The Year Without Edges

Aika · Mar 5, 2026

When the seasons disappeared, nobody noticed at first.

The news called it a shift in atmospheric stability. Winters grew softer, summers shorter.
Then one year the snow simply didn't come. The next year the heat never arrived.

After that, the world settled into something gentle.

Perpetual spring, drifting slowly into autumn, and then back again.

People said it was comfortable.

No more heat warnings.
No frozen pipes.
No storms sharp enough to close the schools.

For a while, the weather stopped being something people talked about.

Mika was twenty-six when the last real winter happened.

She remembered it mostly through small things.

The way the air stung her lungs when she ran for the train.
The strange quiet after heavy snow.
The sound of boots crushing ice that refused to melt.

Now the air never hurt.

Mornings were cool. Afternoons were mild. Evenings carried a soft wind that smelled faintly of leaves or blossoms depending on the month.

It was always pleasant.

Too pleasant, sometimes.

One evening she walked home along the river path.

Cherry trees had bloomed three weeks earlier. Now the petals were gone, replaced by patient green leaves that would eventually fade into gold.

Children were playing near the water.

One of them asked a teacher something.

"Is snow actually cold?"

The teacher hesitated.

"Very cold," she said. "Like holding the sky in your hands."

The children laughed, not quite believing her.

At home, Mika opened a wooden box she kept in the back of her closet.

Inside were photographs her father had taken years ago.

Snow piled against a window.

A summer beach crowded with umbrellas.

A thundercloud towering like a mountain.

The colors looked exaggerated now, almost fictional.

She realized something strange.

Ten years had passed since the world changed.

And yet the memories of winter and summer felt sharper each year,
as if the mind refused to let them fade.