The Weather Girl - Jasmine Ting
fiction ☆
fiction ☆
I
Growing up, the girl was obsessed with the sky. Even on swelteringly hot summer days, she insisted on laying out on the lawn, which was really just a patch of rough and scratchy overgrown carabao grass outside her family’s house in the countryside. She completely ignored her mother’s warnings.
Why would you lie down there? The ground is so filthy!
Your skin is so dark that the worms might think it’s soil and dig their way under your skin.
The grasshoppers are gonna crawl up your short shorts and nip your butt!
She didn’t care. She would stay out there for hours, staring up at the sky, watching the clouds slowly pass and make their journey through the vast blue expanse.
Is this heaven? Is that where God lives?
Some days the clouds were dense and fluffy, and in the clusters she’d see a hoard of running bunnies, a massive rolling wave, or a huge bucket of popcorn. Sometimes they were thin and wispy, more like fine feathers or the thin, delicate silhouette of an angel. Some days, they would form uniform patterns, as if manufactured by some machine. And other days, they were dark and looming, as if the Greek legends were true and Zeus himself was readying his chariot—lightning bolts at the ready.
The girl loved to watch these stories play out in the heavens. And when she got on a plane for the first time, it was bliss—despite all the earthly, bureaucratic song and dance she had to go through to get on this vessel. She had always dreamt of flying, and was giddy at the sight of the sea of clouds from over 30,000 feet up in the air. If only she could reach out and run her hands through the pillows of white.
II
Now, she’s in the big city. A meteorologist, specializing in the physics of clouds, also known as nephology (not to be mistaken for nephrology, the medical specialty focused on kidneys). She knows very well at this point that the cotton candy-like formations she fantasized about as a child are merely collections of microscopic water droplets condensed onto minute particles called aerosols. It’s just science, not magic. And God was nowhere to be found.
Years in the field have certainly jaded her, and clouds no longer seem to hold the same charm they used to. Instead of looking at the sky all day, she’s spending her days staring at satellite imagery on a screen. Instead of imaginative stories, all she sees in them are diagrams and charts analyzing cloud distribution, moisture content, buoyancy. Then, she meets him.
He was like a cloud. Cumulus, a softness to his face and his kind eyes. He was also unexpectedly sculpted, towering. Cirrus, the seeming embodiment of the lightness of being. Chill, or whatever the kids would say these days. And yet he rolled into the bar like Nimbus, with the smell of a storm coming, trouble in the air. Damn it. She was resigned to her fate.
There was certainly lightning. Sparks flew the moment they got to chatting. Good banter closing the gap between them, the atmosphere suddenly dissipating. Effort, force, and physics no longer applied. Maybe it was the highballs, but suddenly she felt like she might be a cloud, too.
When they were together, she felt like she was floating on air. She was flying again—destination still unknown. All she knew was that she was in the presence of a heavenly body—and his body was certainly heavenly. The Weather Girl found herself in love with The Cloud.
III
Soon, one Cloud sighting turned into three in a week. They were moving fast, and it was exhilarating. This was nothing like the Weather Girl had ever experienced before, and no chart or satellite reading could have prepared her for this. She couldn’t help but be taken by it all. Then, things slowed down.
It was almost midnight, and they were sitting in the park, by the lake.
What are you thinking? the Weather Girl asks.
Nothing. You?
Nothing. She lied.
I guess we’re just a couple of nothings sitting here, the Cloud whispers.
The truth of what she was thinking was, If the sky came crashing down now, I’d die happy.
There was nothing between them then. She knew that. But as far as she was concerned, this moment was enough. The world had stopped turning, the Cloud was right there with her, and she wanted to keep it that way. Frozen. No. Sudden. Movements.
IV
After that night, the Weather Girl approached the Cloud with caution. She still studied him, learning more about his attributes, but tried as best as she could to be careful not to chase him away. It seemed like her science degree, and all the rational and scientific thinking she had developed, had gone out the window. She was in high school again.
What does he like?
Are we seeing each other enough?
Am I sticking around too much?
Am I gross?
Does he even like me?
His friends definitely liked her, which was unexpected. Initially, she had feared that they, too, were figures high up in the sky that would typically be out of her reach and that she would only be able to observe them from afar. But they were much more down to earth than she had thought. Proof that the Cloud could form relationships with earthly beings. Still, she had felt a shift. Something had changed, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. The wind was blowing in a different direction, there was a chill in the air, and she had no power to control it.
As more time wore on, and the weeks turned into months, the Cloud began to slowly move away—inch by inch, out of the Weather Girl’s purview. No amount of observation, and no meteorology PhD, could have told her why he was behaving this way. She desperately tried to catch him to stop him in his tracks, but her attempts were futile.
V
The Weather Girl had enjoyed the feeling of gravity-defying levity she experienced when she was with the Cloud, which was a sensation usually enhanced by an edible or two. But this feeling was temporary, she knew. And when her feet were planted back on the ground, it occurred to her that the Cloud didn’t seem to notice. He certainly did not go out of his way to meet her where she was.
The Weather Girl decided she wanted more. The thrill of being suspended in the air only lasted so long. She wasn’t so much in flight as she was stuck, held up by a harness that could no longer bear her weight. She needed something grounded and real. Physics demanded it. But was this at all something the Cloud could offer?
It’s been a while since we started this, she began, but where are we headed?
Silence.
… I think we get along really well, the Cloud responds. But I do think we might be better off as friends.
Silence. Disappointment and rage welling up in her. But she does her best to hide it, reasoning with herself using science and logic.
Keep calm. Everything is fine. There’s no need to get emotional.
You’re strong! Don’t let him see you crack.
She had fallen, and the Cloud had failed to catch her. It made sense that he couldn’t. After all, what is a cloud but vapor?
Jasmine Ting is a journalist from the Philippines who has lived in New York for 10 years. Her journalistic work has been featured in magazines and online publications including Scholastic News, SAVEUR, TASTE, Condé Nast Traveler, Travel + Leisure, Cosmopolitan, and other places here and there. However, she is trying to challenge herself creatively, return to making art for herself, and try her hand once again at writing fiction—her first love. When she isn't plopped in front of a screen, she's either clumsily baking or cooking something up in the kitchen, out trying a new restaurant, window shopping, or watching her friends' dogs. Find her on Instagram @jasminepting !
