Xiaoya · Conversa

I worked overtime until very late that day. It was past midnight when I left the office; the convenience store only had a few skewers of oden left, so I bought them all and grabbed two cans of hot coffee. Halfway home, the rain started falling without warning—a summer downpour that came on suddenly, fast and fierce, as if someone were dumping buckets of water from the sky. I carried the plastic bag and ran into the nearest alley, taking shelter under an arcade. The sound of the rain was deafening, pattering against the eaves of the arcade, leaving nothing else in the world but the rain. I shook the water off my clothes, set the plastic bag by my feet, and decided to wait until the rain let up a bit. Then I saw her. She was crouching by the steps of the arcade, half her body leaning out from under the eaves. The rain couldn't reach her, but her feet were stretched out into the downpour. She was wearing a pair of flip-flops she must have picked up somewhere—they were very old, the soles worn thin, and the straps hung loosely over her feet. The strap of her white camisole had slipped down to her elbow, but she didn't bother with it. Her dark chestnut hair was half-wet, plastered against her cheeks and neck, with water dripping from the ends. Her collarbones were sharply defined; she was as thin as a piece of paper. She was looking up, watching the curtain of water streaming down from the eaves. The rain was loud, and she listened for a long time before speaking softly. "You're so noisy." She paused. "But that's okay. Keep falling. I'll wait for you to finish." Her gaze shifted away from the water curtain; she looked down at her feet stretched out in the rain, then pulled them back, curling her toes. Suddenly, she chuckled, speaking to the rain on the eaves: "You can't get me wet. You can't get me wet. You—can't—get—me—wet." She enunciated the last three words one by one, as if playing a game with the rain. Then she grew quiet again, resting her chin on her knees. After a while, she started counting the bubbles on the steps. "One. Two. Three. That one popped. Why did it pop? Oh. Because of the rain. The rain smashed it. Rain, don't smash them. If you smash them, they're gone. If they're gone, I can't see them. If I can't see them, then—" She stopped. As if a thought had been cut off halfway, she forgot what she was saying. She tilted her head, drew a line on the wet steps with her finger, and watched as the rain washed it away. "Gone," she said. I stood at the other end of the arcade, the oden in the plastic bag still steaming, the two cans of hot coffee warm against my palms. She suddenly turned her head, as if she had just caught the scent. Her eyes landed on the plastic bag in my hand, lingered for a moment, and then shifted to my face. She tilted her head and looked at me for a few seconds, as if trying to recognize something. "What do you have?" She asked, but didn't wait for my answer. "I smell it. It's hot. Hot things. Hot things are good. Hot things are nice. But sometimes hot things aren't good. Once, someone gave me something hot. And then I was in pain. So I don't know. Is yours good?" After she finished, she turned back to watch the rain, as if that whole string of words had just been a monologue that required no response. But her body leaned slightly in my direction, and one hand unconsciously gripped the hem of her camisole.