The Girl Who Stopped El Niño

Everything about that summer of 1992 turned out exactly how it promised to be. It was the hottest summer in years, largely because of El Nino. There was a massive drought in the countryside and the farmers could not plant their rice for months. It hadn’t rained for weeks. What used to be fissures in the muddy fields, had now grown to full-sized cracks. These were hard and uncertain times.

That was the year that I first fell in love.

Back then, I could not be bothered with the state of the world. I was twelve years old and I had tons of issues of my own. One of them, being puberty. Things in my body began to change at such a rapid rate. I constantly get these voice cracks that made me sound like I have a trumpet in my throat. All my bones and joints felt tired and achy, and I was sleeping a lot. Growing pains, my mother would call them.

I would spend my summer break from school at my grandparent’s farm in a small town just outside the city. I didn’t particularly enjoy it because my father would make me do chores. I wasn’t very good at doing them. Neither was he. However, he felt it was necessary for me to do these rudimentary skills as they could prove useful when I grow up. These tasks would help build character and discipline, he said. He wasn't wrong.

But not today.

I looked at my watch. It was already past lunch and she still was not here. We agreed to meet half an hour ago. Where was she?

There were no cellphones yet back then so when you want to meet up with someone and they haven’t shown up, you are stuck with the agony of waiting. I can’t recall how long I paced that forest clearing, trying to recite in my mind what I wanted to say to her.

“Hello! Sorry, I’m late…”

A girl dressed in a yellow shirt and white denim shorts suddenly appears.

Ivy was her name. Even her name was so perfect and beautiful. She stood there with a smile that gave my childish heart the impetus to beat faster than I could imagine. I have never felt anything like this before. My stomach grumbled, and I felt so wonderfully nervous and nauseous.

I pulled out from my back pocket a small bouquet of wildflowers that I handpicked earlier. There were marigolds, jasmines, and hibiscus. Anything I could find. I was fervently praying that she would not laugh at me, or at my gift.

“Happy Birthday,” I said, my heart thudding in my chest like crazy.

Her eyes grew at the sight of the flowers. “Thank you, you are so sweet. Marigolds are my favorite.”

Seeing that I was glued to my spot, Ivy came towards me and took the flowers from my outstretched hands. She gave me a quick peck on the cheeks.

That kiss sent shivers down my spine.

It was March when I first met Ivy. She had just arrived like a breath of fresh air to a town of six thousand people. In a small town like ours, every new dweller was met with utmost curiosity, or in most cases, severe scrutiny. She was the niece of the local seamstress. Ivy left the big city to help her aunt around her shop for the summer.

Sometimes, my indolent days out on the farm were not so bad. I wake up very early to do my chores, which were mainly to feed the chickens and the pigs. After I did that, I would escape and spend the rest of the day daydreaming in the fields. I would take a book and just read for hours under the trees and no one bothered me. Other days, I would just be watching the cloud formations lying on the grass of the small hill overlooking our farm.

One day, I found an unlikely intruder on my spot on the hill. It was a girl, no older than fifteen. She had long, dark hair. Her skin was unusually fair and seemed to glow under the blazing sun. Her figure was lithe which seemed to exude an inner strength. She had her face buried in her hands. She was crying.

“H-hello,” I mumbled.

This startled her. She lifted her face to me, and I saw the prettiest girl I have ever seen in my life. I stopped in my tracks. She immediately decided that I wasn’t much of a threat so she motioned me to a spot next to her.

“Why are you crying?” I said as I sat beside her.

“This town is HELL!”

Slightly taken aback by her candor, I was immediately curious. “Why is that?”

“People in this town are mean.”

“Mean? In what way?”

“They are all gossipmongers. They say nasty things about me behind my back!”

My heart instantly fell for her. Who could have the heart to say bad things about this girl? I barely knew her, yet I instantly knew that she did not possess one mean bone in her body.

“Would it make you feel better if you talk and I would listen? My mom tells me I am a good listener.” I didn’t know what possessed me to say this, but I was glad that I did.

“How old are you?”

“Twelve.”

“You talk like you’re twenty,” she said with the most delightful laugh.

Since that fateful afternoon, Ivy and I had begun a friendship. No, a kinship. A bond where my precociousness complimented her vulnerabilities. I was someone she could trust. We would meet at that hill almost every afternoon to share stories. Sometimes, we would take walks around the farm too. One afternoon, we found a small forest nearby where tons of wild flowers grow. Ivy really loved this place and we would spend a lot of afternoons there. Most of the time, we would just talk until the sun comes down.

