Wet.
She was cold. It was not yet winter but it was the end of November. On her side of the world there was always an uncertainty in the way weather and climate worked. Even though it was half cold and half humid, she kept yearning for the wet coolness on her skin, the rain of mists of long-ago-winter-mornings or the wet coolness of spring shower which she enjoyed several times (when her grandmother was still quite young and as pitchy).
“let’s save the rain” they yelled… “let’s not tell anyone we killed the frog” they conspired.
Sometimes, she thought, her flesh felt like raw apparition of millions of diseases.
She remembered how easily humanity was taken into diluted perception even when she was eight. She tried hard to think of one innocent moment which she enjoyed as a child without causing another being any trouble or without hurting another—the time grandmother lost words while screaming at Auntie for being disobedient? No, it was funny before, but she felt guilty at laughing at something like that even when she was eight… she knew she didn’t want to laugh, but everyone else did when they analyzed grandmother’s age. Was being old funny, then?
She feared everything was turning back time—she feared that she would turn into the dead frog, why did she have to torture the innocent, repulsive looking thing? Why did she have to turn down the boy with a round face and kiss another’s hand in front of Roundface? Money? Love, perhaps?
She feared and remembered the time of the year and where she belonged- there would be no rain, no moisture to drain down her guilt and rinse her inside.
She stopped dreaming.
[285]
