BY: Michaela Shaw
14 June 2019
“Do you want to come back with me tomorrow?” She turned to me with a soft smile. “When I’m here with you, I feel so much more free”
***
She had taken me here on a whim, based off of something her mother had told her when she was younger, and was rewarded with the sight of white-crested waves and the smell of salt and seaweed drying on the rocks. Inviting me along, or so she said, was really only a last-minute thought, but I was glad she had nonetheless, though I was somewhat of an introvert. I typically preferred to be by myself, a sentiment she told me she understood, though she said she could never be alone forever, as I felt I could most of the time. She was a caged bird, and I was a rock.
I stepped out onto the worn dock, the boards creaking under my feet, threatening to fall into the water below, and closed my eyes, opting to let the mist wet my face rather than think about my chances of drowning. I was afraid of the sea, after all, but she had asked me to come and so there I stood right beside her. She needed me, I was sure of it, or perhaps I was just being hopeful.
“Hey.” I opened my eyes to see her hand waving back and forth excitedly, her grin calming the nerves I had about standing so close to the edge.
“Isn’t this place great? My mom told me about it years ago, but I thought she was lying about how gorgeous it was! All I want to do is jump in that water and swim, you know?” She pouted, mouth turning down in an almost cartoonish fashion, “But I didn’t bring a bathing suit, and Lord knows the water is too freezing to swim anyway.”
I shrugged, knowing that even if the water were the perfect temperature I wouldn’t go in past my ankles. “It’s beautiful, very lovely,” I said offhandedly, inching my way away from the edge and closer to her. “To be completely honest, I don’t think I would ever come here if it weren’t for you.” I looked at her, a smile playing about my lips, “So I guess I’m just trying to say thank you.”
She smiled back earnestly, leaning into my side for a brief moment to let me know she heard me. Moving away from me, sweatshirt sprayed with drops from the water that crashed onto the rocks, she danced to the songs that I knew ran through her head. I was entranced by her movement, and she expressed all that she was with each step.
“Dance with me,” She called.
“I don’t know how. I would just mess you up and I don’t wa-”
“Nonsense,” she quipped. She ran to me and pulled me off of the dock onto the sand where hundreds of small footprints ran back and forth where she had been dancing. I pulled away.
“Please, I don’t want to.”
She stopped moving and took my hand.
“Ok, I’m sorry.”
We started walking down the beach, until a strong wind blew my hair across her face and tangled with hers, dancing in the way I had refused to before. A worried look crossed her face as clouds began to shield the sun and darken the sky. The air grew colder and the waves frothed as they slammed upon the rocks. The tense feeling of charged, humid air about to burst into a thunderstorm came upon us, making the tiny hairs on my arm stand straight up on end, as though they sensed what was to come.
I looked over to see her eyes widen and her soft smile turn into a tight-lipped line as a peal of thunder split open the sky, clearing the way for drops of rain. Lightning flashed in the distance, striking the ocean as another clap of thunder shook the ground beneath us.
She squeezed my hand, her soft, small palm fitting into mine as though it belonged nowhere but there.
The wind began to blow harder as I pulled her along, leaving all fear of the ocean behind as I splashed through the waterlogged sand that the tide pushed and pulled around my feet. My sneakers soaked with saline, I searched for a place to hide from the ever-increasing downpour as fog rolled in waves across the heaving water. My vision waned and I began to stumble over unseen obstacles like abandoned crab shells and rotting logs, home to mushrooms and parasites alike. My hair whipped my face as I turned around and stopped in my tracks. I caught her shoulders in my hands, and spotting the worry etched on her usually gentle face, I reassured her.
“Everything’s going to be just fine, we just need to find a place to hide. But we’ll be ok, really. Don’t worry.”
“I know,” she said softly, “I know it’ll be ok, I just don’t want anything to happen to-”
“Nothing is going to happen. Now, can you see anything? I’ve been looking for somewhere to go but I can’t see through the fog.”
“I saw an old tool shed earlier today, it should be close now.”
I pulled away from her and began jogging again across the beach, looking back every so often to make sure she was close behind. As did Orpheus to Eurydice, I feared that every time I looked back she would be gone, and so I looked often. Looking back at her once more, I nearly ran into the shed, old slats weathered by storms and countless days in the sun and salt, spotted with the orange-brown tinge of rust from nails haphazardly pounded into the side. I opened the door, and the hinges creaked with years of derelict.
Inside, an old lantern sat on a workbench, on which also lay a hammer with a broken handle and a single nail. She walked past me, eyeing the hammer and the lantern and searching for a place to sit. She reached in the corner and pulled an empty milk crate and an upturned bucket towards us, positioning them next to the bench and taking a seat on the crate. I looked for a match or lighter to light the lantern, but found nothing, leaving us with only the weak grey light from the cracks in the walls and from a small, grimy window. I looked over at her face, made paler with the tiny streams of light that shone from the outside, and smiled a small smile, hoping to encourage her.
We waited for what felt like hours, hoping that the storm would cease so that we could escape the darkening shed and the chill in the air, but we soon grew restless, standing up every so often to run our hands over the blank walls, swearing that we missed something the first time, or the second time, or the third. I heard her slump into her hands, rubbing her eyes in exhaustion, and reached out to touch the top of her head, uncomfortably patting her hair in a feeble attempt to comfort her.
