spring into summer

At first, it smells like lilacs. The air is wet and sweet, like something that’s just been kissed. Wet bark and something blooming out of sight. I’m running. Everything is soft in spring. The ground gives beneath me, pliant and forgiving. Green grass brushes the backs of my calves coquettishly. I can still taste last night’s rain on the wind.

I don’t know when it starts to change. Maybe when the blossoms stop nodding in time with me. Maybe when the gold gets louder than the green. The flowers become limp petals. Pink ones. White ones. Tiny confetti. I keep running.

The sun paints my arms with heat. My mouth dries out. Each breath scrapes. The earth feels packed now—each footfall louder, less patient. My shoes no longer sink into it; they slap. The breeze doesn’t kiss anymore; it strikes.

Still, I run.

The ground begins to crack beneath me—no longer the sponge of early April but something sunbaked and brittle. The grass is thinner here. Yellower. The wildflowers that once nodded at my ankles have vanished, replaced by dust and sunstroke. The heat rises off the dirt in ribbons.

I run harder.

I run until I feel nothing but heat and heartbeat, the rhythmic thud of soles against an unfeeling earth. And then—just when I think the light might swallow me whole—I see it: a patch of green.

Eventually, the heat ceases to pulse. The light begins to bend. The birds’ screams return to song.

She is quieter this time. Not so bright. A little bruised, maybe, but unmistakable. She smells like a second chance. Before I can arrive, I collapse.