And the season's change was a conduit.

I wrote this back in writing fiction as a very superficial, insignificant way to get through the last bit of my semester. I hated it until tonight - it bears some kind of deeper meaning to me now, and I love it so much more than I did.

Maggie Randall was a fourteen-year-old girl who lived on Gossamer Street in Durham, North Carolina. Pine trees, maples, and oaks surrounded her home, and the occasional dogwood would light up the small forest with its white flowers. Gossamer Street was a quiet sort of street, with mailboxes and flowerbeds that lined its borders and a creek that gurgled behind its homes.
Maggie was a silent, ordinary girl, with mousy brown hair that reached her shoulders when she wore it down but, more often than not, it hung limply in a ponytail instead. She had a small nose with dark freckles that ran across it and onto her cheeks – a few of them even ventured down to her chin or up to her eyebrows. She wore her older sister’s old clothes not for lack of money, but because she rarely wanted to go shopping.
Each year when the summer came, Maggie looked forward to the thunderstorms. Rather than going to the pool or the mall, her favorite thing to do was to sit on her back porch and watch storms pass right over her home. The more violent the storm, the better the show.
Maggie had an image in her mind of the parents down the street, looking out their windows with furrowed brows, concerned more for their freshly-raked lawns than the mortified children wrapped tightly around their legs. She knew that it was with crossed fingers and futile hope that they sided with the familiar weakness of their rooftops and flowerbeds.
Maggie, however, often found herself identifying with the powerful lightning bolts and hail, rather than the hopeless pine trees whose spines were so easily broken. The pines never won and, while it was with pity that Maggie looked upon them, she was never one to bend or break. It was with the smallest amount of guilt that she fervently occupied her thoughts with fallen branches and lost leaves, all in the interest of a victory shared with her beloved rain clouds.
Still, the passing of each storm would leave Maggie slightly heartbroken, for as the summer wore on, she realized nature’s beautiful destruction that she loved so dearly would soon come to an end.
She would often walk the streets of her frightened neighborhood once only the distant rumblings of the formidable monster remained, and she would pick up fallen branches and pine cones, marveling at the life that had once resided in their helpless frames. And, in the latter days of August, these walks left her with a cold sensation that sat in her chest densely, growing heavier with the passage of time and the falling of leaves.
Every September, Maggie would begin to feel the soft but foreboding breath of autumn press impatiently against her heart, warning her that the epic battles between land and sky would not resurface before the other three seasons had their turns that year.
It was August 23rd – just a couple weeks before Maggie started her sophomore year of high school. She sat on her back porch with a shaking, shuddering screen as the only barrier between her and the strong, graceful deluge that sometimes engulfed her backyard during the summer. The creek that lay less than fifty yards away seemed unable to control itself and gushed forward, turning her backyard into a cloudy, brown ocean. Periodically, she would hear pinecones hit the roof, or hear a branch snap, and she would smile.
Maggie was happy with the porch. Recently, she had found herself riding her bike and taking walks around her neighborhood more often than she had in the early months of the summer; she did this in a genuine effort to spend as much time with the warm weather as she could. But here, there was no rush – the hammering of the rain on the screen and roof left her no choice but to stay inside and love every sound and smell that the thunderstorm provided.
Still, Maggie often felt a sense of urgency that came with August, like there was too much to be done. And, while she loved the last month of summer dearly, she dreaded September. Although she’d never had a boyfriend, she imagined September was what breaking up would be like.
On September 3rd, the last storm of the summer happened. Maggie could almost tell, as the storm was rumbling in the distance, that it was the last one. The hail that had hammered against the roof and bounced off the ground seemed to be a good-bye, and Maggie had felt sadness weighing her down as it died.
Autumn came and Maggie occupied her thoughts with school work. While she would admit that the leaves were beautiful, she missed the display of power. She sometimes sat in school and stared out the window, hoping that dark clouds would give rise to something greater than the dreary rain they always provided.
Maggie desired the menacing darkness of the sky after a lofty lightning bolt flashed silently across the sky. She longed for the thrill and surprise of thunder, whether it was deafening like a gunshot, or gentle and sonorous like a bass drum. Maggie wanted the wind to sing, high and low, howling along with the percussive rhythm of the hail.
Instead, there was rain.
The winter came and Maggie was frozen. Snow etched the corners of the bare, ugly trees and sometimes kept her away from school. Most days, Maggie slept as often as possible, willing the days to pass quickly. Everything once alive was dead, and the world was entirely gray.
February crawled onward, dragging Maggie drowsily along with it. Even March was somewhat cruel as it teased her with its occasional warmth. April was kinder. It seemed far more consistent to Maggie and she began to remember what shorts and flip-flops felt like.
It had been warm for a solid week now and the end of April was fast approaching. It was April 20th when the first storm of the year struck her neighborhood. She couldn’t help but feel happy as soon as she heard the distant roar of thunder.
The rain began to pelt the roof above her room and Maggie ran downstairs, flinging open the door to the back porch.
The warm wind and smell of humidity hit her forcefully as she closed the door behind her and took a seat in the worn, wicker chair that sat near the screen. She looked to her left to see blue sky and white clouds, but in front of her, the horizon was like charcoal. An entire cloud lit up with a flash of lightning, flickering dangerously like a dying fluorescent light. Seconds later, there was a rumble.
The storm passed right by, leaving very little impact on Maggie’s neighborhood. True, it was not the most interesting storm Maggie had ever witnessed, but it was a storm nonetheless.
When the rain had died down to a fine mist, she walked out her front door and sat on the top step of her porch, which was barely damp from the weak display the storm had given. Maggie noticed the absence of pollen in the air and felt the mist settling on her bare feet, generating small goose bumps on her legs.
She smiled, prepared to fall in love and have her heart broken all over again.



I feel hopeful or something. I guess God had me write this with something else in mind.

END.