The Things I Never Told the Rain

The Things I Never Told the Rain

BY [ WAQAR ALI ]

Because sometimes, water understands better than people ever do.

I’ve always spoken most freely

when no one could hear me—

not in silence,

but in rain.

Not the angry kind

that slaps windows like punishment,

not the one that drowns cities

and makes everything too loud.

I’m talking about

the gentle rain.

The kind that falls like it’s

listening,

not watching.

It started the summer I turned thirteen.

My world got quieter

while my thoughts grew louder,

and I didn’t know what to do

with all that noise inside me.

So I walked—

barefoot, mostly—

along the old stone path

behind my house,

until I reached the willow tree

that bent low like it wanted to hear me.

And when the rain came,

as it always did in July,

I told it everything.

I told it about the boy

who sat behind me in class

and never spoke

but whose eyes said more

than my friends ever did.

I told it about

the way my mother sighed

after every phone call,

like each one took

something out of her

she never got back.

I told it about

how sometimes,

in the middle of dinner,

I wanted to scream

just to see if anyone

would stop chewing.

I told the rain things

I couldn’t tell people.

Because people interrupt.

People try to fix.

People hand you advice

wrapped like apologies

for not understanding.

But rain—

rain just falls.

Soft, patient,

without judgment.

It never asks

for context or clarity.

It never says,

“Well, maybe if you just…”

Years passed.

I grew.

I kissed people I shouldn’t have.

I trusted people who didn’t know

what to do with something fragile.

I learned the difference

between “I love you”

and “I love the idea of you.”

That distinction

split my heart like thunder.

And when it rained—

God, when it rained—

I went walking again.

I whispered things

to the puddles

like secrets too soft

for solid ground.

I confessed the moments

I pretended to laugh

when I wanted to cry,

or worse—

when I felt nothing at all

and wondered if I was broken.

I told the rain

about my hands—

how they started shaking

every time I had to say

“I’m fine”

and make it sound

believable.

Sometimes, I wrote poems

in my head

while the storm hung low,

as if the sky itself

had thoughts too heavy to carry.

I imagined the clouds

were simply tired,

not angry.

And that made it okay

to be tired too.

The rain saw all my versions:

the loud, the lonely,

the one who left first

before being left behind,

the one who stayed too long

in places that felt like ghosts.

It watched me become

someone I didn’t recognize,

then helped me wash off

what didn’t belong.

And once—

just once—

I danced in it.

No music,

no plan.

Just my limbs

moving the way pain escapes

when it’s finally had enough.

It wasn’t pretty.

But it was honest.

And that’s all the rain ever asked of me.

People often ask

why I walk in storms.

Why I don’t run

for cover.

Why I never carry

an umbrella.

I just smile

and say I like the sound.

They wouldn’t understand

the language I’ve built

with the sky.

They wouldn’t know

what it’s like

to be understood

by something that never talks back.

I still tell the rain things.

Like how I miss

the version of myself

who believed love

was enough to fix anything.

Like how I’m scared

to be ordinary.

Like how healing

feels too much like

starting from scratch.

Like how sometimes

I wish I could be

just a tree—

rooted,

growing,

quiet.

So when the clouds gather

and the sky folds in

like a secret about to break,

I go outside.

I wait.

And when the first drop touches my skin,

I say,

“Oh, there you are.”

Like an old friend

who never left,

only waited.

And then I begin

to tell the rain

everything

again.