The Christmas market smelled of cinnamon and burnt sugar, a memory that remains vivid even now. Tante Margaux had taken me to see the lights, and while she and Elodie stopped at a stall selling silver bracelets, I stood a few paces away. I found myself staring at a necklace I didn't actually want, simply because I needed a place to rest my eyes.
It was then that I felt someone staring at me.
It wasn't the casual glance of a passerby, but a heavy, deliberate stare that landed on my skin with the physical weight of a hand. When I turned my head, I saw a small girl standing only three steps away. Her hair was white, not the golden or silver blonde of my own family or the dull grey of the elderly, but a pure and startling white like fresh snow on a barn roof in midwinter. Her eyes were a green so vibrant they looked almost impossible in the dim market light, and she wore a puffy blue coat that made her look like a small, drifting cloud.
She stared at me without blinking for a long time. Then, she walked toward me. She stopped right in front of me, tilted her head, and told me that I was beautiful before asking if I could be hers.
I didn't know how to respond to that at all. I had been called beautiful before, as Tante Margaux's friends said it easily when they visited, speaking with the careless tone adults use when they assume children aren't listening. Maman said it too, but that carried the specific, unconditional weight of a mother's voice. This was neither of those things. This was a small child stating a fact and asking a profound question in the same breath, looking at me as if she already knew the answer.
She patted her own chest then, confirming something to herself, and told me not to worry. She said she could take care of others because she had Cinder.
I had no idea who or what Cinder was, perhaps a dog or a sibling, but it didn't seem to matter. The way she said it, with such absolute certainty, made me want to laugh. A small, surprised sound escaped me before I could stop it, more of a caught breath than a noise, but she didn't flinch. She simply waited.
I reached out and pinched her cheek because I didn't know what else to do with my hands. Her skin felt cold from the winter air and soft under my fingers, yet she didn't pull away. She just kept looking at me with those steady, unblinking green eyes, watching me the way one looks at something they have already decided to keep. I told her she was far too cute, but she didn't seem to care about that. She only cared whether I would say yes.
That was when I really looked at her. I didn't just see a small girl in a blue coat; I studied her face. Her white hair wasn't dyed, as I could see it grew that way from her scalp, and even her eyelashes were pale and almost invisible until the market lights caught them. Her eyes were so green they reminded me of the lake near our house in the summer, when the sun hits the water just right and makes it look like something from a storybook.
I asked her if she was an Evans, and she gave a single, certain dip of her chin. She turned and pointed toward a woman with reddish hair and those same green eyes, whom I realised was her mother. The woman was frozen mid-step with her hand pressed to her mouth, standing beside a man with dark hair marked by a white streak. Behind them, another woman was laughing, a loud and bright sound that bounced off the wooden chalets and sent pigeons fluttering into the air.
I looked back at the girl. she stood there with a patience that was neither nervous nor hopeful, simply waiting for me to speak as if she had asked for the time and expected a simple answer. I didn't say yes, but I didn't say no either. I thought she was charming and unusual, and as the market noise swelled around us and Tante Margaux began to wear the expression she always held when something entertaining happened, I thought I had never met a child quite like her. I believed that was all there was to it.
. . .
The dinner happened because Tante Margaux knew her mother, Jane Evans. The restaurant was small and warm, filled with the scent of garlic butter and grilled fish. Nimue sat beside me and told me her name as if it were a fact I should have already known, and then she asked if she could call me big sister. I said yes because I didn't know how to say no to a face like hers.
She watched me eat, not with glancing looks but with a steady gaze that tracked my fork from the plate to my mouth and back again. She asked if I had finished my fish and then told me I was too thin and should eat more. I found myself laughing a lot that evening. I told her she was strange, and she simply said she knew before going back to her bread.
She pushed her bread toward me, specifically the larger half. Nobody had ever offered me the larger half of anything before, so I took it. She nodded, as if a suspicion had been confirmed, and kept watching me. When she pushed her entire bread plate toward me, I understood for the first time that she wasn't being polite. She wanted me to have more because I was hers now, and that meant she had to take care of me.
At the end of the meal, she wrapped her arms around my waist and pressed her face into my coat. She held on tight, as if she were afraid I might disappear, and then looked up with those steady eyes to ask if we could play again tomorrow. There was nothing uncertain in the question; she wasn't asking if I wanted to, but was merely checking the detail of the next meeting.
