The Quiet Balcony

The black railing on my balcony turned white every time the lightning struck, the blinding light hitting the raindrops balancing on the wrought iron. It etched a beautiful arched design for a split second across my wall, making me wish I had any kind of artwork put up instead of sending them to my storage unit when I had moved in, thinking I would have time to set up the next week. Unbeknownst to me, everything would be sent spiraling into terror when an extremely contagious disease took the world by surprise, and I wouldn't be able to leave my house to retrieve them.

Another bang startled me as I stared at the wall, but this time, no arch design showed up. Confused, I checked the sliding glass door that opened to the balcony, expecting a downed bird that may have been out trying to fly in the storm. Instead I found a quarter bag of brown rice, tied tightly at the top with a thick elastic, protecting it from the weather. I put on my rubber cleaning gloves and bought the bag inside. On the elastic band I noticed a small heart, filled in with black ink. Next to the heart in neat, slightly slanted, all caps handwriting were the words “after the rain”. 

I felt myself smile without meaning to while disinfecting the outside of the plastic rice bag with a sanitary spray. I then wrote the date with a permanent black marker on it and then I carefully placed the entire bag in my quarantine closet. It would take three days for any remnants of the virus to die, so I wouldn't risk contracting it. This was an overly cautious measure, as I knew where the bag came from, but my anxiety got the better of me and I always followed protocol anyway.

I looked out onto my balcony once again, straining my eyes to see through the dark veil of unending downpour. The outline of a building was barely visible but I stood there anyway, staring at the silhouette and waiting patiently.

 I waited for a long time and my eyelids began to droop. I was about to give up when I heard the crash of thunder and the lightning brightened the outside into daylight for just barely a second, but it was enough to see in the patio door directly across the courtyard through the pounding rain. A woman with bright, wavy chestnut hair just past her shoulders was standing with a slight smile on her face, also patiently waiting. I raised my hand as a final thank you for the rice, but it was too late. The split second lightning steak had ended, plunging the night back into the all-encompassing, wet darkness. 

I hoped my face had also been smiling in that short second, but I’m sure, instead, it conveyed the desperate loneliness and fear I felt every night after the sun went down. I exhaled finally and shook my head, surrendering myself to the tiredness I felt. I walked towards the single bed in my studio apartment. Whispering a final goodnight and wishing with everything in me, that one day she would actually hear me say it. 

The rain was still misting in the morning and it woke me gently. The sunlight was slowly taking its turn and a rainbow had formed in the corner of the patio door on the balcony.

The rainbow eased my anxiety upon waking, if only for a second. After nearly sixteen months in quarantine, eleven of those months with no power or access to the outside world, I was running dangerously low on food. I had raided every single one of the empty apartments in my building. I guess I was the only one who decided to hunker down in my small studio instead of finding somewhere seemingly more equipped for isolation. I don’t know if any of my neighbors found a safer place but none of them had returned. 

I felt my heart rate rise as the near constant daily anxiety returned. I walked to the patio door, to see if she was awake yet. She sat cross legged, sipping a coffee, behind her own closed patio door. A note written with a white window marker next to her.

“I want to try something today” It read. I smiled immediately as I felt my chest loosen as it always did when I saw her messages, I heard them in my head too, imagining what her voice sounded like. In my head it was soft and silky, but with a fiery energy that matched her hair color.

She looked up from her coffee, noticing my arrival. She smiled her wide smile and her eyes smiled too with legitimate joy to see me. I wondered if the anxiety of living in a situation like this didn’t affect her. She was my beacon of light through this. She was the only reason I still woke up every morning. I didn’t even know her name. I once asked her but she just gave me a playful look and pointed to her mouth, indicating that she would not write it, but would only tell me when we could finally speak to each other. 

She pointed to her drink, signalling that I should make some coffee as well. I didn’t have any left. I hadn’t for months. But I would never her that, knowing she would share hers and I didn’t want to take any of it. I watched her enjoy it every morning, like clockwork. So I nodded, and went over to the sink, where I stood for several minutes before filling my mug with water. I walked back to the patio door and raised my mug in cheers to her and she raised hers as well, standing up and waiting for my response to her window message. 

I traced a large, invisible question mark on my patio door with my finger. I did not have window markers, only regular ones, and I was running out of paper to send her my messages. She clapped in a silly way, rushing to get her cloth to wipe the glass and write her new message. I chuckled, she clearly had an idea she was very excited about. I grabbed a couch pillow and sat on it, cross legged, waiting for her to finish her message. 

