Waterfall

The waterfall falls,

Yet I can only hear its sound.

I sit by the small waterfall, just ten minutes away from my two-story house. The third week, fifth day, and the tenth hour of summer break feel like three years, five months, and ten weeks with empty eyes. Graduation feels like it’s long gone in my history, and the only thing I can look forward to is Brown University in just a few weeks.

I’m a rarity, a one-in-a-million phenomenon. A medical miracle, but gone wrong. A cloud followed wherever my gaze went, from paragraphs of my final essay to my own mother’s face. Sunlight, headlights, and the bright light from my friends became too intense for me to handle, and when I shielded myself from the brightness, I could not see in the dark. When I went to the hospital, it was too late. And the worst part is that I blame myself for being this way. I blame myself for going to all the senior parties, graduating, and writing all the stories instead of blowing the clouds away. It took three weeks, three days, and a couple of hours to realize that I was blind. I could not see.

The damp summer air clings to my skin, and the hot air beats down on my face. The sky is clear, yet my vision is clouded. The irony. I push my hair out of my face. I’m trying to remember what I looked like. I trace my face with my finger, feeling each valley and crevice of my nose, feeling the shape of my eyes and the thickness of my brows. My finger trails over my frown, the curve of my lips unknown to my own eyes.

The waterfall seems to never stop. The water cascades down, probably from some cliff, and falls into this sparkling, crystal-clear pool of purity. The soft wind blows against my ears and dries beads of sweat along my neckline. I don’t know what I’m wearing. I choose not to care. Why bother if red is so variant in your mind, and blue is just the color of the sky?

A quiet clatter and a small splash come from somewhere near me. The hairs on the back of my neck rise. I jolt up, frantically feeling the rocks around me. My walking stick—it fell in the water. Fragments of pain come every second as my bare knees and hands get scraped by the roughness of the rocks. Little bumps and jagged surfaces scratch my skin until I feel like my entire body is scratched bare and bloody. I have no way to see if I have blood on my hands and knees. A lump forms in my throat and presses down in my neck, threatening to explode into a million pieces, shattering me into an ugly mess of tears. My eyes seem to burn, and the heat takes control of me. I can’t breathe.

A bigger clatter and a huge splash come from near me. I take a sharp inhale as the wooden walking stick is placed in my hands, the wetness dripping through my clenched fingers.

“Here,” a voice says. It’s familiar, yet stranger. All that I hear are ghosts because a voice without a visible host is practically a ghost. “You looked like you were looking for this.”

“I was, thanks,” I mumble. I don’t know where to look. “Where are you?”

“Next to you,” the voice responds. “I’m Jack Sanchez. I went to your school. You probably know me from Honors English.” I can hear the smile in his voice. Jack Sanchez, part of the school swim team and in the band. He’s not popular, but everyone knows and appreciates him. He’s tall and not the worst-looking guy in school. I always admired him. He was always smiling. He reminded me of the sun while I reminded myself of a gray cloud.

“Yeah, I know you, Jack from Honors English. I’m Sally Connell,” I hold out my hand. He shakes it. Jack’s hand is warm and dry. I can feel the small cracks running along his palm. I can feel his heat on my skin. And I can feel the little squeeze that calms me down. The lump in my throat is gone. “What are you doing here?”

“Just chilling. I was cooped up inside the house for too long, packing for uni. The waterfall was practically empty, so I thought it was the best place to go.” Jack explains. I nod patiently.

“I’m sorry if I’m facing the wrong direction. I lost my vision.” I’m not blind. I just lost my vision. I tell myself.

“Here,” Jack slightly nudges my chin to the right. “Now you’re facing the right direction.”

“Oh, am I?” I smile for the first time in a while.

“Yeah,” I can hear a smile in Jack’s voice. “You’re facing me.”

“Did you actually go into the water?” I ask.

“Yeah,” Jack says. I can hear him shifting a bit. “If you don’t mind, how did this happen? I mean, you weren’t always like this, right?”

“Is the water deep?” I respond with a question. My words shake a bit. “Is the water clean, and is it clear? Is it blue, or teal, or green? Is the water cold, or is it hot as today? Is the water—” My voice cracks eventually and tears start to fall down my cheeks. I sniffle and wipe them away with my hands.

“The water wasn’t deep, actually. Just up to your waist,” Jack whispers loud enough for me to hear. “The water is clean, crystal clear. I could drink out of it, probably.” I laugh a little. I wonder how red my face is, how runny my nose is. “The waterfall is crystal clear with a sparkling, bluish hint as it catches the light. The pond is like a mirage of the sky and the little green plants around it. The water is cold, but the kind of cold that feels good on your skin and not painful. Do you see it?”

“Yeah,” I smile. “I see it.” I pause for a while, exhaling a tear-stained breath. “I want to go in.”

Jack starts laughing. I think he stands up because, as soon as I hear movement, a hot ray of sun kisses my face with warmth. I stand up as well and wobble a bit, laughing awkwardly.

“Okay, I’m going to help you now.”

“Please,” I laugh. Jack’s hand gently takes mine and guides me slowly. I try not to trip. The dry rocks gradually turn into a rush of cold, and I gasp. It’s wonderful. Cold, but not the kind that feels good on my skin and not painful. With each step, the cold wraps around my ankles and slithers up until it stops at my waist. Soft sprays of water fall on my face, and I let out an echoing laugh. One that comes from the heart, not the mind. Not because the situation is funny or an appropriate time to laugh, but because the sudden joy is so refreshing that a laugh cannot be contained within arteries and veins. Jack laughs too.

“Do you like it? It’s great, isn’t—”

“I didn’t realize I had cataracts until they had already progressed to the point where surgery couldn’t help; now, at 18, my vision is completely gone,” I say. Jack stops laughing, but his hand still remains wrapped in mine. “Losing my vision was like losing a part of me. I write, by the way. I got into Brown. I had stories that I had written and stories I wanted to write. But now even that feels lost. And this, this is what hurts the most because for years now, I’ve defined myself as a writer. As an author. With that disappearing, I’m nothing. I’m not special. I’m just a girl with empty eyes and an empty purpose. I’m empty.”

“You’re not completely empty,” Jack’s grip tightens a bit. “You’re not just a writer; you’re nice, you’re beautiful, you’re brave.”

“I don’t want my vision to make me some kind of superhero. It wouldn’t because a hero isn’t someone who is pitied and then worshiped. I don’t want my blindness to make me a brave figure. I haven’t yet done anything to define me as brave.”

“You’ve decided to pursue it and go to college at Brown University. That’s brave. You decided to trust a stranger—”

“Jack, you’re not a stranger!”

“—A stranger to go into the cold waters of a waterfall with! You’re brave, Sally. You need to tell yourself that.”

“Okay,” I squeeze back. “Are you leaving for university soon?”

“In two weeks. Why?”

“I just wanted to ask you a favor. You don’t need to say yes. You especially don’t need to pull the pity card on me just because I’m blind.”

“Of course not. What’s up?” Jack moves closer. I can feel his warmth. The sixth human sense.

“I want to tell you my story, and I want you to write it for me,” I say.

“Is that it?”

“Yeah,” I whisper. Jack laughs.

“Well, sure! That’s easy. I’m looking forward to listening and writing,” Jack says. He pauses for a while, then lets out a small sigh. “I’m going to miss you.”

“I’m going to miss you too.”

I feel like I can see the world. I can see the waterfall exactly how Jack described it. I can see him exactly how he was in school. I can see myself, happy, smiling. I remind myself of a cloud parting and the sun shining through.

The waterfall falls,

And I hear more than just its sound.