The Winter That Buried Our Youth

My dad is a fan of tough love parenting.

When I was a kid, there was a time when I obtained full marks on two subjects. But he told me, "Your grades don't mean anything in life. If you were a true man, you'd leap down five floors without batting an eyelash."

Some time later, I was awarded for my act of bravery. But Dad scoffed in my face.

"Not even a hair is harmed on your head. Why should you be awarded anyway?"

I thought Dad wanted me to go through more training in life.

On Christmas Eve, he ditched me on a snowy mountain under the guise of wanting me to go through more training. He didn't give me a tent or a lighter.

Later on, Dad even brags about his parenting method to his relatives and friends.

"A real man should survive and thrive in a desperate situation! I told Julian that he can forget about being my son if he can't even make his way back to the summit!"

But the red dot on the GPS tracker installed in his phone hasn't moved for the past three hours.

The truth is, I've already frozen to death in the mountains. Trapped in my fist is a crumpled, torn scrap of paper.

Meanwhile, my soul is currently floating above the dining table while watching Dad brag about his tough love parenting.

Dad glanced down at his phone, and his smug smile deepened a little more.

"See? He hasn't moved in two hours."

He thrust the phone screen right in front of my uncle, Arnold Bowen, jabbing his finger at the stationary red dot a couple of times.

"This brat's definitely sulking and hiding out on some sheltered slope having a nap. I know him too well. The moment he runs into any difficulty, he wants to curl up and hide just like his mother.

"I told him that if he doesn't make it to the summit by midnight tonight, I'm cutting off his living expenses for the next semester."

I floated above the dining table, bitterness flooding through me.

The blizzard hit out of nowhere, and I lost all sense of direction.

As hypothermia took hold, I started hallucinating. I even tore off that flimsy windbreaker Dad had grudgingly given me.

Right before I died, I still fantasized that Dad might come to save me.

Uncle Arnold's wife, Ethel Gallagher, shrank her neck and glanced at the howling snowstorm outside the window.

"Trevor, this snow looks serious. The news has already issued a yellow alert. Has Julian dressed warmly enough?"

Dad swallowed a piece of steak, then raised his glass and took a satisfied sip.

"I gave him a windbreaker, and he's got thermal underwear underneath. That's more than enough. A man's gotta be able to handle the cold.

"Back in my days in the military, I used to run three miles shirtless in -22-degree weather. Now, that's what I call tough."

I sneered from midair.

His so-called shirtless three-mile run was nothing but a drunken tall tale he bragged about to his army buddies. He'd turned his own drunken fantasies into truth and then mercilessly imposed them on me.

But Dad, I was already stone-cold dead.

I floated right in front of Dad. I wanted to tell him that I had tried my hardest, that I had wanted to keep climbing.

But my lungs felt like they were exploding, each breath like swallowing knives. My legs had gone numb long ago, all because of the single-layer hiking boots he forced me to wear to toughen up my will.

I screamed right in his face, "Dad, I'm cold! So cold!"

After muttering something under his breath, he picked up his phone and held down the voice message button.

"Julian, quit playing dead. I see your location hasn't moved. Are you staging a sit-in protest against me? Well, let me tell you—it won't work.

"If you're not at the summit by midnight tonight, don't even think about going back to that crappy college of yours. You can go work on a construction site instead!"

His finger lifted, and the message was sent.

I stared at that familiar chat window. The last message was still the one I'd sent him three hours ago.

"Dad, I can't breathe. Is the medicine in your bag? I think I forgot to bring it."

His reply was, "Medicine? I already threw it away. That stuff's a crutch for the weak. Just tough it out—it'll pass."

In that moment, I fell into utter despair.

I kept climbing in the snow until the last trace of warmth drained from my body.

Now, floating in midair, I stared at the face of the man I had called "Dad" for 20 years. Suddenly, he felt like a complete stranger.

This was my dad. To him, my life was worth less than a plate of appetizers or a topic to brag about in front of relatives.