I sat next to her.
“It’s mostly empty.Sometimes a few people walk by.And this area here,” she gestured to the grass that stretched along the edge of the dirt road, “will be full of flowers in a few months when spring comes.And it’s beautiful that over there you can see the sea far away.”
She raised an arm and pointed to the horizon beyond the green hills of the mountains.Her lips drew a slight smile.“And at night, I love it when it gets dark and you can see this panoramic view of the city in the distance, with its thousand little lights flashing.”
It wasn’tmycity, but I could imagine the night view she was talking about.
“I love high places because I love those night time panoramic views,” she said, looking at me and smiling again, as if to end her speech.
She went back to staring at the nature around us.
And I found myself staring at her.
The way her hair fell over her shoulders and arms, the way freckles dotted her cheeks.The way she seemed so serene.
“And you,” her blue eyes turned to me.“How did you end up here?”she asked.
“Here in Evermere?Or lost in this street?”
“Both!Tell me everything,” she said, repeating that amusing tone I had already noticed her using before.She positioned herself, those blue eyes facing me, ready to listen to what I had to say.“Only what you want to tell, of course,” she added quickly, as if thinking she was being a nosy stranger to me.
We were, in fact, complete strangers.
But something about the way she paid careful attention to my words moved my mouth to say things, my brain to analyze things, and myself to feel things.
I told her about living in Wayneth for as long as I could remember and how much I liked the busy, intense, energetic way of living there.I told her about my mother’s decision to move, but I left out a lot of details in that part of the story — details that even I didn’t really know.I told her a mere fragment about the argument that had led me to leave the house on the day I found Miss Amara at the village, and the day we later met.
It was probably the longest I’d ever talked about myself without being interrupted, either by my own thoughts or by the unfocused external factors around me: my listeners.
She stood there, raising some questions I knew I barely answered, and smiling with her lips and her eyes.Allowing me to utter words I hadn’t really thought about before.
And I felt the urge to thank her.
I felt heard.
Chapter 8
Ella
September 8th,1998
Tuesday
I realized he wasn’t used to sharing much.Or maybe just not used to sharing so much with a stranger.
From time to time during our conversation, we would hit a wall where I couldn’t get any more of Miles to jump over.
I enjoyed being here with him.
His green eyes shrank with reflections on his words.Full of something, I didn’t know what.
“Is that an instrument?”he asked.
There it was — the detour.We reached the last wall.
I grabbed it.“It’s an ukulele, actually.Very much like a small guitar with only four strings.”
“Well, I brought my guitar too.”
