Rain by Jonathan Sherwood

It wasn’t the sound of the rain that woke me, it was the splashes from the open windowsill touching my face. I blinked several times as I sat up. What time was it? I didn’t have a clock, and Mom and Dad said they’d get me a phone for my next birthday. But it must have been late because I couldn’t hear that sound of tearing paper that cars make on the road in the rain. After midnight I guessed. The moon shone through the window onto my damp sheets. I got up to shut the glass.

The rain was pouring down so hard it was turning our yard to mud, and forcing the trees in the woods beyond to slouch under the weight. It wasn’t making any noise on the roof though. That was quiet. Very quiet. I watched the water wash away the muggy summer night.

Then I saw him.

I didn’t actually see him, even when he moved. The moonlight was bright enough that I could see the entire yard, and he was standing right in the middle, but I still couldn’t quite see him. Except where the rain hit him. I could see the splashes where they were hitting something in the air. The rain outlined a body moving around in our yard. A body the moonlight flowed right through.

I recognized him, his stride, the way his arms hung. Sometimes you can just recognize someone by a smell or the sound of their walk. I knew who this was. It was Joey. Joey, a best friend of mine who I hadn’t seen in almost two years. Joey whose face I can only remember now by his monthly appearance on the back of milk cartons. I stared at the rain-made outline dancing on my lawn.

I considered changing out of my footy pajamas before going outside but I didn’t want Joey to disappear again. I slipped down the hallway, past Mom and Dad’s room, down the stairs to the kitchen door, and peeked outside. Joey was harder to see from down here but I caught sight of him out on the other side of the yard. He was jumping up and down like he was throwing and catching a ball. I stepped outside. The rain engulfed me in a constant rush, like static. Joey came running over to me.

It made him awful hard to see. I could just make out the rain parting in a wave toward me. His outline of splattering droplets appeared as I stood face to face with Joey for the first time in two years.

A drop of water rolled down his head and traced the curves where his cheek and nose should have been. Having reached the end of his nose it stopped, wavered in the air, and fell.

“Joey?” I breathed.

I stared at him, the mud seeping through my footies. I could feel his breath but its sound was lost in the hissing roar of the rain. He was moving again.

He was jogging slowly to the other side of the yard. He was visible again when he stopped at the line drawn between our yard and the woods. He was looking back at me. His hand motioned for me to follow, throwing rain droplets high into the air. Heaven pushed them back. I followed.

I ran across the yard, kicking up mud all over myself. Joey leapt into the trees and was running, the rain slicking down his back.

In the woods he was a lot harder to see. The moon only shone through in shards now, and I had to watch for his wet outline carefully. The warm rain hit the leaves above with a thousand taps, and dripped down on my pajamas. If I was sweating, I couldn’t feel it. I saw Joey standing on a crest, his watery skin gleaming in the moonlight. He waited until I had almost caught up with him, then turned to continue his dash. He ran through thickets that remained unmoving while the form of rain ran through them. But they tore at me. My pajamas and skin were ripped by the tiny thorns, but I couldn’t stop. I’d never been this far into the woods and I was afraid to lose him now.

Joey finally stopped. I had almost lost him a hundred times, but every time I would see him again just a little farther on, running through the broken moonlight. He was standing now in front of a wall of thickets. The rain was collecting on him again so I could see him better. My chest was pumping up and down, but his wasn’t. He motioned toward the wall and walked through it, the undisturbed branches pulling his drops of water from the air. The downpour was making me blink continually and my hair was in my face. I held up my arms in front of me and pushed ahead. I came out to open sky.

I was standing on the edge of a pond surrounded by huge willow trees. The rain poured down from a million miles up and burst on my face. It lashed down like a giant, gleaming pillar of water and dumped into the clearing, making the surface of the pond froth and dance. The stars thundered down on me and I caught them on my tongue.

Across the pond stood Joey atop a single large rock. The moon burned a hole in the trees directly behind him. It blazed through his myriad of tiny droplets like stained glass. He stretched out his arms, the moon searing through his chest, and he jumped.

He arced through the air forever and plunged into the lily pads. There was no splash except for the drops on his skin hitting the water. They were lost in the downpour anyway.

I ran around the pond and mounted the rock. My shadow stretched out over the roiling water. The lily pads were of a tremendous size. They were big and green and looked like you could lie on them.

I reached out my arms and my shadow touched the edges of the pool.

I thought of Mom and Dad and what they would say tomorrow.

The water tasted good on my lips.

I should have said goodbye.

I threw myself into the air.

I cut through the pads and they closed off the moonlight above me. Their stems wrapped around my arms and legs and my wet pajamas pulled me down. I wasn’t swimming as much as pulling myself along. I didn’t know which way was up anymore and I was caring less and less. My lungs were getting tired and I started breathing out slowly. The bubbles were the only sound and I couldn’t see which way they went. I couldn’t have followed them anyway. The stems and branches of the lily pads were wrapped around me and the water was too cold to let me pull free. I heard the last of my bubbles hit the surface and my lungs asked to be refilled. My eyes closed and a slight smile touched my face. Strange how the rain is so loud. It’s so quiet down here.

I inhaled.

I lie on these lily pads all day. The sun warms my toes and the frogs keep me company. Last winter I missed them. I sat around on the ice most of the days and made pictures out of the clouds. Kinda boring. Summers are much more fun. I splash water on the birds that come here to cool off, and they scold me with their chirps. It’s great fun. I hardly think of the world outside the willows. Sometimes I do, and I miss it. Like my Mom and Dad and my friend Bryan. Bryan’s probably a couple years ahead of me in school now. I wonder how he’s doing. I suppose I should see him just to say hi. I’ll just run down to his house and see if he’s there. I’ll wait until tonight though.

It looks like rain.

—

Jonathan Sherwood has written about science and scientists for research universities for more than two decades, and written fiction for much longer. He holds a bachelors in science writing from Cornell University and a masters in English from the University of Rochester. His fiction has appeared in Asimov’s, Analog, and others, and has been translated into Chinese, Czech, and Polish.