She took her time writing, erasing and adjusting it twice. The letters were smaller than normal and the message took up almost the entire patio door. When she was finished she combed her hands towards her, urging me to stand up and read. I held up a single finger, asking her to wait just a moment. I needed my binoculars to read this one.

“Behind your building, there is a bulletin board. This morning, the toothpaste ad on it has been written over. It says “it is safe”. What if this has all passed? What if the virus has died out? I haven’t seen the dead ones in days. I want us to speak to each other. Really speak. Yell across the balconies. We will see if they come. We will see if it is safe.” My breath had quickened as I read, fear rising. This is dangerous. Really dangerous. If they hear us, they could find out where we are and climb the balconies. It is imperative for survival that we do not draw attention to our location. However if someone had been able to climb the ad board to relay that message, then maybe it was actually true. Still. She could be in danger if we did this. I was shaking my head without noticing when I looked up and saw she was nodding in silent argument with her wide smile. 

She pulled the patio door open and stepped outside, patiently waiting for my compliance, as I stood there in shock. This couldn’t really be ending could it? I slid open my own patio door and stepped out warily on the balcony. Breathing in the fresh after-rain air, I looked around in every direction. She was right. I didn’t see dead ones anywhere, come to think of it, I had been seeing less and less for weeks, they must have been slowly dying off, the virus leaving their systems and returning them to their true deceased state. 

Her eyes smiled as she opened her mouth and faked a scream. I covered my mouth and grabbed the balcony railing, gripping hard until my knuckles turned white. She laughed silently and pointed at me to say “Got you!”. I smiled lightly in forgiveness of her joke, but I did not loosen my grip on the railing. Holding up her hand, she started to count down with her fingers, slowly pulling one finger down at a time, and mouthing the corresponding number. 

For the first time I saw her bubbly facade break down as she showed nervousness. Her smile faded, replaced with furrowed eyebrows and focused eyes of fierce determination. Her hands shook slightly as she counted down past three. 

Her anxiety spiked mine and my instinct to protect her surged as she folded the last finger of the countdown.

 “No!” I screamed as long and as loud as I could, aiming to be louder then whatever sound she had decided to make. If the creatures came, I wanted them to attack my balcony first, to give her enough time to get inside and hope they didn’t notice her. My scream ended and both of us stared at each other, her mouth open in shock at my actions. 

I counted slowly. One, two, three, four… I countdown to thirty-two before I finally blinked and exhaled. They would be here by now. They are fast. I could see her mouth slowly turning upwards in the realization that we were safe and this was truly over.

Before I could say anything, she spun around, racing for her apartment door and the stairs out of her building. My heart started pounding as I watched her, I wanted to follow suit but I was frozen, watching her run, watching the area, still not convinced. I saw it before she came out of her building. The dead one limped, distressed into the enclosed courtyard, it made desperate gurgling, grunting noises while eagerly looking for the source of the sound.

I hit the stucco wall of my building in anger, pacing back and forth on the small balcony trying to figure out how to save her, as she finally walked out of her building door into the courtyard. Her bright eyes flashed black as she noticed the dead one, only a few feet from her and without a thought I jumped over the second story balcony railing, landing inexplicably sideways on my left ankle and the jolting crack it made was just as loud as my pained screech. I continued my screeching as I stumble-hopped on one foot towards the open courtyard gate, drawing the creature away from her. It gained speed as it followed me, getting excited that it was so close to such a slow meal. 

 As soon as it was through the gate I spun around the dead one in a tight circle, on my one good foot narrowly avoiding its virus ridden touch, back into the courtyard. It spun angrily as well, following me, snarling and clawing, but I made it behind the beautiful curved wrought iron gate and I pushed against it with every ounce of power I had. I collapsed on the ground as the cold metal swung into the creature, slamming with great force. The startled beast fell backward, as I heard the relieving clink of the swivel lock closing securely, holding the gate firmly closed.

I heard her running footsteps approaching behind me, I turned around still sitting on the grass. She knelt down to my level and took my face in her hands, I could see her tearing up and realized she had brilliant caramel brown eyes I had never been close enough to see before.

She looked deeply into my eyes for several seconds before she finally said, in the vibrant, silky smooth voice I had been imagining in my mind all this time:

“Clair.”