The Way the Light Looked That Day

You were wearing

your brother’s old sweatshirt,

the one with the fraying collar

you always said felt like armor.

We were near the creek,

the one that only fills in spring,

ankles deep in mud and mosquito hums,

telling each other secrets too big

for our fourteen-year-old mouths.

Do you remember what you told me?

Because I do.

But maybe I invented it—

maybe you only looked at me that way,

and I made the words up later

to match the heat

that flushed through my ribs.

You said:

"No one ever really knows when it's the last time."

Or maybe you didn’t.

Maybe you just looked at the water and said nothing.

Maybe the air said it for you.

But that was the day the light did something strange—

splintered through the willow branches

like a warning, or a blessing,

or the sound of something breaking

far off in the distance

but already inside us.

After that,

I saw you less.

Then not at all.

I forget the last thing you said to me

but I remember

how the sky turned pink

like skin pressed too hard

and the way the wind curled around your name

as if trying to carry it back

and failing.

Memory is a liar

with a good singing voice.

It hums this tune

whenever it rains in June

or when I smell river mud

or when I wear something soft

and fraying

and brave.

I still think about that sweatshirt.

I still think about the creek.

I still think—

whatever it was,

it was real.

Even if it wasn't.

Especially then.