We met at a local tavern, one of the only places open on a holiday. We had been talking online for about two weeks and Nigel was about to give up when I finally said "yes". The date moved to his back porch where the air was still, smelled of sweet lilacs and filled with the sound of old West Indian records playing as we talked and laughed for hours. After that first night, we've been inseparable.

It was the day of Nigel's birthday party. We had lots of cleaning and errands to do before everyone came over to the house. As the morning enfolded Nigel was acting weird and infuriating me with his causal manner about the things we had to get done. On top of everything, he said let's go for a walk behind the house. It was one of those snowy days where every limb on the tree was covered with a light sprinkling of snow. When we eventually went for the walk, Avi joined us and it broke into a snowball fight. Nigel and I tumbled to the ground at one point and upon getting up he said "look at this"....