I looked toward Tante Margaux, and though I didn't know exactly why I felt this feeling, I found myself desperately wanting her to say yes. I barely knew this strange little girl who spoke with the authority of a tiny empress, yet I remained there, waiting for the answer as if it were the only thing that mattered.
Tante met my gaze for a brief moment and gave a small nod in return. Jane, who seemed to have understood the situation before we even spoke, reached for a scrap of paper and wrote down her address before passing it over to my aunt. The arrangement settled into place without any real effort, almost as though it had been decided long before we ever met in the market.
It was only then that I finally said yes. Nimue nodded once, looking thoroughly satisfied, and let go of me before walking back to her family. As they began to leave, she glanced over her shoulder one last time, and we both raised our hands in a silent goodbye.
That night, I lay in bed and stared at the ceiling with the stone from the market still in my pocket. I rolled it between my fingers, feeling how smooth and cold it was. I didn't understand what had happened. A little girl had walked up to me and asked if I could be hers as if I were a doll in a shop window or something to be claimed. It should have been strange, and it was, but not in a way that made me want to stay away. I thought about her bright green eyes and the way she never blinked, and then I fell asleep.
. . .
The next morning, I woke before my parents and dressed quickly in a cream jumper and the blue ribbon my grandmother had given me. I looked at myself in the mirror, not quite knowing why I was checking my reflection so carefully.
Tante Margaux drove me to the building. It was old, its facade worn and quiet, and the stairwell creaked beneath our steps as we climbed to the fourth floor.
I had expected something grander. The way Jane spoke, the name Evans itself, always seemed wrapped in the quiet weight of old money. But when the door opened, the illusion fell away at once.
Jane stood there, greeting us with a calm warmth, and stepped aside to let me in. The apartment was small. Smaller than I had imagined. A sagging sofa occupied most of the sitting room, and the kitchen table bore deep knife scars,.
It was only then that I noticed her.
Nimue stood just beyond the doorway to the hall, watching me. Her white hair tangled and unbrushed. A faint stain marked the front of her shirt, as though she had spilled something during breakfast and never bothered to change. She looked exactly as she had the day before, as if she had done nothing but wait. She called me big sister, and I said her name as a smile spread across my face. I didn't mean for it to happen, but it did.
She grabbed my hand and pulled me down the hallway before I could even finish saying hello to her mother. Her fingers felt small and cold around mine, but I didn't pull away. Her bedroom was a mess of clothes and a green canvas bag spilling across the rug. I would later learn about the cold stone under her pillow that made the air sharp, but for now, she just sat me on the edge of her stripped mattress and disappeared.
She came back carrying a tray, her arms shaking with the weight as she walked with the concentrated pace of someone determined not to spill. There was tea for me, milk for her, and three biscuits on a plate. She set it down as if it were the most important task she had ever performed. I told her she didn't need to do all that, but she simply said she wanted to.
She climbed onto the bed beside me until our shoulders almost touched, bit into a biscuit, and started to talk. She told me about Tilly, the house-elf who made biscuits and cried when she left, and about a village in England with a five-hundred-year-old oak tree. She spoke of a boy named Andrew who had shown her a hollow tree with initials carved into the bark, and of Hermione, a girl in London who talked too fast and cried when Nimue left.
She told me about a farm with a Highland cow named Bess and how she had ridden her, about cleaning mussels with a sharp knife in Normandy, and about skiing in the Alps where she sat in hot springs while the snow fell. She mentioned an old woman with green eyes just like hers who gave her hot chocolate with thick cream.
She talked for a long time in a steady, unhurried voice, as if she were reading from a book she had memorised. She didn't ask me questions; she just wanted me to listen. So I did. At some point, her shoulder pressed against my arm, and then her head followed.
Eventually, she was just there, talking into my shoulder as her weight seemed to increase with every new story. She stopped mid-sentence about a grey cat and a woodstove, and when I looked down, she had climbed into my lap with her back against my chest and her head tucked under my chin. She felt heavy and small and very warm.
I told her she was heavy, and she insisted she was small. I said she was both, but she didn't move, and I didn't push her off. My hand moved before I could tell it to, settling on her back with a light and careful touch, as if I were holding something that might break if I pressed too hard.
She shifted sideways to put her ear over my heart while her white hair tickled my chin. I felt her breath through my jumper, slow and even, and I kept my hand on her back. She wasn't asleep; she was just listening. After a long moment, she said without looking up that I was more beautiful than the mountains.