“I’m so tired,” I yawned, “How much longer should we stay here? I mean, I don’t really want to get wet but eventually our families are going to wonder where we are, right?”
“I guess so. If you want to leave you can. I’m sure your family will be happy to see you.” I sensed some bitterness in her voice that was hidden under a veil of pointed exhaustion, but was brought forth as her impatience from being stuck took away the usually positive lilt to her voice. I stepped towards her, or at least what I hoped was towards her; it was darker now than ever before.
“Is everything ok? I get that you probably don’t want to leave because of the storm,” I quickly peered at the tiny window, attempting to gauge the level of rain and wind, “but is there another reason on top of that?”
“No.” She said, far too quickly.
I took a seat on my barrel, shifting from side to side as I felt a heaviness fall on my shoulders. There was a sort of tension in the air, the kind felt by two people when both know that one person was lying.
“Are you sure? You seem a little on edge.” I asked, hoping that she would confide in me and that I wasn’t driving her away.
“I’m fine! Can’t you just… stop asking? Please?” Her voice rose, stinging my heart with every syllable that rang out in the tiny shed.
I heard shuffling as she stood up and walked to the door, opening it quickly just as a gust of wind blew inside, sending tendrils of her hair curling across her face, which was framed by the pale glow of the moon behind her. She stuck her hand out, somewhat needlessly, and felt for the drops of rain that poured from the sky just as heavily as they had when we first came to the room. Gazing up at her from my seat, taking in every detail I could with the small amount of light from the door, I kept silent so that I wouldn’t upset her again.
“Look,” she turned to face me, rain dripping from her fingers onto the dusty floor, making the smallest of sounds at her feet, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell, it’s just… I’ve just… I’m sorry.” She trailed off, dropping her eyes to the floor and quietly shutting the door before carefully making her way back to her seat on the milk crate.
“Hey, it’s ok. I’m not mad. I’m just concerned about you.”
She shuffled her feet, awkwardly avoiding my words as though I had never said them. Sighing shakily, she hummed a tune under her breath, as she sometimes did to calm herself down. Perhaps it was Hozier, or maybe Birdy, but either way it was slow and sweet. I lost myself in the sound of her voice for a moment until she suddenly stopped and pulled her crate close to my knee, looking straight at me, poised to speak.
“You know, my family isn’t worrying about me. They never do. In fact, I’m sure my dad is happy that I haven’t come back.”
“What makes you say that?” I asked softly.
“They don’t approve of me, and frankly, I don’t think they ever could. They don’t accept people like me, and ever since my mother died the names and jokes and refusals to even try to understand it all have increased on an almost daily basis, or at least that’s how it feels to me.” She spat, anger rising in her voice. “They hate me, and I hate them. I think I hate myself because of it” Her voice shook with anger and tears about to fall.
Reaching out, tentatively, so as to not startle her, I touched the back of her hand. She turned it over, accepting my hand into hers, and squeezed tightly, as though she never wanted to let go. I thought of what she had said, of how her family treated her with resentment for something she had no control over and didn’t deserve hatred for, and thought of how my own family loved me and accepted me for the very same reason her family treated her poorly. I thought of how my mother hugged me tightly when I came out, how my father clapped me on the shoulder and said, “Whatever makes you happy, dear,” and how my younger sister had smiled a wide toothy grin and asked me if there were any girls I liked. I had told her, of course.
That girl sat next to me, holding my hand in her lap as she cried. I felt a tear drop off of the tip of my nose; I hadn’t realised I was crying too. I felt so terribly for her, and wanted nothing more than to comfort her and keep her away from those who hurt her. Especially when they were making her cry like this.
I stood up, pulling her up by her hand as she sniffled and wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her sweatshirt, which was dusted with salt from the ocean spray that had fallen on her on the beach. I pulled her into a hug, and she rested her head on my shoulder, taking deep breaths to stop her tears.
“I’m here. I’m here,” I soothed, gently swaying back and forth, “I accept you, I know you, I care.”
She pulled away just enough to look up at me, and smiled a small, hesitant smile.
“You really mean it?”
“Of course I do. I like you.”
She looked at me in shock, eyes widening for a moment, before taking my hands in hers and drawing them to her cheek, where she smiled a sweet smile that turned the dark night into the brightest day. I smiled back and, closing my eyes, stomach fluttering with the feeling of a thousand feathers, placed a small kiss on her forehead. After I pulled back I kept my eyes closed, breathing in the smell of rain and the feeling of a hundred dreams.
We stood in silence for a moment, until I realised that the wind had died down. Taking my hands off of hers, I opened the door to see a bright moon, no longer shining through fog and clouds, illuminate the rain, which had slowed to nothing more than a trickle. It was as though the last few drops had fallen from a large bucket, wetting the ground before ceasing, drawing me out and taking with me the bird, now freed from her cage and ready to sing to the stars. She ran past me, wriggling her bare feet into the wet sand and inhaling the damp air. She rubbed the last of her sorrow from her eyes, and looked up to the sky.
“Sometimes, all I want to do is fly away.”
I took her hand and we began to dance under the light of the stars.