They say water remembers, so maybe it knows the last time I was small enough to believe in winning. Watch the rain, press your palm to the glass, trace the way it runs—beginning; every drop’s a body.
Stumbling forward and leaving the rest behind,
one droplet shoulders another. This is how you grow—
not all at once, but by learning that some things are faster than you.
My father’s hands at ten and two, my forehead against the window. The road unwinding like a ribbon of something I was never meant to hold.
Somewhere between red lights and left turns, the race becomes a river and the rain forgets my name. It only takes a moment.
By the time we pull into the driveway, the glass is clear again— only the shape of what was left fogged on its surface.
Sarina Marzbani is a high school sophomore in the Creative Writing Conservatory of Orange County School of the Arts. She enjoys writing about the struggles and experiences that often go unspoken, aiming to create spaces where people feel included and heard, which has been recognized on a national level.