Ever since I stumbled into that thrift store by the airport, looking for an ‘emergency’ pair of jeans following an…incident. The clerk (and only occupant) of the establishment seemed incapable of emotion; responding neither to my sudden entrance nor my state of advanced disarray with even an elevation of his eyebrows, let alone a greeting.
Until I pulled the jeans off the rack.
Then, what appeared to be panic.
“A mistake,” he assured me. “Those aren’t supposed to be…”
I didn’t let him finish; throwing a 20 onto the counter and running out and behind the building to change. Throwing my old (and incriminating) pair into the woods before leaving on foot.
It has been snowing ever since.
It seems to follow me and fall as if some ancient arctic god is trying to win my approval.
(I’ve had moments, brief but undeniable, when I were certain a few flakes were falling after I had been indoors for an extended period of time; hours).
And the cold. I can’t seem to feel it through these jeans; but it is ever present.
In Siberia, the Yakut people have a term for the sound your breath makes when it instantly freezes upon exhalation; sublimating from vapor to solid crystal and falling before you, a storm of your own creation.
They call it “the whisper of the stars.”
I hear it with every breath, a small crystalline symphony.
I can not seem to take these jeans off. The buttons on the fly are too cold to touch, even through gloves.
J. Bandersnatch Limited jeans (No. 867): Classic five-pocket denim; 100% cotton. Reinforced whip-stitching on all seams. Snowflake motif chainstick detail on back left pocket. Major intersections and pockets reinforced with rivets. Flannel lined. Imported.
Matt Greene 
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