To the Boy Down the Road

When I was a little girl, I had a crush on the boy down the road. We’d walk home from school together. He still wouldn’t know that I held on to every moment the two of us had known. Wondered many nights if he’d be my first kiss. Would he brave the world to do what I had wished? Would his dimple sink in if we did? We would talk about family. Share stories of being from somewhere else different to where we found ourselves grown. The closest I’d been to a boy’s soul. Continents apart, our two worlds collided on the desert Island we now called home. Did the universe conspire to bring us together? I thought. Would he interlock his hands in mine when I brushed against his arms? Maybe our sparing Gods prayed us away from the war-torn motherlands we left to find salvation in a sunburnt country we could make our own. Begin anew. Start our own lineage of Kings and Queens. Anything seemed possible being in the present with you. Hearing your words wrapped around an accent so far from the town I had sprung from. Your stories are so vivid and painted in all the colours of your heritage. Made me feel less alone. In a world where I had still yet to discover the roots of my own home. Being so comfortable in the colour of your skin. Shades darker than my own. That I shaded from the sun’s kiss. Desperate to belong. You’re the reason I went to investigate. Traced myself back further than I could run. So, I could run and tell you all the parts of me that would bring us closer together to being understood. For it seemed I was half the person I was bred to be until I knew you. You gave me permission to be fully misunderstood. And I owe you, my worlds. For walking me home after school.