Chapter 7
700 Words
The Fire We Didn’t Name
On the second-to-last day, he was riding back around 11 AM when he saw them.
Two girls walking on the shoulder of the road, bags slung over their shoulders, talking fast. One was tall, dark-skinned, with a tired but sharp look. The other was shorter, louder, gesturing with her hands as she spoke.
“Turn around,” David told the okada rider.
The rider slowed, confused, but U-turned at the next gap. David would pay him extra just for this, got off, and started walking toward them from the opposite direction. He didn’t know why. He just knew he had to.
Chandeline saw him first.
She didn’t recognize him. It had been months since that night in the dark, and the man in front of her now was clean-shaven, walking with a slight limp, wearing traditional clothes and a hat instead of the suit he’d had on when he fell and had a walking stick.
David didn’t recognize her either. The girl from the road that night had been a blur of concern and quick hands. This girl was thinner, older, with eyes that looked like they hadn’t slept well in weeks.
But recognition didn’t matter.
The moment they were close enough to speak, the air changed. It was the same static he’d felt months ago, the same pull he couldn’t explain. His chest tightened. His limp seemed to matter less.
“Excuse me,” he said, stopping in front of them. “You look beautiful” he said to Chandeline, ignoring Amaka completely. “I was on a bike on my way home when I saw you. I had to beg the bike man to turn around for a chance to talk with you, assuring him that I would pay him extra for his troubles.”
The last time Chandeline saw him, he’d been on the ground, cursing under his breath, face red with embarrassment. That had been months ago, at night, under bad lighting.
The last time David saw her, he saw a girl with a kind voice and a steady hand who’d crouched beside him when he fell. He didn’t remember her name, and this girl was thinner now, her face drawn, her clothes plainer.
But the moment their eyes met, something shifted.
It was small. A flicker. A pause in his step that had nothing to do with his foot. For Chandeline, it was like seeing someone from a dream she’d forgotten she had. The same posture, the same quiet confidence, the same eyes.
For David, it was the sudden, irrational urge to stop walking. To say something. To ask if she was okay, even though he didn’t know why he’d care but he couldn’t say all these things for lack of time. Instead he said
“The bike man is waiting and I wouldn’t like to keep him waiting much longer. Can I get your number?”
Amaka, standing behind her, rolled her eyes. “Chandeline, let’s go. He’s just another guy.”
David ignored her. His attention was locked on Chandeline, and hers, despite herself, was locked on him.
Neither of them knew they’d met before. Neither of them knew the last time they’d been this close, she’d been helping him off the ground.
But the attraction was immediate, stupid, and impossible to ignore.
“It’s alright” Chandaline said to Amaka and she called out the number for David and he dialed the digits.
After collecting her number, they both stood still, staring into each other’s eyes; it was as if time was no more of the essence.
Amaka broke the moment by loudly asking, “Are we done here or what?”
Chandeline blinked and looked away first. “Let’s go,” she muttered as they walked on by.
David walked back to the bike man his jaw tight, telling himself it was nothing. Just coincidence. Just a girl who looked familiar.
But as they passed each other on the narrow road, the air between them felt charged, like static before a storm. Neither of them knew why. Neither of them said anything.
They moved on, in opposite directions, both unaware that the fire had already started.
- Writer