I didn't know what to do with a compliment like that, so I said nothing and just held her. We stayed like that for a long time as the grey winter light shifted across the cracked ceiling. I could hear the apartment settling and the faint sound of Jane moving in the kitchen. Nimue's breathing slowed, and her hand found mine to hold it tight.
When Jane finally knocked on the doorframe to say lunch was ready, her voice was soft and she didn't tell Nimue to get up. She waited for a moment and walk back to the kitchen. Nimue didn't move right away, staying with her ear over my heart as if she were memorising the sound. Then she unfolded herself slowly, climbed off my lap, and held out her hand. Her fingers were warm now. She told me to come, and I took her hand as we walked to the kitchen together.
. . .
The days blurred after that. I don't remember ever deciding to go back, but I just did. Tante Margaux would ask if I wanted to visit, and I would already be putting on my coat. I went to the apartment every few morning and stopped knocking after the third visit, simply opening the door and walking in. Nimue was always waiting by the window or at the door, her small hand reaching for mine with fingers that were always a little cold.
We played cards, and she cheated, though I don't think it was on purpose. She just didn't understand losing as a concept that applied to her. When I won the second round, she looked at the cards as if they had personally betrayed her, then declared herself the winner anyway and moved on.
We went to the gardens where she ran ahead with her white hair streaming behind her, feeding the ducks and watching the old men play boules with intense focus. She would ask me to push her on the swings and then complain that I wasn't pushing high enough.
We read together, and I read La Belle et la Bête out loud while she traced the pictures with her finger. She asked why Beauty wasn't afraid of the Beast, and I said it was because Beauty saw what was inside. She looked at me then with those steady green eyes and said she saw what was inside me. My throat tightened as I asked what she saw, and she told me she saw something soft and bright. I turned the page and kept reading, my voice much softer after that.
There were other things I noticed over those weeks, the way you notice the layout of a room you are spending time in. I noticed she always came to the door itself when I arrived, and that when I read to her, she went perfectly still. It wasn't the stillness of boredom, but of someone paying attention with everything they had. I noticed she split things in half without thinking, always giving the larger half to me, and that she didn't even seem to know she was doing it.
I noticed that I had started knowing where the cups were kept, that the third stair from the top creaked, and that Cinder always slept on the left side of the sofa. I had learned these things without trying, the way information accumulates about a place you are returning to. She noticed things about me too, patterns I hadn't realised were there.
On the sixth visit, she pointed out that I always came in the morning and never the afternoon. I blinked, having not noticed that myself, but she said it as if it were obvious. Watching me was just something she did.
The frost changed something. She showed me on a rainy afternoon when we stayed inside, holding out her left palm. Without closing her eyes or whispering, cold bloomed across her skin into a snowflake that grew and turned, catching the light in ways that had nothing to do with the grey December afternoon.
It shimmered silver and spun in her hand. I reached out and touched the edge of it, and the cold was real. It was dry and sharp and absolutely hers, and the sensation lingered on my skin for a moment after I pulled my finger back.
I asked if it didn't hurt her, and she said no, it was hers. She closed her hand and the frost was gone, and then she told me not to tell anyone because it wasn't for everyone. I told her I wouldn't say a word, and I meant it. I haven't told anyone to this day.
When I think about that moment, I think about her choice of words. It wasn't that it was a secret; it just wasn't for everyone. It was as if she had considered the whole world and decided that I was the one she chose to tell. I held that carefully, and I still do.
I bought the ribbon on a morning when Tante Margaux and I were at a market. I wasn't thinking about Nimue particularly, but I saw a pale blue silk ribbon and stopped. I bought it, telling myself it would suit her and that she would like the colour. I tied it in her hair that afternoon with clumsy fingers, and the bow came out crooked with one loop larger than the other.
She say that I had made an ugly bow, and my face went hot as I offered to redo it. She said no, it was hers, and she was keeping it exactly like that. She wore it the rest of the day, the crooked bow bouncing against her hair every time she walked. I watched her and felt something strange in my stomach, something fond and manageable.
. . .
She wanted to be touching me all the time, whether it was her hand in mine or her head in my lap. At first, I thought it was strange, but then I got used to it and eventually started to expect it. One afternoon, she fell asleep on the sofa with her head on my knees while Cinder curled on the back of the sofa with his chin on my shoulder. I sat there for over an hour without moving because I didn't want to wake her.
When Jane came to the doorway and offered to carry her to bed, I shook my head and said she was fine. She was, and I was fine too. Sitting there with a sleeping child, a fox on my shoulder, and a dying fire, I felt something I couldn't name. It wasn't exactly happiness, but something softer that made my chest feel tight. I didn't think about it; I just stayed.
