Snowflakes by Tal Lingenua (ereader manga .TXT) 📖

shorter. She had gotten older. Sweet! She was now a young adult.

This wish keeps getting better and better! Now that she was an adult, she could do whatever she wanted. After she finished in the bathroom, she went into the kitchen where the rest of her family was eating oatmeal.

“Good morning sleepyhead.” Mother said.

“You look old

.” Maxi said.

“Thanks.” Gabriele smiled and went into the pantry. She always wanted doughnuts for breakfast! She grabbed a bag of chocolate doughnut holes and took the remaining seat around the table.

“How come she gets doughnuts for breakfast?” Maxi whined.

“She doesn’t.” Mother said and reached across the table, but Gabriele pulled the bag close to her chest.

“I’m 20-something years old mother. I make my own decisions.” Gabriele popped a doughnut into her mouth.

“Oh do you?” Mother said, “Do you make your own money? Do you own this house? So long as you live under my

roof, you live by my

rules.”

What was the point of being an adult if she had to listen to her mother? What was it most adults did in this situation? They moved out. “Fine.” Gabriele flung the doughnuts onto the table, “I’ll get a job and I’ll get my own place.”

“No.” Mother said, “You can’t get a job. Now make yourself a bowl of oatmeal.”

“You can’t tell me no. I’m a grown woman!”

“You are not a grown woman. You are a ten-year old girl who is inexplicably aging... every... day.”

Silence fell over the room. Nobody moved anything but their eyes. Gabriele and mother looked at each other. Maxi and Vanessa looked back and forth at the two.

Gabriele’s thoughts seemed louder than ever. She was ten two nights ago, a teenager yesterday and now she was twenty. A curious amount of aging, but this is what Gabriele had wished for, to be older than Vanessa, for all they knew, she had just finished aging.

“How old, are you exactly?” Mother asked.

“I don’t. Somewhere in my twenties I believe. But you shouldn’t worry, I don’t think I’m gonna get older.”

“I think she’s 22.” Vanessa whispered.

“Did you say something?” Mother asked.

“I think she’s 22 and I think she was 15 yesterday. L-Like the song 100 years

. I-I think she’s going to turn 33 tomorrow. Then 45, then 67... then 99.”

Gabriele scrunched up her face, “That’s not what I wished for though. I only wished to be older than Vanessa.”

“All those ages are older than me.” Vanessa snapped.

“Oh.” Gabriele put her hand on chin. Was she really going to keep aging every day? That meant... her heart froze. That meant she was going to die. This couldn’t be happening to her. It just couldn’t. It wasn’t going to happen.

She got a bowl from the cabinet and made herself a bowl of oatmeal.

“Is Gabriele going to die?” Maxi asked.

“Well... We all do eventually.” Vanessa said.

“But I know that’s not what you meant,” Gabriele cut in, “Don’t worry. I’m not dying anytime soon.” She scooped a spoonful of oatmeal into her mouth, “We should play in the snow today, it’s getting pretty high.”


They played in the snow, had a snowball fight. Maxi caught snowflakes on his tongue, but Gabriele decided she was too old, much to Vanessa’s annoyance. Even more to Vanessa’s annoyance, Maxi and Gabriele recorded 100 years

once more.

This time, Mother didn’t send Gabriele to bed at 9:30. In fact, she didn’t send any of them to bed until 11:00 following a family movie and family game day.

Vanessa and Gabriele walked into their bedroom and climbed into bed.

“Why weren’t you catching snowflakes?” Vanessa said.

“Because I’m too old. That’s kid stuff.”

“But you need to reverse your aging. You’re growing too fast.”

“I’m not doing any growing until my birthday.” Gabriele fluffed up her pillow and buried her head into it.

“You’ll be dead as soon as your birthday comes.”

Gabriele laughed, “You are such a worrywart.”

“You aren’t worried enough! This wish you made is like a terminal illness and you have only five days to live.”

“Like you said, we all die eventually. So what does it really matter if I die on my birthday or not? Hmm.”

“That’s- that’s.”

“A very realistic and mature worldview?” Gabriele said.

“Stupid! Just plain stupid!” Vanessa rolled over in her bed. “I’m going to bed. I hope you come to your sense tomorrow.”

“Goodnight.” Gabriele closed her eyes. Such a worrywart. We all die eventually, so... it doesn’t really

matter when we die. Gabriele’s eyes popped back open as the words she just said sunk in. She just called life meaningless.

Chapter 5

Gabriele felt nauseous. She sat up in bed, it was a dark shade of blue and she could still hear Maxi snoring. She gagged. She climbed down the ladder and rushed over to the trashcan to vomit. Her shirt felt tighter than when she went to sleep.

A sign that she had gotten older. She was shaking from fear. Was she really going to die when her birthday came? According to Vanessa, she was 33 now. She rose to her feet. Her back was somewhat arched. Perhaps because she got heavier overnight.

