"And I love the rain."

This story takes place over a month ago, which makes it all the more amazing.

After dinner Fatou Bobo passed out slices of papaya. Days that end with papaya are the best.

Then Rugi asked me to bring out my blanket, so I did, and we crawled underneath and spent some time rearranging ourselves and the blanket in order to be completely tucked in. Days that end with Rugi are also the best.

She wanted to play “Coca-Cola” so we clapped silently and then lay still except for once and awhile we’d have an exchange like this:

“Binta.”
“Naam. Rugi.”
“Naam.”

And later: “Rugi. …Rugi…Rugi. Rugi.”
Softly, “Naam.”
And because I didn’t want her to fall asleep to be later shaken awake, and also because I was tired, I took my blanket and went inside. While I was drifting to sleep I thought about how it sounded like rain, wondered what could be making that sound, and remembered last year when I’d mistaken real rain for dream rain. Except—I overheard someone outside say the word “raining.” I went outside in time to feel two minutes’ worth of slow and scattered, barely-even-a-drizzle rain on my face. It was several months early and completely unexpected. Days that end with rain are the very best of all.

The title of this post, by the way, is a line from "April Rain Song," a poem by Langston Hughes that I would copy here if I had the right to do so.