Love Burned, She Rose Unscathed

Chapter 814

Roseanne turned to look behind her.

She had no idea when Owen Reynolds had shown up or how long he'd been standing there, but he was watching her now, a smile playing at the corners of his eyes.

When his gaze drifted to the pile of snow at her feet-now reduced to a heap of crumbled slush—his amusement only deepened.

"Playing in the snow again?"

Roseanne nodded, feigning nonchalance. "Yeah."

"Trying to make a snowball?"

"...Didn't work out."

"I'll show you how." Owen was already rolling up his sleeves as he spoke.

Roseanne's eyes lit up. "You know how?"

"It's all about the physics. Once you get that, it's easy."

"There's physics to this?" Roseanne asked, her curiosity piqued. "What kind of physics?"

Honestly, she'd never thought about it before.

Owen scooped up a handful of snow and pressed it firmly into a small ball.

"First, you need a compact starter like this. At the beginning, you need a little extra force to get it rolling. As the ball grows, the pressure between the snowball and the ground lowers the melting point of the snow just enough to create a thin layer of water. That water helps the snow stick to the ball as you roll it along."

anymore, the pressure drops, the melting point rises, and it refreezes more snow

over, and the snowball just keeps getting bigger as you

Roseanne blinked. "Uh... what?"

look.

just explaining it isn't very convincing." She was

So what do you

a snowball in front of me, and I'll believe

straightened up, all confidence.

Five minutes later-

keep a straight face. This was... really testing her

mess of snow in his hands,

worked last time... What the

blinked innocently. "Last time? When

a few seconds, brow furrowed. "...Must've been when I was ten? Or

Roseanne couldn't help herself.

times she really didn't want to laugh-but

burst out laughing.

Owen stood there, defeated.

for showing off. Instead, he'd

Sigh.

minutes. Not wanting to make things any more awkward for him, Roseanne pretended to check her watch and hurriedly announced she had to

dashed off, leaving

the lab, and even as he climbed up onto the platform to check his experiments,

came out fine, but the "snowball incident" still gnawed at

off the