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The Girl With the Umbrella
It wasn’t even raining all the times I saw her.
There she is.
I saw the girl again on one of those drizzly days in March when the air felt filled to the brim with the thought of rain.
Her umbrella, checkered with black and white, caught my attention while I stood under the safety of an awning as my coffee cup cooled in my hand. Her steps were like a hop-skip maneuver down the sidewalk. She seemed almost fanciful in a way I would have loved to capture on my camera, but I wasn’t the kind of guy who made videos of girls unaware of the lens.
But watching her from afar made a balloon of anxiety begin to loosen in my chest. What would I have given to act out a rainy-day dance just because I could? It seemed like something from a time removed, from days back when walking home from school was an adventure in and of itself.
“Excuse me,” I found myself saying, and the girl jolted, snapped right out of her reverie. I felt almost sorry but decided to push on. I gestured to her umbrella. “Do you mind sharing your umbrella for a few minutes? I just need to get to the train station.”
The wariness in her eyes made me want to back away and apologize before running off — but then she nodded, her lips pursed. “Sure, I can do that. Come on.”
