Past Tense

Chapter 3

coccinellidae
ladybug

WHEN IT RAINS, it pours. I'm not sure how long I wait underneath the bus stop, the raindrops falling heavily on the rooftop above, until I feel a vibration from my phone. A text message from my mother: Did you arrive back safely?

I blink and look around, forgetting momentarily the way back to my sister's apartment. It's almost dark and it's cold, and I wish I stayed at my parents' house for another night.

Almost. I text back, my fingers numb from the brisk air. I'm not averse to taking the bus, but I feel somewhat irked that the socks inside of my shoes are wet, and that I need to walk in the rain, all the way back, alone.

But I begin to remember where I am, the worn down buildings and sidewalk pavement, telephone poles casting shadows across the street. I had been here, in this exact spot, not too long ago.

I walk a few feet to the apartment lobby entrance, trying to pull the door open before realizing it's locked. An intercom near the door handle reminds me that I'm not a resident, or even an acquaintance, to be welcomed inside. I could wait until he shows up, blaming my presence on the rain, and the wind, and the coincidence of seeing him again, even after all these years.

I stay there, standing, a feeling sinking at the bottom of my stomach. Did any of it matter, anyway? All the things that happened in the past?

I feel it again, my sentimentality, his regret, the world blurry through watercolored eyes. We were just girls, and they were just boys, and I was just someone who liked to rhyme things together and run along with the wind dancing through my hair, trying to follow the dandelion dust trailing closely behind the clouds.

But it was tainted, these memories; like a drop of black paint touching every color, staining shadows across my hands. I wasn't sure what picture of my childhood I was trying to paint anymore.

I was just a girl. I wanted to say.

Was he just a boy?

"Kira."

I blink at the sound of my name, startled, looking up quickly to meet Matty's gaze. His fingers linger near the door handle to his apartment lobby, then fall to his side. It twitches, near his knuckles.

"Matty," I say, letting go of a breath I didn't know I was holding. "I'm—"

"What are you doing here?"

My mouth opens, then closes, and I blink again, at a loss for words. He stares at me, with his eyebrows pulled together and lips drawn into a frown. Raindrops gather at the curls near his neck. I grasp my hands behind me and quickly look away from him, my eyes staring at his feet. I wonder if he knows how overwhelming it is to be here, to be this close to him. I want to reach out, grab his wrists and trace his veins, feel his heartbeat to know that he's alive, and standing right in front of me.

"It's raining," I finally say, looking back up at him, my voice faint against the wind. "I'm just waiting, I think, for you."

He sighs, running a hand through his already disheveled hair. I'm not quite sure what else to say, or do, without feeling it again, the heaviness in my chest. It was so long ago, the childhood we shared; and longer still, the distance that had formed between us.

I wonder if he knew how uncomfortable it was, to see someone all grown up in the span of a few days. This wasn't the Matty I knew, and I wasn't sure if I wanted to keep standing here, keep wondering if there was always going to be this divide between us.

Because maybe that's all we really were now, just two people who barely knew each other anymore, separated by time and unfamiliarity and regret. But to me, he was still a small child finding insects in between branches and chasing marbles across the classroom floor. And to him, I was just a bully—a painful reminder of the past.