She arrived barefoot,
dragging a stuffed animal behind her
like a body.
I was older then,
with eyes that forgot how to weep cleanly,
and hands that only knew how to hold ruin.
She said, “You left me in the pit.”
I said, “I know.”
She walked ahead of me,
ankles slicing the tall grass.
Her dress clung damp to her knees.
There were bruises in the shape of silence.
At the river, she turned.
“Do you remember the language of water?”
And I did—
not in words,
but in what came before them.
Before shame.
Before mirrors.
Before I was taught
to sit still and smile small.
It was the language of being.
Of breath, of hunger,
of splashing without apology.
It spoke in ripples,
in open mouths,
in unbrushed hair
and unhidden joy.
She held out a jar.
Inside:
a broken hair clip,
a crumpled drawing,
and my old voice—still trembling.
One said, “Let me stay loud.”
One said, “Don’t look at me.”
One said nothing,
but it was mine.
She poured them into the river.
They floated like dead petals.
We didn’t speak again.
We just sat,
her knees to her chest,
me trying to remember
the last time I let myself float.
When she left,
she left the stuffed animal in my lap.
It stared at me like it knew something.
The river moved on.
And this time,
I followed.