Icebreaker 1.

The night Liv decided to break the ongoing silence between herself and Thomas was an icy night in late December. It was Friday and Liv had gone to meet up with some friends after football practice. Huddled they had stood in a field in complete darkness, shoulders up to their ears due to the searing cold that the down vests did little to protect from. A bottle had been passed around but still the get-together didn't last for long. Before eight o'clock most people had left, shivering, headed for their warm homes where they could watch Netflix and have tacos with their families. Wilma had suggested they do the same but Liv did not feel like going home, not yet. There was too much restlessness and frustration within her.

"I said I'd meet up with Mel", she lied to Wilma who immediately grinned at her and nodded. 

Annoyed thoughts, angry thoughts about Thomas, spurred on by the alcohol, whooshed around inside her head. Why had he acted like such a dick last time he was over? What had she done to deserve that repulsed look on his face whenever he saw her?

"I'll just go to his place and demand answers", she thought.

It made perfect sense at the time.

Half an hour later she knocked hesitantly on the door to Thomas's terrace house, questioning her decision more for every minute that went by. The buzz from the alcohol had subsided slightly and she suddenly felt really pathetic. Luckily, Thomas did not seem to be in since no one came to open. Liv knew she ought to go home but this exhausted feeling suddenly crept up on her. 

"If he doesn't show within the half hour I'll go home", she thought and slid down onto the staircase, her back against the door.

Thomas got home first five hours later, around 1 am. Perplexed, he saw the silhouette of a person sitting on his doorsteps from far away and didn't realize who it was until he got closer. When it registered, his insides started to twinge and ache and even more confused he quickly stubbed out his cigarette and hastened towards her. As his heart beat increasingly fast he figured something was very wrong.

Liv was all crumpled up, almost bare legged except for the training shorts and the football socks, eyes shut. That definitely wasn't the appearance of someone who had just gotten there. Still in disbelief, he started to curse and call out her name.

"Liv!? Liv, you hear me?", he struggled to push the door open, knelt down next to her, scooped her up in his arms and hauled her inside. Despite the commotion he was causing she remained lying motionless with her back against his chest, head falling back heavily onto his shoulder. Her lips were slightly open, swollen and blue tinted, her skin a blank, white, dead surface.

"Liv!? Liv, please! For fanden, look at me!"

Almost unnoticeably her eyelashes fluttered for a second.

"Where have you been?", she coughed and he felt the alcohol on her breath.

He would have laughed had the situation been less grave.

"Jesus, what's wrong with you? Have you actually lost your damn mind!?"

Liv frowned slightly at him and looked like she was about to give him a snide answer when she instead began to shudder and folded in her head and legs.

Sliding out and then back into drowsy unconsciousness, she vaguely perceived Thomas's cursing in Danish over her. 

"I... I think I really ought to be calling 911 or your mother or..."

Thomas sat at the side of his bed, to which he had apparently carried her and then layered blankets on top of her. 

"I'm fine. It was just for a couple of hours."

The chattering of her teeth was not helping her make her case.

"I'll kill you as soon as you're better. God, how could you be so unbelievably stupid?"

"Harsh", she mumbled and smiled, pulled her shaking hands towards her chest before he caught them, rubbed them gently to get her blood flowing. 

"This is not a goddamn joke Liv. I mean, what the hell were you thinking? You get wasted, you come to my place, and when I don't let you in you just fall asleep outside my door? I can't... I can't have you doing stuff like that. Fuck, what if I hadn't... I hadn't... You wouldn't have woken up the next morning."

Liv stared up into his panicked, dark blue eyes. She noticed how they searched her constantly for signs of her being cold or in pain, and she willed herself to stop shaking.

"Hey, hey. I'm alright. I won't do it again, I swear. I just... I really wanted to see you. I'm sure one of your neighbors would have found me before I got in any real danger of freezing to death, if you hadn't showed."

Thomas brows furrowed skeptically and he shook his head. Then another terrifying train of thought hit him.

"That's another thing, just anyone could have found you there: a drunk teenage girl, asleep outside in the middle of the night. Christ, where is your sense of self preservation?", he sighed. 

"Great another lecture", she rolled her eyes.

"Where did the friends you went out with go?", he asked, ignoring her.

"I told them I was going to see Mel."

The name caused a stir in him and then... then he had to quench the euphoric sensation it gave him to know she had gone to see him instead.

"So why didn't you? Why in all that is holy didn't you?"

"I wanted to...", she seemed to consider her words, "Break the ice between us."

A smile played on her lips and he had to bite his own lip to stop himself from smiling back.

"I swear to god if you're making really bad jokes right now..."

Yawning, she shifted to her side.

"Hey, shouldn't you be getting in bed with me?"

Thomas eyes widened and he drew back slightly.

"Sorry, what?"

"Oh, don't look so appalled. I thought that was a common hack for warming people up."

"Yeah... No."

Liv simply shrugged, wrapped the sheets tighter around herself and closed her eyes, still with that same slight smile.