She sloshed her way into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror. There was a fire missing from her eyes and her hair was shorter. Her breasts were a little larger than before and her belly was protruding. Her eyes got wide. She was pregnant!

How did that happen? She placed her head on the sink. This wasn’t fair! This wasn’t what she wished for. She pounded the sink. Why did these sorts of things only happen to her? And why did she want tacos? More importantly, why didn’t they have any?

She glanced out the window, it was still snowing and it looked pretty high. She wasn’t going to be getting tacos anytime soon.


“Vanessa.” Gabriele shook her sister gently, “Vanessa.”

Vanessa cracked a sleepy eyelid. She shot up like she was on a spring, “Holy crap! You’re pregnant.”

“Thank you captain obvious. Help me.”

“How in the world did you manage to get pregnant?” Vanessa threw off the covers and stepped into her slippers.

“It’s a line in 100 years. ‘I’m 33 for a moment, I’m still the man but you see I’m a they. Kid on the way, a family on my mind.’”

Vanessa let out a sigh. “Come on, let’s go tell mother.”

“I was afraid you’d say that.” Gabriele said and followed Vanessa up the hallway


“Now you’re pregnant?” Mother cried.

Gabriele didn’t like that her family’s first reaction was stating the obvious.

“How?”

“It has to do with my wish. It’s a line in the song.”

Mother grabbed her head. Then she looked seriously at Gabriele, “Do you know how far along you are?”

“No!” Gabriele cried, “But it doesn’t matter, cause I’ll be dead before I give birth.” She buried her head in Vanessa’s shoulder. Tears flowed freely and she shook uncontrollably. She should’ve known better than to make a wish. Wishes always turned out horribly.

Vanessa pulled her into a hug. Then she gently pushed her back so she was gripping her shoulders and looking her in the eyes. “You’re not going to die.”

Gabriele sniffed and wiped her eyes, “Yes I am, we all are.” The unsettling thought of being motionless, thoughtless and non-existent for all of eternity crept into Gabriele’s mind. It happened to everyone some sooner than others.

“You mustn’t think like that.” Vanessa said.

“You started it.”

“Well I’m finishing it. Let’s go get some breakfast.”


Mother had a guilty look about her as she poured pancake batter into a pan. She tossed some strips of bacon into another pan and took a seat around the table.

“Is something eating at you mother?” Vanessa asked.

“No.” Mother said and took a sip of her coffee. She looked down at it.

“Something’s clearly bothering you.” Gabriele said, “You can tell us.”

“You’re such sweet girls.” She said, “But I really am fine.”

Maxi walked into the kitchen. He rubbed sleep out of his eyes and still donned his red pajamas. “Do I smell pancakes?”

“Yup.” Vanessa said.

Maxi smiled then he saw Gabriele and his eyes popped. He walked over to her, climbed onto her lap and wrapped his arms tightly around her neck. He started sobbing directly into her ear.

Gabriele squeezed one of her eyes shut, but didn’t push Maxi away. Now, on top of everything, she had to be strong for Maxi.

“It’s going to work out. Don’t worry.” Gabriele said and managed to sound like she meant it.

“But you’re going to die. I don’t want you to die.” Maxi started crying into Gabriele’s chest.

“Shh.” Gabriele said and patted Maxi on the back. Then she wiped the tears off his face and placed him on the ground. “Let’s go outside and catch snowflakes, we’ll catch an identical pair and everything will be back to normal.”

Maxi lit up. “why didn’t we think of that earlier!” He grabbed Gabriele’s hand and rushed with her towards the door.


After getting dressed and explaining once again why she was pregnant. Gabriele, Maxi and Vanessa were all outside in the snow trying to catch snowflakes on their tongue. Vanessa made her way over to Gabriele she made sure was out of earshot of Maxi.

“You know lightning doesn’t strike twice.” Vanessa said.

“And no two snowflakes are the same.” Gabriele raised her eyebrows, “Besides, that’s a myth you know.”

“I knew that.” Vanessa said unconvincingly, “Why did you tell Maxi we would catch identical snowflakes?”

“To give him hope that I would live. Something a good big sister should do. Instead of being pessimistic and unhelpful.”

“You don’t think I’m helpful?” Vanessa said, her voice shrinking somewhat,

“Not really. You just tell me not to worry about things but you don’t give a reason.”

Vanessa looked at the ground, “I was just trying to be realistic.”

Gabriele put a hand on Vanessa’s shoulder “I know I don’t always act like it, especially recently, but I do need my big sister.”

“And I need my little sister.” Vanessa gave Gabriele a big hug. She was still being unhelpful but she probably didn’t even notice. Well, Gabriele, this is what you wanted, to be older than Vanessa. Are you happy?