I think it was February when he stood in my door. Literally. I had just opened the door as I was bringing the trash outside and turned around to get those thick gloves to wear above the finger gloves. When it is cold like that, I wear three layers of gloves. Thin neoprene finger gloves, warmer Thinsulate™ ones and some mittens above it all. For the garbage cans, mittens would do. And it was minus fucking twenty out there.

And a white guy.

I mean, really white. That skin of his was just barely perceptible against the snow storm that was rushing into my hallway and heaping small icy flakes on the doormat carpet and the few pairs of outdoor shoes that stood there. Everything white, except that he was also tattoed. Tiny - lots of tiny words all over his skin. His bald scalp showed a bit of a dadaist love poem, words trailing off, falling from his shoulders, glued along his arms, clenched together with his fingers that he was blowing on. He was cold.

I mean holy-fuck-yes he must have been out there at minus-holy-fucking-twenty in a snowstorm. Nude, except for some white briefs. Then he looked at me with a deadpan face, blowing over his fingers, as if I was the one behaving odd. I probably was. He didn't really wait for me to settle from my stupefaction but pushed me with the back of his arm. I jerked back, mostly from the icy touch, and he was past me. His back was also white. The writing on his back formed some sentences, like the cut and paste from a blackmail letter, just that it was about apples. There was a crude joke on his left buttock.

My own shudder reminded me to close the door. I had to move the trash back in to close the door. I closed the door. I turned around, and the white guy sat on a box in a corner of the kitchen. He stared into the air and kept on rubbing his arms and legs and blowing his fingers.

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So as you can see, he's still sitting there. It's not like I didn't try. I talked to him, and offered some coffee, because, I mean you don't just let people freeze, do you? When he didn't react, I think I put a blanket over his shoulders. I called the emergency and the police lines. Ok, I admit, I called the police first. The police didn't believe a word of my story, and the emergency diagnosed that when he was breathing normally there's nothing they would do. Even they didn't want to go out in this weather. He didn't seem to mind the blanket. But even that couldn't get a reaction. I ate my dinner, alone, since he wouldn't hold a plate or a fork. I wasn't going to force that on him.

The first night was creepy, and I locked the door to my room. He sometimes started to hum faintly at night, and then stopped again after a few minutes. In the morning, he had shed the blanket. I wasn't able to move him from the corner. He didn't fight me, but he's a heavy guy. I'm not. And even though he was by then sitting in my heated kitchen, his body temperature hadn't gone up a bit. The only movements I ever got to see from him was that blowing and rubbing. He never ate, and never left his spot, so I assume he neither pursued any other needs.

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So, yeah. He's an odd one, somehow. I think I like him, because of that. I got used to him sitting in his corner in the kitchen, and it's not like I have to see him all the time. I like to read his poetry and to muse if maybe he's quite a sensitive person. That crude joke he is now permanently sitting on, fortunately. So, other people have shrunken heads in their living room cabinets, I have a cold body in the kitchen. He must be cold, but there's nothing I can do.

We get along pretty well. I even have a name for him.

I call him the Freezer.