The Rain Came Down, Chapter 1

Here is the intro to my new story: "And the Rain Came Down"

She remembered how her heart stopped beating. Her breath caught in her throat and never left her body.

Time just stopped flowing and all that was left was the image in front of her, burned into her brain. The sight of her husband, looking physically crushed by the weight of the burden he had to pass on to her.

It was difficult when all things stopped. He was frozen in time, the words choked out, the deed done. No going back. Sean was gone, he said. An accident, he said. Something about the boy’s bike, no helmet, a car.

Her husband couldn’t get all the words out before time stopped. She felt sad for him. It was obviously important, what he had to say. It wasn’t fair time stopped him in midsentence. He was forced to hold it all in.

She looked around the room. Everyone there was frozen, her mother, the policewoman, all of them.

She turned and walked to the kitchen and realized it was silent. No humming refrigerator, no fan, no clinking ice maker. She realized the water wouldn’t flow from the tap in the sink. So she put down the glass she had taken from the cupboard. No use trying to get a drink.

Her favorite window over the sink showed a frozen moment of a perfect summer day; a bird on approach to the bird feeder, a bumblebee laboring toward a potted rose in the planter under the window. They were motionless, suspended. She smiled. She wanted to go outside and look at things. To walk in this lost time. She wrapped the stillness around her like an old fuzzy robe, warm from the dryer.

But then she heard the thunder. Zeus clapped his hands right over her head. The sound split her in two and she felt the rain, a deluge, pouring over her, so cold. She couldn’t see through it and her outstretched hands groped for the counter. But it was too much rain. The thunder exploded again and she fell to her knees. The rain fell and time flowed. She heard the thunder screaming, screaming her son’s name and she melted into nothing. And the rain came falling down.