Before We Learned To Hide

                         Before We Learned To Hide

Episode One

I woke up that morning trying to convince myself I was okay.

The queer event was supposed to distract me from heartbreak. From my ex. From the version of myself that had spent months crying quietly and pretending she was healing faster than she actually was.

So I got ready slowly.

Music playing in the background. Clothes scattered everywhere. Looking at myself in the mirror longer than usual, trying to look like someone who wasn’t carrying sadness around in her chest.

I told myself I was going there to meet new people.

To laugh.

To feel alive again.

And maybe a part of me really believed that.

The event was loud.

Lights flashing across people’s faces. Music vibrating through the room. Girls dancing together without fear. People laughing too hard in the way people do when they finally feel free somewhere.

And somewhere between all that noise…

I saw her.

Lila.

And suddenly the room disappeared.

Because memories never come back gently.

They arrive all at once.

                                        ****

The first time I saw her was during a school church service.

She was celebrating one year since she got saved, standing there surrounded by people and soft noise and that strange kind of silence churches have when everyone is trying to feel something at the same time.

I didn’t know her then.

Not really.

Just a girl people talked about sometimes.

People used to say she was rude, but I never confirmed it myself. We were in different classes. Different worlds that barely crossed paths.

So I didn’t think much about her.

She was just another face in school.

Or so I thought.

Then came the last night of the term.

Everything felt chaotic in that specific school way where everyone suddenly becomes loud because leaving is close. People everywhere. Noise overlapping noise. Time feeling loose.

I went with a friend to the seniors’ class.

I don’t even remember why.

But I remember her calling me.

She told me another friend of mine was looking for me.

And I went.

Just like that.

No meaning attached to it yet.

No understanding that some small moments quietly become the beginning of everything.

The following day, when I got home, I saw a message.

It was from her.

She asked if we could be friends because she found me interesting.

And I remember staring at the message longer than necessary.

Like it didn’t fully belong to my life yet.

Like maybe some beginnings happen softly so you don’t realize they’re changing you until much later.

At first, it was simple.

Good morning texts.

Small conversations.

Random check-ins throughout the day.

But slowly, Lila became part of my routine.

And there’s something dangerous about routines.

You don’t realize how attached you are until they disappear.

Someone brushed past me at the event laughing, and suddenly another memory hit me.

Saturdays during entertainment time.

Dancing with Lila like nothing else existed.

Like the school rules didn’t matter.

Like rumors couldn’t touch us there.

Like we were just girls being young instead of girls who had to be careful.

Then another memory.

Church.

She was sitting in front of me and didn’t even know I was behind her.

I remember feeling nervous for no reason I could explain at the time.

So nervous that my friend grabbed my hand and touched hers for me.

And the second our hands touched, shivers ran through my body so hard I thought someone around me would notice.

At the time, I didn’t fully understand what that feeling meant.

Or maybe I did.

And I was just scared of it.

Sometimes sermons became background noise.

So we’d quietly sing for each other instead.

Small songs.

Small moments.

The kind you never realize are becoming memories while they’re happening.

I remember the first time rumors started spreading about us.

Lila told me maybe we should stop talking for a while.

And even though she said it softly, it hurt more than I admitted.

So we took a break.

Not because we wanted to.

Because fear got there before we could figure ourselves out.

Weeks later, I returned to school after opening late.

And somehow, we reconciled like nothing had happened.

I remember her stealing my bandana and running with it through the rain while I chased her across the compound.

Both of us laughing breathlessly.

Rain everywhere.

No fear for a few minutes.

Just us.

I remember sitting at her dorm cubicle eating bread she bought for me from the canteen.

And because she did Home Science, she’d sometimes bring me food after cooking classes.

Funny how the smallest acts of care stay in your memory longer than dramatic moments do.

Sometimes she flirted with me.

And every single time, I became shy.

Which is funny now because I acted like I was fearless back then.

But the truth was…

I was already starting to love her.

And it terrified me.

Because in our school, girls like us weren’t a love story.

We were a scandal waiting to happen.

Then came third year.

The lesbian rumors became bigger.

The school changed.

People whispered more.

Teachers started paying attention to girls too closely.

Fear moved through the corridors quietly but constantly.

And then the school striked because of the lesbian cases.

And eventually…

Lila had to leave.

I escaped by an inch.

But something about losing her like that stayed inside me long after she was gone.

After she transferred, everything stopped suddenly.

No more messages.

No more routines.

And the worst part was that I didn’t even have my own phone back then.

So losing contact with her felt permanent.

Like someone closed a door before I realized I needed it open.

But I never fully forgot her.

People who move on don’t spend months searching for someone.

And I searched for Lila for months.

Not because I fully understood what I felt.

I just knew losing her felt unfinished.

Eventually, last year, I found her again.

And when we started talking, a part of me genuinely believed something would return.

Maybe not exactly the same.

But close enough.

I thought maybe some connections wait for you.

But time changes people quietly.

And when we talked again, I realized Lila had already continued living while I was still emotionally standing inside old memories.

She had moved on.

Not cruelly.

Not dramatically.

Just naturally.

And the version of her I carried in my head no longer fully existed.

That realization hurt more than I expected.

Because sometimes you don’t miss the person.

You miss the feeling attached to a version of them that no longer exists.

Back at the event, I looked at her again.

And for a second, I felt like I was two versions of myself at once.

The younger girl who once waited for her good morning texts.

And the current version of me standing in a queer event after heartbreak, trying to rebuild herself from all the people she loved too deeply.

And somehow those two versions collided the moment I saw her.

I wanted to ask if she remembered everything the same way I did.

The rain.

The church.

The singing.

The hand holding.

The rumors.

The fear.

Us.

But some questions feel too heavy to say out loud.

So instead, I just looked at her.

And let the memories happen.

Because maybe some people never fully leave you.

They just become softer in your memory over time.