ran a red light, realized it too late and slammed the brakes. The car immediately spun out of control and after a couple of spins, rammed into the wall. Before passing out, she saw him. A man in a red parka pinned between her car and the wall. 

Her father was an influential man and had taken care of everything so she did not even have to appear in court or had any charges laid against her. Turns out, it was a homeless man and there were no witnesses, so it wasn’t hard for her dad to dig her out of the mess and that’s all Amanda ever found out about the man, not that she wanted to find out more. 

The memory always upsets Amanda, though she can’t figure out if it’s the trauma or the lack of guilt she feels about the life lost. She pulled on her parka, grabbed her bag and headed for the elevator. She was lost in her thoughts again when she reached the subway station and only realized where she was when someone bumped hard into her. The guy that ran into her had immediately launched into a volley of apologies and general ‘are you okay’ questions, when she looked up to face him. As she is assuring the guy that she is totally fine when she catches someone out of the corner of her eye. Her breath caught for a second as she spied the familiar tall, slim,  red parka-clad figure across the street. But just as quickly as she had seen him, he was gone. Confused, she turned her attention to the guy he knocked into and noticed that he was looking at her with a mixed look of concern and amusement. His body language told Amanda that he was expecting an answer from her but she had no clue where the brief encounter had gone. She hemmed and hawed out a quick apology and ran past him,  through the subway entrance, stopping only when she had reached the platform. 

The man in the red parka was still on her mind when she walked into her apartment. The snow stopped as she was walking home from her subway stop and that made her feel less anxious. She went through her usual evening routine and as she settled into her chair by the window with a book, she saw the man with the red parka again, standing on the busy snow-filled sidewalk, looking up at her window, at her! Amanda’s mouth went dry, she sat frozen stiff in fear as they both looked at each other. The seconds stretched into minutes as they stared at each other, no one moving an inch. Somewhere a distant but urgent thought kept echoing in her head. Her instincts told her to pay attention to that repeated thought and she jolted back to her senses. The thought had all but consumed every other musing in her head. It screamed into her consciousness, ‘Someone’s watching me!’. As that notion hits her, she immediately looks away from the man in the red parka to find her phone. She had to call someone, anyone, to let them know what was happening. How unsafe she felt! As she located her phone in the folds of the blanket she had on her lap, she glanced at the window to see if the man was still there but to her surprise, he was gone! Vanished into thin air in a matter of seconds,  like the first snowflakes falling on asphalt. As she stared out, in disbelief, she noticed something. 

It was snowing again. 

Dec 18th, 2022

The doctor’s appointment could not be avoided. Amanda had already had a major heart attack when she had the accident and since then she had been on medication to help heal her weakened heart. After a thorough checkup, Dr. Rizvi finally met her with the reports in his office. He did not look too happy. Amanda braced for the news. 

After an hour with Dr. Rizvi, Amanda’s head was swimming with all sorts of thoughts. Apparently, her recovery was not going as well as they had hoped. Her heart was still quite weak so she will have to go on new medications. Which means more restrictions and possible side effects. This was definitely not the news she had hoped for. 

The red parka again! As she exited the doctor’s office, she spotted the figure standing behind the nearest pillar. The shock of seeing him again made her stumble and she hurtled down the flight of stairs in front of the building, landing in a heap at the bottom, thoroughly embarrassed and a little hurt. She quickly picked herself off the side of the road, her new coat now dirty with the slushy salt and snow of the pavement. Thankfully, there weren’t too many people around so she was spared the horror or niceties after that fall. Amanda turned around to see if she could find the guy in the red parka but he was nowhere to be seen, again! Her heart hammering in her chest, she abruptly realized; it was snowing again. 

Dec 24th, 2022

Amanda tried to convince herself that she was just being paranoid as she rode the uber to her parent’s house in Aurora. There have been no signs or sightings of the parka-clad guy since the little episode in front of her doctor’s office.No sign of him all day but Amanda can’t shake the feeling of being watched. A tendril of fear, like a live wire, snaked down her spine the past few days, which has her cautiously checking out every dark corner and jumping at every sound. 

Once she reaches her childhood home, she stamps down that feeling and resolves to fully immerse herself in the festivities. The day passes quickly in the company of her family. Her Brother Adam and his wife Emelia had flown in from San Francisco and her little sister Rachel had already been there for the entire week as her University had closed for the holidays. The food, drinks and Christmas traditions had almost completely driven out her thoughts about the red-parka-clad guy. 

As she crawled into bed, exhausted but content with how the day went, she could feel a thin veil of dread threatening to cover her again. Fatigue seemed to have seeped into her bones and she fell into a deep dreamless sleep. 

Suddenly she is awake. Someone is crawling into bed with her. She smiles groggily as she thinks it’s Rachel, crawling into her bed in the middle of the night, just like she used to when they were kids. A hand snakes across her torso and holds her tight. Even in her sleepy state, something about this feels odd and then she feels it…the figure, hugging her in bed right now is too big to be Rachel. Fear and panic rush through Amanda as she realizes that this person is wearing something like a coat. She can feel the material through the old tee she wore to bed. Even as she picks up her duvet to take a look at the hand across her, she knows what she will be seeing. A hand in a red parka! 

Paralyzing terror consumes Amanda. She tries to yell but her voice is gone. She tries to will her body to move, tear free from the grip but she is unable to move. The arm across her is getting increasingly tighter across her chest, and she hears him over her own pounding heart, “It’s snowing again!”

Outside, the snow was falling, fast, quiet, and beautiful.