The House That Kept the Rain

There was one house on the hill where the windows were always wet, even in August. The rest of the town had forgotten the sound of rain. Lawns split open. Birds sat beneath parked cars with their beaks parted. But each morning the old house wore its silver veil.

When Arianna finally climbed the hill, she found no clouds above it. The rain was falling inside.

It moved down the wallpaper in thin, shining threads. It tapped on the dining-room table, filled the cups in the cupboard, and slipped beneath a locked bedroom door. A calendar on the wall had stopped at a date thirty years before.

In the kitchen stood a woman in a blue coat, holding an umbrella she had never opened.

“Does it ever stop?” Arianna asked.

“It will,” the woman said, “when someone remembers why it started.”

Arianna looked at the calendar. She knew the date. It was the day her mother had left town, promising to come back before dark.

For the first time in thirty years, Arianna spoke her mother's name aloud.

Outside, on the dry hillside, a single drop struck the dust.