Strangers. The air outside 713 Music Hall was thick with cigarette smoke and the metallic scent of the rain still clinging to the pavement. My ears rang with the ghost of Ethel Cain’s voice, her hymns of broken homes and yearning still vibrating inside my chest. That’s when I saw him, sort of short, with his double layered shirt, like he was trying to cover from the weight of the night. His laughter was quiet but magnetic, the kind you lean toward without realizing, and in the dim halo of the street lamps in downtown, his features sharpened into something I knew I’d remember.
His name was Jake.
Short for Jacob.
I jokingly asked for a ride home, not expecting him to say yes. We didn’t plan it. But the hours unraveled anyway. The drive home was stitched with half sung lyrics, “am I making you feel sick?” And the soft hum of mini cooper tires on the freeway, every silence between us filled with a strange ease. At my house, neither of us wanted to break the thread, so we stayed outside, two shadows beneath the porch light. He told me about his boarding school in Mississippi, how the pine trees there swallowed the sky, and I told him about, well Houston, about how the city hums even when you're alone. His words were deliberate, but his eyes flickered like someone trying to hold on to a fleeting flame.
He drove a dark green mini cooper.
He was about five foot six.
By 3 in the morning, he stood to leave, the night air colder than before, or at least it felt that way. My driveway suddenly became a stage for goodbye. The sound of his dark mini cooper pulling away lingered longer than it should have, and I felt the emptiness in my chest settle like ash. I kept wondering, if he had been from Houston, what conversation would have turned into more than a night’s confession? What space between us would've collapsed into something permanent? Instead, I was left with the ache of a connection too brief, like a hymn cut off mid verse, still echoing long after the singer has gone. I return back to my bed, in my head playing Strangers by Ethel Cain.
He was from Mississippi.
He stood out in the pit in a silent way.
With his brown sugar hair, and cathedral eyes I may never forget about.
I decided to write this story because the night itself felt like fiction, even though it really happened. It was one of those rare moments in life where reality blurred into something dreamlike, the kind of memory that almost writes itself into a story. I was very inspired to capture the fleeting connection I experienced that night because it reminded me of how short lived, yet meaningful, encounters like these can shape us in unexpected ways. The song “strangers” by Ethel Cain tied perfectly into this experience, giving the story both a title and a soundtrack. I wanted to use writing as a way of holding onto that moment while also transforming it into something bigger than my own personal memory.
Even though the story is personal, I believe it reflects universal themes like the mystery of human connection, as well as the fragility of time, and the ache of impermanence.
Almost everyone has experienced a moment where a stranger briefly becomes significant, whether it's on a train, or in a cafe, or in my case, after a concert. The story explores what it means to trust, to feel safe, and to wonder about the “what ifs” that never unfold. The piece asks how we handle moments that feel both ordinary and extraordinary, and how those moments linger in our memories long after they're gone.
One choice I made was to describe Jake with highly specific details, for example, his layered shirt, his height, his “brown sugar hair”, and even his car. These small, almost generic details make him feel real and physical as well, while emphasizing how certain memories burn themselves into our minds. Similarly, I chose to set the story outside the 713 music hall, with cigarette smoke and rain still in the air. The setting reflects the mix of rawness and dreaminess that framed the night, connecting to the theme of fleeting connections. By grounding the story in vivid, sensory detail, I hoped to make the universal idea of temporary feel alive and relatable.
When I began writing this piece, I leaned on music as a mentor text. The lyrics of Ethel Cain's “Strangers” inspired both the tone and the emotional undercurrent of the piece. One challenge I faced was deciding how much to reveal to the readers. I wanted a piece to feel honest without turning it into a diary entry. To get through this, I blended personal truth with a style that felt lyrical and narrative driven. It sort of almost felt like creative non fiction. If I revise this further, I may expand the ending to show how the memory continues to echo in the narrator's mind, bringing the night itself with lasting emotional impact.
A passage that shows my narrative preferences is when I write: “The drive back home was stitched with half sung lyrics, am I making you feel sick? And the soft hum of mini cooper tires on the freeway, every silence between us filled with a strange ease.”Here the pacing slows to capture the intimacy of the moment, small details stretch out mirroring how time itself felt stretched in that car ride. The narrative distance is close, pulling readers directly into the narrator's perspective, while the voice is lyrical, echoing the influence of the song. These choices invite the reader to feel both the tenderness and the uncertainty of that night.
From writing this, I learnt how fiction and reality can blur in storytelling. Even though this event really happened, shaping it into a story allowed me to focus on the universal emotions that give it weight and longing, and the ache of impermanence. I also learned the importance of specificity, that small details like a laugh or a car can carry big emotional resonance. But most importantly I discovered that even brief moments can hold the power to inspire reflection and art, and that sometimes the best stories come from the things we can't stop thinking about.