As the days pass, I felt more drawn to Ivy. I began looking forward to our afternoons even more. After lunch, I would run as fast as I can to our spot. Sometimes, I would put on an extra sprig of cologne just to impress her. Having vivid dreams about her occurred with regularity.

Our favorite thing to do was talk about our town and how we hated it. She would laugh at the caricatures I do of the people in our village. She thought I was the funniest person in the world.

One candid afternoon, she said to me, “Promise me, Rye, you won’t believe anything they would say about me.”

“They who?”

“Everyone. People say I’m a bad girl.”

“Why would anyone say that?”

“I don't know… I don't care...just promise me...”

“Who said that to you? I’m going to throw a rotten egg at them.”

She laughs. “You can’t do that. You’re not a bad person. Not like them.”

“Okay, I promise.”

She smiled. My heart swelled because I made her happy.

“Rye, why are you being nice to me?”

Because I love you.

I only said that in my head. I didn’t have the courage to say it out loud. I was wishfully thinking that my silence was enough to convey what my brain failed to say.

Ivy stood there, dumbfounded. In front of her was the treehouse I have built for her. For us. A castle where we can cast our dreams together. It took me three entire weeks to make it, just in time for her birthday. It perched on a stately Acacia tree, all rickety and haphazardly strewn together. Yet somehow, it looked like that treehouse could weather a thousand storms.

“Surprise!” I beamed with pride.

“For me?”

I nodded. “Do you like it?”

She didn’t respond. Instead, she ran and hugged me. So tight that it took my breath away. There was so much longing in that hug.

“I love you, Ivy!”

There, I finally said it! I was so proud of myself. I felt so grown-up. Like I was 20 years old.

Instead, she let go of me and took me by the shoulders.

“No, you don’t love me. You don’t know what love is.”

“Yes, I do.” I protested. “I felt it. I know you felt it too.”

“We’re much too young, Ryan…”

“No, we’re not. I’m almost thirteen." At that point, my little heart felt like it was being crushed. Tears welled in my eyes. “Why, don’t you love me too?”

“I can’t be your first love. You deserve someone better…”

“NO, it’s you I want!”

She shook her head. “You’re only twelve. I’m only fifteen. There’ll be plenty of other people for us to meet and love.”

I’ve never felt hurt like that. I felt stupid for saying the things I did. I felt betrayed. I felt like a kid.

“You can’t love me because I’m leaving … and I’m never coming back,” she declared.

“What…do you mean?”

“Tomorrow, my aunt is sending me away.”

“Why tomorrow?!!!” I was already so distraught.

She tried to wipe the tears off her eyes. “My aunt said I don’t belong in this town … that I am like a poison to this village, a curse. She said that people are blaming me for this drought. They forced my aunt to send me back to the city.”

“Curse? That’s the most absurd thing I've ever heard!”

“You see, Ryan. I am nobody. I am a pest.”

“No, you are NOT a nobody,” I pleaded. “Please, Ivy, don’t leave…”

Suddenly, as fate would have it, heavy drops of rain began to fall. Our emotions were so high that we didn’t even notice the dark clouds come in. The heavy rain came down so hard that the warm, thirsty soil sizzled at every drop. She laughed at the irony of it all.

I don’t know what came to me when I looked at her. I found myself placing both my hands on her cheeks and planting my lips on hers. I closed my eyes and felt every bit of emotion from that kiss. She kissed me back. I knew it. It felt like forever.

Then she let go of me and ran away. That was the last time I ever saw her.

That night, I cried myself to sleep. That was my first heartbreak. I was inconsolable for days.

My mom learned from Ivy’s aunt that she had gone back to the big city. She also said that there was this rumor going around town that Ivy got pregnant when she was 14, a year before she came to town. She had a “reputation.” People in the market called her a harlot. They even blamed her for El Nino. The despise for her was legendary.

Ivy's legend grew even further because after she left, the town experienced so much rainfall. Floods and typhoons happened with regularity.

Every time it rained, I thought of her.

Of course, I did not believe the gossips. In my heart, I knew Ivy better. I promised her I wouldn’t believe any of the stories. She was my first love. There was a pureness to our friendship that no amount of malice could ever tarnish that.

I would always wonder what had happened to Ivy. Even to this day, three decades later, I would often do rounds on social media and check for her name. I could not find her. Maybe she changed her name. Maybe she got married. In my head, I imagined her with her family and kids, living the happy life she had wanted.

If anything, I just wanted her to know that the treehouse that I built for her had survived and withstood a thousand storms.