the day i met her

Her lips were stained red and her hair fell down onto her shoulders, it looked like a slow wave, the kind you can run into without being scared. The soft kind that barely hit the bottom of your legs. Not the ones that push you under, where you feel like you will never come up again. Not the one that crushes your body, scraping sand across your cheeks and water fill your lungs. Not that kind. Though now that time has passed, I can see that she is more like that kind of wave, not the soft one. The soft one I see, but seems so distant, I was young, two braids in my hair, wearing a light blue bathing suit, kids all around, running in and out, boogie boards taking us back to the shore and all of us thinking that nothing will change. That the smiles on our faces, that the soft waves that made us laugh would never end. But we were wrong. Of course we were wrong. We liked to believe that the feeling we would get when we ran into the frigid water, when the sand lightly touched our lips and the sun beamed down on our exposed skin, that we would be happy just like this forever. But then our parents tell us we have to leave, they are standing there waiting for the waves to lead us back to them, towels held in hand ready to wrap around our chilled bodies. Our hearts would break as we stepped out of the water, back onto the sand, and into their arms. We wanted to be the fish that got to stay into the night. That could breathe through the strong waves, through the soft waves, and explore below the surface when the sun began to fade. But instead, we were taken away, taken away from the sweet sound of the ocean falling on top of our bodies, and forced to say goodbye. It reminds me of her. Of when I had to say goodbye. But with the ocean, you get to go back. You fall asleep quickly, exhausted from the heat, and then all of a sudden the sun is shining through your window onto your eyes, you bounce out of bed, throw on that damp bathing suit that was left hanging in the bathroom, then there you are, back in the water with the soft waves peeling away from the shore.