She turned the key and the rumbling engine that Demi could feel pulsing through her like a constant heartbeat came to a standstill. She wondered briefly if anyone would be around to feel her own heartbeat stop but pushed the thought aside as she carelessly pushed the door open, forgetting about the rain.
"Shit!"
She quickly ducked her had back inside the car and wrapped her perfectly manicured hand around the umbrella, her black fingernails blending in with the black fabric. Stepping outside once again, she clicked the button on the handle and the umbrella and it leapt forward like some kind of cobra, its end curled comfortably in her hand.
It was barely drizzling, so the steady sound of the raindrops hitting the stretched cloth above her was calming. The comfort lay mostly in the fact that something else was taking the hits for her- taking the raindrops.
As she walked, she tried matching her footsteps to the patter of raindrops around her but soon found that trying to find any sort of beat amid this chaos was impossible. She knew this from personal experience, and regularly applied it in the chaos she called her life. She winced as a few stray raindrops were blown in her face by the wind.
She hated rain. Couldn't stand it. When it rained everything was grey and wet, it seemed like no matter where she went she couldn't escape from it. Even when she went inside she could still feel the rain in her bones and blood. The one thing she hated most about the rain was how much it made her think. It was as if when it rained the carefully built damns in her mind flooded, and everything came rushing back to her- everything she had tried so hard to lock away for good. Demi couldn't help but think back to two years ago, on a day quite like today.
Demi walked up to the door of the school and pulled a few times before remembering she had to push. Two years at this school and she still couldn't remember even that simple fact. She walked out into the rain, her brow immediately furrowing in disapproval and her hands flying to the hood of her black jacket in an attempt to salvage her hair.
Her scowl turned into a smile at the sight of Selena spinning around and around in the rain, her hands held out and her head tilted to the sky. Water ran off of her content face and landed on her grey hoodie, the hood of which lay forgotten on her back. Her already dark hair was turning black as a moonless night.
"Sel? What are you doing?"
"Spinning."
"I can see that but…why?"
"Why not?"
"Well, for one thing, your makeup will get ruined!"
"Not wearing any."
Demi felt a pang of jealousy at that comment. She wished that she could look half as gorgeous as her best friend did, but for all her makeup she knew she couldn't compare. Selena suddenly stopped spinning and looked over at Demi, all the silliness from the moments before lost. Instead, Demi saw…determination. Selena started walking towards Demi swiftly.
"Lena? You're walking awfully fast…Lena should I run?" Demi said, taking a few steps back, fear and confusion etched into her face, getting ready for the hit that she knew was about to come. And boy did it come. Selena couldn't have knocked the breath out of her more if she had thrown an anvil at her. Before Demi knew what had happened Selena's lips were on hers, the rain making them slippery, smooth, and soft. Their lips found a rhythm that mixed perfectly with the rain falling around them, even when Demi smiled into the kiss and threw it off, thinking about all the clichés of kissing in the rain.
Demi felt the rain coloring her hair as it had colored Selena's and briefly wondered when exactly it was that her hood had fallen off. Before she could come to an answer she was distracted by Selena's hand moving from her neck to her waist, fitting perfectly into the soft curve, and she wondered why it hadn't always been there when it was so obviously perfect. She wondered why Selena had waited so long to kiss her, or better yet, why she hadn't gone ahead and kissed the daylights out of Selena herself when it was quite possibly the most perfect and natural thing she had ever felt. Most importantly, she wondered why she had not always loved the rain when it felt so good falling lightly on her face- as if the sky was kissing her as she too tilted her head up to stare at the clouds, trying in some way to repay them, to kiss them back. She looked back at Selena, knowing that her makeup had run all over but simply not caring as Selena cupped her cheek.
"Demi Lovato you have never looked more beautiful."
And then, just like that, they were kissing again, and Demi knew that she would never have to spin in the rain. Selena made the world spin around for her.
As much as these memories killed Demi they never failed to bring a smile to her face, or make her heart skip a beat. She stopped in her tracks as the wind picked up. Feeling it against her face reminding her oh so much of Selena's minty breath hitting her face, even of her caress. For a moment, she forgot everything that had happened since, forgot how much Selena had changed, forgot how Selena had let herself get sucked into the world of superstardom- a world that didn't include Demi. She even managed to forget that Selena never wore grey hoodies anymore, or spun in the rain, or kissed her. The new Selena would never tilt her head up to the sky as Demi did now, because she knew that Demi wouldn't be there to tell her she looked beautiful even when Selena's makeup (because the new Selena wore makeup of course) ran all over the place.
Just when the wind picked up to a staggering crescendo, Demi let go of everything. She let go of her memories, her pain, her fears, her cares, and her umbrella. She turned around to watch as her last protection from the rain flew away, going higher and higher until it was nothing but another star in the sky.
With her hands free of the burden of the umbrella, she spread them out and slowly began to spin in the rain, growing dizzier and dizzier. In the back of the mind she knew she should be worried because Selena wouldn't be there to catch her when she grew too dizzy to stand, but she pushed the thought aside, deciding that when she fell she would simply stand back up and continue spinning.
As if her spins were some magical spell to summon Selena, the sound of footsteps reached the singer's ears and the scent that floated in the wind told her exactly who it was. Demi didn't stop spinning. She hesitated for a moment before opening her eyes, scared that hearing, smelling, and seeing Selena all at the same time would be too much for the girl who had to grab onto something for balance at the mere mention of her name.
The Selena she saw before her in glimpses every time she made a full circle was nothing like the one from her memory. She was wearing a gorgeous dress as opposed to an old grey hoodie, for one thing, obviously on her way to some event. She was dry as a cactus on the sun thanks to her umbrella, for another. However, the one thing that caught Demi's eye the most was the one thing that most people didn't notice. Selena's eyes were a flat, even black. Dark chocolate had replaced the milk chocolate orbs of days past. As Demi stared into her eyes she saw nothing that she remembered, nothing familiar. They were cold, distant, expressionless, and worst of all they lacked the gleam that Demi had come to associate so fully with her best friend.
"What are you doing Demi?"
They were the first words Selena had said to her in over a year, and Demi was now seriously worried about keeping it together in front of the girl. Selena could never know how she affected her- how much Demi had cared, did care, and always would care, because if Selena found out, Demi lost. Demi lost everything she had tried so hard to create. Her image of apathy, strength, and independence- all lost. So she did what she always did. She slapped on a smile and replied in a single word.
"Spinning."
Selena shook her head incredulously, lifting a perfect eyebrow ever so slightly.
"Why?"
Demi stopped spinning slowly; this was what she had been waiting for. She looked Selena dead in those foreign eyes and tried to put everything she felt into these few words.
"Because at least one of us has to remember to spin in the rain."
Selena stared back at Demi for a moment before the tiniest of one sided smiles graced her lips, coupled with a small nod. And then she turned on her heel and left. Just like that. But that was all Demi needed, that tiny sign. She'd won Selena back, the old Selena. She'd won back a miniscule piece of her and she didn't care if it took her the rest of her life, but she would put Selena back together again piece by piece, like a puzzle. Until she, and along with her Demi, were whole again.
With that Demi smiled, looked to the sky, and resumed spinning- repeating those words simply to hear them once more.
"At least one of us has to remember to spin in the rain."
