Flash Fiction: “Pink”

"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."

Ernest Hemingway 

On the day I found out, it snowed. Tiny flakes falling from a white abyss that we call “sky.” They landed on my bare head and teased the dry skin on my face. I hid my hands in my coat pockets and fingered the soft items I had taken from the hospital. Tears froze on my numb cheeks. 

The wind that wrestled with my shoulder-length hair carried tiny echoes of children’s voices, whose little hands were probably reaching for their mothers to shelter them from the storm. There were also footprints about an inch deep: big ones, and small ones. But the snow kept falling, so soon, they would disappear to be replaced by another stranger’s steps. 

I walked on. Eventually, the objects I carried felt heavy in my pocket, so I pulled them out: a pair of tiny pink socks that would never touch baby feet. After caressing the cotton fabric in my palms, I released it, and the socks fell beneath the snow.