. . .
The thirty-first of December arrived colder than any day before it. Since Tante Margaux and Elodie had gone to their own celebrations, it was just Maman, Papa, and me walking up to the Keiths' apartment. I knocked, and Nimue opened the door in an oversized sweater, her white hair catching the light. She stared at me for a long moment before telling me I was beautiful. I told her she was too, and she looked down at her clothes to check if I meant it. I did.
The adults spoke of plans for the evening at Le Meurice, but I didn't listen. Nimue had taken my hand to talk in her room like usual, and soon we were all walking down the stairs and into a car. The hotel was grand, all gold and crystal and marble. Our parents had connecting rooms, and Nimue made sure the door between them stayed open.
Dinner was long and warm, served in a private room with a small ensemble playing in the corner. Nimue sat beside me and pushed the larger piece of her bread roll to my side of the plate without looking. I ate it without discussion. Maman noticed, as she notices everything, but she said nothing. After dinner, Papa suggested dancing. Maman and Papa went to the floor together, Jane and Jack sit in the sofa near the window with their shoulders touching, while Saoirse went to the bar.
Nimue walked over to me and held out her hand. She not even reach my shoulder, making it a ridiculous proposition, but I took her hands anyway. We turned slowly while she kept looking at her feet, and I told her to look at me instead. When she looked up, her green eyes caught the light from the chandelier, and for a second, I forgot to breathe.
She tripped over her own feet before we had even found a rhythm, and I caught her by the arms to steady her. For a moment she leaned into me, unbothered, as if stumbling were simply part of the dance.
I guided her again, slower this time. We turned in a small circle, uneven but continuous, until she grew dizzy and rested her forehead against my chest. She told me I danced well. I said she had not stepped on my feet.
Later, we went to the rooftop terrace where the city spread out dark and glittering below us. Maman gave Nimue hot chocolate, and she held it out to me before she had even taken a sip. I told her it was for her, but she said we could share, so I took a sip and gave it back.
The countdown started, and Nimue's hand found mine in the dark. I didn't look at our hands but at her face, which was tilted up at the sky. The fireworks were reflected in her green eyes, painting her white hair in silver, gold, and blue.
She turned to me and said happy new year, and I said it back. I meant it. She leaned against me, and I put my arm around her shoulders without thinking. After the fireworks, she fell asleep on a sofa in her bedroom with her head in my lap. Her mother came to carry her to bed, but Nimue's fingers tightened around mine even in her sleep. I told Jane I would stay a while, and she left us.
I don't know when I fell asleep, but I remember the warmth of her weight and the sound of her breathing. I woke on the morning of the first of January in a bed with pale grey light through the curtains.
Nimue was asleep beside me, her white hair spread across the pillow and her mouth slightly open. I watched her sleep, and when she opened her eyes, she caught me immediately. Heat climbed to my ears as I looked at the ceiling and then back at her. She was smiling that wide smile again, and my chest felt a flutter like a trapped bird.
She said good morning, her voice thick with sleep, and then told me my ears were red. They went even redder. She laughed and nuzzled into my shoulder, telling me I was cute before she lifted her head and kissed my cheek. It was quick, barely a brush of her lips, but I felt it everywhere.
My face went hot, and I touched the spot where her lips had been. She giggled and hid her face, saying she liked it. I didn't know what to do because she was a child and I was a child, and such things shouldn't mean anything. But it felt like something.
She asked if I had ever kissed anyone, and I said no. She said she hadn't either, before me. I told her a cheek kiss wasn't a real one, as those were on the mouth. She asked if we could try a real kiss on the mouth, and I said no because it wasn't for children.
She asked if we could when we were grown up, and though I meant to say no, it came out as a maybe. She said okay and that she would wait, speaking as if it were already decided. I didn't correct her and instead pulled her closer, my arm tightening around her back while she nuzzled into my neck. I told myself it was sisterly.
. . .
The days that followed blurred together as we explored the hotel corridors and found the library. We watched the sunset together, and she said I could come to England. I said maybe, and she insisted that wasn't enough. She was right, but I didn't know how to give her more.
On the third, it snowed, and we went to the Tuileries where Nimue said the snow was quiet like her cold magic. On the fourth night, she knocked on the connecting door because she couldn't sleep, and I brought her to bed and told her a story until she drifted off.
