GOLDEN MEMORIES

I sit on the counter of the corner store, shoes tucked up flawlessly to keep away from the racks of chocolate bars and candies, with a course reading adjusted kneeling down. "You need to get down on the off chance that a client comes in," says Ophelia, jabbing my leg. "Indeed, ma'am," I say, not looking into, zeroing in rather on translating the outlines portraying plant multiplication. She pushes my shoulder. "There's no real reason for you being here in the event that you won't converse with me. Return home if you have any desire to study." I snap the book shut and gaze toward her. "Is that so? My presence isn't sufficient?" "At the point when you're tranquil, you should be any other individual," she prods, grabbing attention contact. I hold it however long I can prior to dropping my head. I actually get anxious when I meet her eyes. She's simply so lovely. Regardless of how I attempt to portray her, to attract her down to basic words, I can't do her equity. She has dark hair yet it's adequately not to say that it twists around her face like smoke. She has dull eyes, yet I was unable to get out whatever variety they are precisely on the grounds that the manner in which they make my stomach dance is so extreme I can't maintain eye contact with her long enough to find out. I could attempt to make sense of the shade of her skin and the shapes made by the spots on her cheeks and nose, however it could never be sufficient. The tattoos of blossoms on her arms, the sun all over, the manner in which I could pay attention to her discussion for a really long time. Everything exists some place beyond language. My longing is extreme to the point that it makes me need to run from her yet pulls me back like gravity. Nothing might at any point be sufficient. Not kisses or her fingers on my skin. I'd just need more. She resembles water in a dry spell. Be that as it may, she won't ever be aware. She has Jack and when one loves somebody however much I love her, they know that occasionally it is ideal to allow the affection to wear itself out before the fire gains out of influence and torches different lives with it. Thus, I love her from a remote place, in any event, when I'm right close to her. "I need to complete this part," I tell her. "I have a lab on Monday." "That is two entire days away," she says. "That is fundamentally 100 years. I'm certain you can set aside another opportunity. I'm so exhausted." Downpour pours down outside, and it has been north of an hour since the last benefactor maneuvered into the corner store. He didn't actually come inside, just topped off his vehicle at the siphon and left, tires shrieking over the wet black-top. "100 years, huh?" I peer down the back streets of sweets and chips and through the window. With the weighty sheets of downpour beating down past the siphons and pouring in weighty streams from the shade above, the street and the fields past it, obscured by the downpour, out of nowhere appear to be delicate. Like the remainder of the world has started to wash away, and Ophelia and I are existing in a liminal space, away from the downpour yet impacted by it. The main thing concrete is the service station, the side of my course reading diving into my leg, and Ophelia remaining there behind the sales register. We are quickly frozen in time. "Is something off-base?" she inquires. "You're so tranquil today." She wears a radiant red shirt with the station's logo of sun and moon ("Open 24 hours every day, 7 days per week!") with her unofficial ID stuck right underneath. The material is solid, and she pulls at the collar. I shrug my shoulders. "There's a great deal at the forefront of my thoughts." It is torment being so near her yet at the same time being not able to connect. Jack makes her blissful and she adores him. There isn't space in that frame of mind for myself and it would be childish to request that she make room. I can't destroy this. I can't lose my companion. She slants her head, her braid slipping over her shoulders. "Educate me." "I can't actually track down the words." I'm certain I will have different loves than this one, yet presently, with the downpour sprinkling down outside, safeguarding us like a shade from everything past us, I feel rawer than a serious injury. "Is an off-base thing?" I shake my head. "Not actually. This weather conditions is simply cutting me down." She projects her eyes through the window. "It truly is descending out there. Spring showers like this normally just last a short time yet, man, it's been hours." A thought sparkles inside me that pushes the agony aside. "You ought to shut down the store," I say out of nowhere, a grin slipping onto my lips. "We should head outside." "I can't shut down the store." She frowns. "We should be consistently open. Imagine a scenario in which somebody pulls up." "Then, at that point, you go resume it." I gaze toward her from my situation on the counter, opening my eyes wide to make an emotional, arguing look. "In the event that the proprietor stops by and I cause problems " "I will accept any penalty. Swear on my all that is holy." She feigns exacerbation. "Fine however just for a couple of moments. I would rather not get drenched." "Much thanks to you, my sovereign," I bother, swinging my legs over the counter and sliding off, abandoning the reading material. Ophelia pulls the red uniform over her head, exposing the dark tank top under and uncovering the tattoos of twin heavenly messengers underneath her collarbones. The dark and dim concealing is so smooth and exact that they appear to be laying on her skin, as opposed to part of it. "What?" she asks, seeing my waiting eyes. "Your tattoos," I say. "Regardless of how frequently I see them, I can't move past how clean they are." She brushes her fingers over the holy messengers. "My folks can't stand this more than the blossoms. They assume they make me look modest." "Advise them that cash doesn't purchase satisfaction. Plus, it's past the point of no return now. It's as of now on your skin." "Once in a while I get terrified by how extremely durable my tattoos are," she says. "It kind of reminds me how much life I should have left." "I know how that feels." I have script inked on my ribs and I know that inclination. I can ask that the words I saw as so lovely at eighteen actually sound wonderful at fifty. Yet, as long-lasting as this liminal space feels, the downpour could slow without warning, so I push open the entryway and am hit by the smell of downpour hitting wet asphalt. Ophelia flips the open sign on the way to the side that peruses Closed for cleaning! what's more, arrives at up to set her hair free from its braid. She looks more liberated now, with her hair blowing in the delicate breeze and her uncovered arms raised over her head to loosen up the hours spent behind the till. We stop together under the covering, taking a gander at the drapery of water just past. "We will get so cool," she says. "What's more, totally splashed." I snicker. "Stressed you'll soften?" "You're dumb." And she pushes out of the wellbeing of the overhang and out into the downpour. She sprinkles through the puddles, arms outstretched, and face split with delight and tipped up to the sky. Watching her twist, beads running down her cheeks and flying from her hair, feels practically strict. I fail to remember it was my plan to go over here and simply need to watch her. However at that point she's going after me and hauling me out into her twist. The downpour is warm, and she is giggling, and I am chuckling, and everything is wonderful. The service station is gone and presently the downpour is our endlessness. We dance together, kicking curves of water from the puddles, snickering and whirling, our fingers slipping separated and afterward finding each other once more. Above us, the mists part barely to the point of letting the sun through. The downpour doesn't stop. All things considered, it goes to gold.