I’m tired. It weighs on me relentlessly; gravity is hanging from my arms like children yanking for attention. I have no play left in me. Get away.
I shuffle out onto the hill and sag onto my knees. The grass is tender, grown thick with summer warmth as the sky is heavy with evening rain. A sunny rain – I never fail to wonder at such a sight – falling straight, not a murmur of wind. The earth below me writhes, dripping with disquiet and dismay. Cars jolting; streetlights churning; windows flashing; distant heads streaming ever onward, onward, always moving never getting anywhere: water glistens over all, dripping, spilling, splashing, shimmering.
I lie out onto my back and watch the water dribble down from the gray; the sky covers me, smothers me. From corner to corner all I see is gray. The world is gray. The world is falling. It drips staccato against my skin, everywhere, no place is secret, no place is intimate. I am not me: I am rain. Cold shivers through my core; my skin is dry and taut under a veil of damp murk, flowing, falling, pooling, moving. I writhe in my stillness.
“You’ll catch your death,” a voice floats up to the hill. “You alright, stranger?”
“Just catching my breath,” drips out of me.
A face parts the gray. “Got no better place to catch your breath? You ain’t cold? You’re certainly wet – soaked right through. Don’t seem to mind, though, do you? Well …” He stares down at me, watching me. “…you thirsty?”
I tilt myself up and small rivers cascade down my face, my neck, my arms. Water rolls off the back of my hands, beads, and rolls again.
“All I got is watered down vodka.” He stretches an arm out to me and at our fingertips we exchange an understanding. I flick back a swig and he smiles, contented. Sitting down beside me, his knee leans against mine.
“Got a girl?” He takes a sip.
“Got a girl.”
“Treat you right?”
“Treats me swell.” My eyelashes are pearled too heavily. I resist blinking.
“Yep. Mine treats me like a king. To love!” He takes a long swig, turns a grimace into a smile and gurgles a broken chuckle. I drink to love and lie back on the grass.
I’m so tired.
“Nice day for rain, eh?”
He takes my silence with a sip from his flask and seems to take comfort in learning this conversation will be a quiet one.
“Sunny rain is funny, ain’t it? You’ve got a splendid day ticking down to its end and all of a sudden the air is filled with raindrops. Comes on slow at first, all gentle like, like it might just be a few sprinkles and then pass on, but then the drops thicken and come down more and more and you find yourself in a full out drizzle. This rain ain’t too bad, kinda old-bath water warm feeling. At least we’re not up here shaking our asses off, eh?”
He chuckles and pulls out a packet of cigarettes. He almost lights one before thinking better and pushing the pack back down into his coat pocket. Fidgeting, hugging his knees up to his chest, deciding that wasn’t going to work, he leaned back with a throaty sigh and put his hands behind his head. We lie together, parallel to each other, before he starts laughing.
It starts out as a simple chuckle, a silence filler, almost, but the silly sound of his own voice seems to fuel the fire. The chuckle gains volume and pressure in the throat until it rolls itself into a deep, guttural sound. He twists onto his side, knees pulling themselves up to his chest until he’s kicking like he were riding a bike, his stomach tightening as he huffs deeper for breath and guffaws even freer.
Lying next to this madman, his movements occasionally brushing against my arms, the absurdity of my situation seeps into me as raindrops splatter against my face. I can’t help but laugh with him. These moments are unique and precious to me even as they pass and my sides start to ache and my jaw tightens. We roll in the rain on top the hill and laugh and laugh and it finally starts to fade and quiet and ends with final gasps and deep breaths and us on our backs looking up at the rain falling down on us.
“So,” he giggles, sitting up, “this girl of yours, she pretty?”
“A dream,” I say, sitting up and reaching for the flask.
“That right? Mine too. A dream, a woman among women. She’s got the face, the body, the hands of a true woman. Just beautiful. How long you known yours?”
“All my life, since we were kids.”
“That right? How old are you, eh? You’re just a kid, can’t be more than a kid.”
“I’m twenty-six.”
He laughs and hits me on the back. “Why, well! A year older than me, then, eh? Ha! Well, sir, to love!”
He makes a face and hands me the flask.
“To love.”
We laugh together and he brushes my hair out of my eyes and kisses me on the forehead. I laugh and take a swig and hand it back.
“To love!”
“I’m Fin, Finnegan Gunner.” I reach out my hand.
“Anthony Jacobs, nice to meet you.” He pushes the flask into my open palm and laughs.
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