The fifth of January arrived, a date that had been a fact in the back of my mind until it became a problem. We had our last breakfast together, and then the Keiths went to their apartment to gather their things. We part ways after breakfast.
The morning of the sixth was cold and grey. We went to the apartment one last time, and when I knocked, Nimue opened the door in her blue coat. She took my hand and pulled me to her bare bedroom where the sheets were gone and her bags were packed. We sat on the stripped mattress, and she said she was going to write to me. I asked if she knew how to write, and she said her mother would help and that I had to write back. I promised I would.
She reached into her pouch and pulled out a smooth grey stone with a white vein. she said she had found it by the sea and gave it to me so I would remember her. I closed my fingers around it, feeling the warmth of her pocket before the air took it away. I said I wouldn't forget, and I meant it. We sat for a while, holding hands in silence, until Jane called that it was time.
We went outside to the waiting car, and Nimue walked to me on the cobblestones. She looked up with dry eyes, though I could see something deep and still behind the green. she told me to write to her, and I said I would.
She wrapped her arms around my waist, and I held her tight, not wanting to let go.
She pulled away enough to look up. Her face was very close, and I saw her take a breath, and then she rose onto her toes and pressed her lips to my cheek. She lowered herself back down and looked at me.
I bent forward without deciding to. My hair fell around both of us. I pressed my lips to the top of her head, to the white hair and held them there for one second. Her skin was warm, and I smoothed a stray strand of her hair before she said goodbye.
She turned and walked to the car without looking back. I watched the door close and the engine start. As the car pulled away, I raised my hand, and through the window, I saw her raise hers. She was gone.
I stood on the cobblestones for a long time until my mother say we should get back. That evening, I set the stone on my nightstand, but it felt too far away, so I put it back in my coat pocket. My mother didn't ask anything when she came to say goodnight. I touched the stone through the fabric before I slept.
. . .
The first day without her was the hardest.
I woke up and reached for her. The other side of the bed was empty and cold. The sheets smelled like lavender, not like her. I lay there for a while, staring at the ceiling, and then I got dressed.
I put the stone in my pocket, and carried it to breakfast. My mother asked if I had slept well. I said yes. I did not tell her that I had dreamed of green eyes and white hair. I went to my tutor in the afternoon. He talked about French history, the kings and the wars, and I tried to listen. But my hand kept going to my pocket. The stone was smooth and cool. I touched it when the tutor was not looking.
At dinner, my father asked if I was feeling well. I said I was tired. He did not push.
That night, I put the stone under my pillow. I fell asleep with my hand on it.
. . .
The second day was easier. Not much. But a little.
I went to the Luxembourg Gardens with my mother. The pony track was empty. The pond was frozen at the edges. I stood where Nimue had stood, and I remembered the way she had thrown bread to the ducks, the way she had run ahead with her white hair streaming behind her.
My mother said I was thinking of her.
I said yes.
She did not say anything else. She just took my hand, and we walked home in silence.
I wrote a letter that night. I did not have her address, so I could not send it. But I wrote it anyway. On a piece of paper with my best handwriting.
Dear Nimue,
I am thinking of you. Paris is quieter without you. I hope you arrived safely. I have the stone. It is on my nightstand. I am wearing the blue ribbon in my hair. Are you wearing yours too?
Write to me when you can.
Your big sister,
Fleur
I folded the paper and put it in my drawer. I would send it when I had her address. When I knew where to send it. For now, I just waited.
I checked the post slot by the front door before I went to sleep. Nothing.
. . .
I put the stone in my pocket again. I carried it to my tutor, to lunch, to everywhere. My mother noticed but did not say anything.
At night, I held it in my palm and thought about her words. I know you well enough. She had said that after knowing me for only a few days. It was ridiculous. A child could not know someone that quickly. But when I thought about the way she looked at me, the way she never looked away, I wondered if maybe she was right.
Maybe she did know me.
Maybe she knew me better than anyone.
I put the stone under my pillow and closed my eyes. I dreamed of snow, of white hair and her green eyes that never blinked.
When I woke up, my pillow was damp. I did not know why.
. . .
The days blurred after that. I kept the stone and checked the post every morning. I told myself she was busy, but I knew she wouldn't forget me. She looked at me with a promise of waiting. She had asked for a kiss when we were grown up. I was sitting alone with the stone in my hand, I wondered what I would say if she asked again.
I just did not know. But I knew I would keep my word. I was already planning exactly what I would say the moment her letter arrived.