The whiteness fell with a gentle pattern and the big blue eyes took it all in hungrily, in the way that only a child's innocent eyes can see.

The girl was sitting on her bed- she'd been in bed seventy percent of the last year- and the romance novel in her hand had long been forgotten. It lay limply on top of the pink duvet while the round eyes searched and drank in the perfect flakes that fluttered in the heavens.

"Kate?"

Regretfully the eyes turned from the snowfall to the door. Her mother's head peeked through the opening, her forehead wrinkled. "Are you alright? I knocked, but you didn't answer."

"I'm fine, Mom, I promise," she responded with a little smile. "I just like to watch the snow falling and that's all, I was only distracted."

"Well, anyways, it's time for your medicine." In she walked, a glass of water in one hand and a few medication bottles in the other. "Has anything gotten worse in the past few days?"

Kate shook her head, popped one iron supplement in her mouth and took a sip of water to swallow it. "No, just coughed a few times. But other than that, I'm fine."

Down went another pill. Mrs. Willis' hand felt her daughter's forehead. Her face wrinkled and her brows knit. Out came the white plastic thermometer and it went into Kate's ear as the girl swallowed a third pill.

"You're a few degrees too warm," frowned her mother. "You're sure you feel fine?"

"Yes, Mom. Can I go now?"

"You're not going anywhere. It's your room, isn't it?" Mrs. Willis' face relaxed and even smiled.

"I want to play with Albert."

"You don't need to ask for that, darling. Albert's right here." She patted the old upright piano that rested on the wall, next to the bed.

"Fine. Can you go now?"

"I'll see you in a little while for dinner. Come down about six, okay? You haven't been up all day and I think you need to move around a bit."

"Okay."

She kissed her daughter's forehead and left the room, leaving the glass of water but taking the bottles of pills. Kate turned towards the window once more and smiled at the snow still falling. Then she threw off the duvet and got out of bed. It was only a few steps towards the worn and creaky piano bench, and then Kate set up her music and played.

She moved her thin fingers through the major scales first, then she transitioned to playing the arpeggios, the rhythmic chords wrapping around her as warmly as her sweatshirt. Lifting a hand to brush her thin blonde hair back, Kate saw that the music set on the piano already was one of her favorites- the Blue Danube- but she wasn't done warming up yet. Steadily, carefully, she ran the minor keyed scales through, choosing to play not only relative minor scales, but melodic and natural scales as well. The arpeggios made her shiver as though the note was wrong as she hit it- but it wasn't, that was just how minor scales were. Even if it sounded wrong, it could still be just as beautiful- only, in a different way. 

Finally she turned on the little lamp that lit the music- and moved through the familiar tune- letting herself sway with the waltz and imagined all the old- fashioned dances it must have played at. Kate could just see the skirts twirling and men whirling pretty ladies around- things she'd never herself see or experience in real life.

Kate had anemia and something else that the doctor's couldn't place. When they had lived in Utah, a few years back, the altitude had made it worse- because her blood wasn't carrying the little oxygen there was up there- and now that they lived in upstate New York, she had only gotten better in the respect that there was a lower elevation. Whatever else was plaguing Kate was not only linked to the altitude. It made it hard for her to go to school- all of the walking from class to class preyed upon her chronic fatigue- so she was home schooled, it made it hard for her to really do anything for long periods of time.

The song ended and Kate was surprised- she hadn't remembered really playing it. She remembered starting it, but the tune had wrapped her up and she'd forgotten she was playing until she was done.

She switched the page to find only the wood of the piano staring at her. Standing, Kate opened the bench to the wealth of books there. Carefully placing the piece she'd just finished inside, she sat down again and rested her hands in her lap, wondering what to play.

She lifted her hands to the keys again, letting them run up and down without pressure, just feeling the chipped ivory beneath her fingertips. She'd played on Albert for the past eight of her thirteen years- as long as she'd ever played the piano. He was her best friend- the one that had moved with her and didn't get pulled away by others. Albert didn't talk back or complain- he just listened to Kate talk about her older brothers or how she wished she could go outside.

"It's just so pretty, isn't it, Albert? The snowfall, I mean, but of course you always know exactly what I mean, Don't you? Oh, don't answer that, I'd be terribly scared if you did. You're not supposed to talk and that's why I love you. You only listen and let me tell you what to say. I wish my brothers were like that, or I had other friends to confide in but I don't. Amanda hasn't tried to talk to me since I left school and Marcie moved away so I'm completely alone. But you understand that, and I've told you all of this before. I do wish," she said, changing directions-"that Mom would let me go out to the snow. I love it so much and I want to have it forever but she doesn't let me out. It's a miracle if she even lets me get out of bed to eat some days."

She plunked a C chord and them moved up to the sharp in a chromatic pattern. At the F she stopped, hitting the solitary note and then letting her pinky reach for the C above that. Down a half step she went, but quickly corrected to another half below- the b-flat.

The clock downstairs struck six and Kate got up for dinner. Looking wistfully one more time at the darkening outside, she opened her door and went downstairs.