My COVIDcation ⛸❄️

The air was crisp and cool that winter night, days before Christmas. Two girls pulled up in a black minivan with their skates in bags and helmets on their heads. They seem no older than 13 years of age and seemed almost stunned by the lights when they jumped out of the van with excitement. One girl had long brown curls wearing a white jacket, she carried her skates in one of those bags that stores give out, this one particular was a dark Everest green, as dark as the forest.  She was standing next to a slightly shorter girl with long, dark brown, wavy hair. The lights around were soft yet bright. You could see them from thousands of miles away. The warm coloured lights were bouncing off everything. They were everywhere and not at the same time. I look away to hear a voice.

 

“Yards,” what I assumed was one of the girl’s fathers yelling out of the van, “call me when you want to go home!”

 

The curly-haired girl turned around with her puffy hair flying into her face. 

“Yeah, sure. I do have my phone, right Halel?” she looked at her friend with fright crawling into her eyes while she was patting down her pockets as fast as her heartbeat. She stopped patting when she found her phone. Yards delicately pulled out a silver phone case out of her pocket, trying not to drop it. 

 

“Good, I didn’t lose it this time!” she gasped with relief and a grin you could see through her light purple mask.

 

“Yeah, this time.” Halel joked which made them both burst into a small laugh.

 

A few short seconds later they found themself waving bye to Yards’ dad and rushing over to the cold rink just like waterfalls crashing when they smell the sweat mixed with the aroma of coffee and winter. They find a spot to sit on a brown bench and pull their skates out of their bags. Yards pulls out her dirty white figure skates and starts to take off the purple skate guards, while Halel pulled her clean, new, navy recreational skates out of her giant blue Ikea bag. They tied their laces up slowly to make sure their feet won’t come out and stand up cautiously trying not to tip over. They are slowly stepping onto the slippery ice and try to keep their balance as they start to skate. Yards has been skating since she was two will, on the other hand, Halel has only gone skating twice! They skated around for a while. They try going backwards and on one foot. Yards skate backwards a lot with only a few stumbles here and there trying to teach Halel how to skate backwards.  They skate a while until they see me. I think I recognize them from somewhere but I couldn’t quite put a pin on it. I could hear them whispering about something. 

 

The shorter girl with small gold glasses asked, “Do you speak Hebrew?”

“Yeah, I do,” as I answer with a bit of confusion the other girl starts to collapse into laughter, “Why?”

“Nevermind.” Yards looked over at her friend with laughter creeping up her throat. 

I slowly turn my head looking over to my brother a bit puzzled. 

“So um, are you guys here alone?” I asked curiously.

They glance at each other before Yards answers, ”Yeah, we are.”

Halel stares at her before she jokes and starts hitting her lightly. They laugh loudly and skate on the mirror-like rink until the black minivan pulls up again with a roar.

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