Cal's Character Contest
#5 Word: 49: trees Picture: 3
here's the link: http://www.youngwriterssociety.com/topic33572.html
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The patter on the umbrella slowed, and finally disappeared.
“How is it?” Jacob whispered to me.
“It’s beautiful,” I whispered back. I’d brought him out to the meadow behind my old school. It had been pouring, and he still held the big yellow umbrella over us. I pressed myself closer to him for warmth. And just because I could. He smiled.
It might have seemed useless to someone else to bring a blind person to sight see, but that’s not Jacob. I was his eyes and I loved it. I loved to describe things, and I loved him. I think he liked it a lot too.
“What’s it look like?”
“It’s misty. The sun’s poking out from behind the clouds. There are yellow dandelions all over the grass, they match the umbrella. There are trees all over there,” I took his hand and pointed his arm with mine. “And they’re just starting to get tiny little leaves on them.” I brought our arms back down to our sides. I intertwined my fingers with his.
“That sounds really pretty,” he said. I laid my head on his shoulder. I knew he wished he could see it, but he wouldn’t say it. I closed my eyes, trying to imagine how he must feel.
“Thanks.”
I nodded, my head was still against him, so he knew I acknowledged it.
“Ya know,” he continued. “I don’t even really mind not being able to see most of the time.”
I looked up at his face. He seemed to be staring out into nowhere… if his eyes weren’t hazed over.
“Except when I think about how pretty you must be, and the fact that I can’t see your face…” he trailed off.
“You’re not really missing much,” I muttered, burying my face further into his black t-shirt.
He was really quite for a while. Curious about his reaction, I looked back up at his face. He looked like he wanted to say something.
I touched his cheek lightly. “What?”
“Can you describe… you for me?” My hand dropped.
I blushed. “I, uh…” I didn’t know what to say. How would I describe myself? I cleared my throat. He frowned.
“It’s ok, you don’t have to. I was just a little curious, I guess,” he paused. I didn’t say anything. What was I supposed to say? He continued after a minute anyway. “I was just thinking that I wouldn’t be able to recognize you someday if I ever got my vision back,” he whispered again. I think he felt bad for flustering me. And he might have felt like that was shallow to ask, but I knew he didn’t mean it in a shallow way.
But then I realized what he’d said.
“If you ever get your vision back?” I asked in a small voice.
He was slow to answer. “Well, it doesn’t exactly seem likely, but I don’t know if it might be possible.”
I didn’t know what to say to him again. Usually his blindness didn’t bother me. I’d gotten used to it. But I felt oddly uncomfortable now. I didn’t know what to say to him. Should I console him? Should I pretend that that was possible?
Was it possible?
I didn’t know what to do, so I didn’t do anything. We stood in silence for a while, the last words hanging in the air like an omen. He wrapped the arm that wasn’t holding the umbrella around me as it started to drizzle again.
We had just started dating; I'd had a crush on him for the longest time, but I'd never really talked to him. I suppose it wasn't fair to expect him to make the first move when he wouldn't have been able to even notice me.
“What’s it look like now?” he asked quietly.
I didn’t answer right away. I didn’t want to pull my face away from his chest to look, but when I did, I let out a gasp. I said, “There’s a rainbow over there,” and I pointed to it with him once again.
