And in that moment, the dense, gray clouds opened.
The weather was broken, and rain poured down.




Droughts suck. For the obvious reasons. Less water means fewer and shorter showers, for one. And all of the beautiful grasses and flowers etc. whatever, that make up my town – the ones that I oh-so-secretly admire – shrivel up to a bland brownish color that no one likes.

But there are also the other effects. The tension. The tension that comes from the stress of fewer and shorter showers and gross looking shrubbery. The tension is what I’m getting at here. It’s what caused my problems.

At first we made fun of everyone that freaked out about the drought. We’re teenagers, it’s what we do. He’d crack some off- color joke and I’d laugh my a** off because he’s hilarious. And I’d make a joke and he’d laugh. Back and forth. It’d be our banter and the drying leaves above and below us. Back and forth. Calm and normal. For about a week and a half.

Then we were finally affected by the d*mn tension. My stupid sister ratted me out for a kind of, semi-longish shower. My parents were already on edge. They full on jumped with the opportunity to yell at me. I was throwing pillows around my room when he called. I was angry and he started asking me about something that I took the wrong way. More screaming. All at once. Like storms on the shores of the Atlantic. The waves and the thunder and the lightning all crashing at once. Very irregular. A storm without rain.

Everything was broken. We were broken. My dark eyes blinked to prevent tears – angry, pained, and frustrated tears – but they fell anyway. They rained into my hands. But this rain relieved no tension. And the grass was still ugly.

Three days went by. No words passed between us. Still alive. A week. Maybe I was a little worried. Two weeks. We’d never gone that long without talking since we were little. I felt like death.

Every day for the entire third week of our silence people said there would be rain. But the weather was a tease. Everything was gray and heavy. Clothes clung to my body like a second skin, the air was so damp. As if that wasn’t enough to make me crazy, I hadn’t heard his voice at all. That deep, heart-breaking voice. I’d wanted to, but he seemed to be avoiding me. I’d think that I saw a flash of dark, messy hair, but then it’d be gone.

And me. I’d been walking around with red-rimmed eyes and working my most disheveled look yet. Even for me it was bad. Brown hair and freckles everywhere. What a mess.

Thursday came and I considered not even rolling out of bed, but my gut said to get up. Wow, that seems cornier now than when it was just a thought in my head. Oh well.

The day was oppressive. I felt the sky crushing me. Everyone swore that it was the day. There hadn’t been a drop of rain in over a month. We hadn’t spoken in three weeks. It was my opinion that the world was falling apart. I decided I needed a walk. So naturally, I drove to the park. Again with my gut.

I got to the park and left my car. Ten minutes later, I saw him. I had missed him so much, but he couldn’t know that, so I set my face and walked over to him.

He was seated on the grass, eyes closed and he was singing along to something on his iPod. It was some song about waiting out a hurricane. How ironic. Just hearing his voice made me almost break down. God, that voice. But no, I had to be strong.

So I kicked his stupid Converse sneaker.

His eyelids parted revealing his chocolate brown eyes that I swore melted momentarily when he saw me before becoming hard. He stood and readjusted that stupid leather jacket. Why was he even wearing it? It had to be a billion degrees plus humidity.

“I take it you’d like to talk?” said the unbelievably gorgeous voice.

“Well aren’t you just so smart! No wonder you’re on Honor Roll!” My voice was dripping with sarcasm. He was unfazed. Jerk.

“You could have just called if you wanted to talk. You know, rather than following me to the park,” he said. I was shocked! Did he really think I followed him? And was I supposed to believe that he would have answered my calls?

“Am I supposed to believe you would have answered my calls?” I ask.

“You hung up on me. You flipped out on me. I couldn’t very well expect you to answer me, could I?”

“Why didn’t you try?” My voice is a barely there squeak.

“If you really didn’t want me to call you, I wasn’t about to risk decapitation. I thought it’s what you wanted,” he told me. How can a voice that sounds so wounded still be so beautiful? Oh God, he sounded wounded!

“You were wrong,” I informed him. It was so quiet I wasn’t sure he heard me. I started again, louder.

“You were wr—“

And, ladies and gentlemen, cliché as it sounds, I was cut off mid-sentence by a gorgeous boy’s lips. I remember that kiss to this day. Not exactly urgent, but certainly not soft. It was tender but felt all important. It could have been seconds or hours later that we finally broke apart. He held my face between his hands and my arms were around his neck. We stared at each other. Just stared. Sorting things out, each in our own, silent ways.

“I’m sorry,” I said, almost a whisper.

“I love you,” he replied. It was the first time he ever said it in a romantic context. He could have apologized first.

“You could have apologized first. But I guess I can forgive you, since what you said was kinda sweet,” I tell him. He just rolls his eyes and looks at me expectantly. “And I guess I love you too.” He smiles and tilts my chin up, pressing his lips to mine.

And in that moment, the dense, gray clouds opened. The weather was broken, and rain poured down. It was the most beautiful thing that I had ever seen. I mean, that and the smile on the boy I was standing next to.