Winter had clasped it's icy fingers upon the English countryside. Snow had crept it's way down from the peaks of the mountains above to blanket the sleepy villages, desperately clinging to their slopes, with a thick blanket of white powder which grew ever thicker with the unceasing onslaught of the rushing snowflakes that attacked in ranks of shivering grey.
And yet, there was a strange warmth to these cold times; the comforting yellows and oranges of the lights in those cosy stone-clad homes, cast a reassuring glow onto the pavement; they were an oasis of warmth in a landscape gripped by cold. In the rare days where the snow ceased to drive itself wildly onto the unmoving mountains, the villages would seem to spring to life with a buzz of activity; children could be seen building snowmen, and the high-school kids of the villages would jostle and shove one another, stuffing snow into each other's faces as they made the trek back up from the valleys below, where they whiled away long, boring hours in school, or, like Noah, College.
That was, if you HAD friends to jostle and shove. Noah, a newcomer to this rough landscape; a slim but not muscular 18 year old standing at 5,9", shuffled through the heaps of snow that had piled up on the pavements, shaking the disparate patches of white powder out of his coal-black hair; his head to the ground and his hands stuffed into his pockets, fiddling with little pieces of paper which had inexplicably found themselves in his possession. They were myriad and incongruous; fragments of wrappers or worksheets that were now useless or intangible. Around his classmates, their features and bodies seemingly alight with the joy of a sky finally clear, his figure stuck out like a sore thumb; appearing hunched against some non existent winds, sea-green eyes desperately scanning the pavement for some excuse to avert his gaze from the critical eyes of others.
Today, like every day for the past few months, Noah took the overgrown, forgotten, muddy path that would eventually lead him up the hill, through the woods, by the river, and finally through the field to the roughly hewn stone-brick terrace in which he would find his home. It was in no way the quickest way home, nor the easiest, but it was the only time that he could truly be alone with nature.
The only birds you could hear In the winter were the odd robin, their tiny red breasts puffed proudly in birdsong, but still there was the odd hare scampering with endless haste through the undergrowth, and, on the few times he had been here at nighttime, snowy owls, mournfully hooting to announce their presence. Noah loved it all, and the opportunity to be at peace with nature was the highlight of his day; the one time where he was truly at peace, happy within the world around him.
