Dance in the Rain

"Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass... It's learning to dance in the rain."

-Vivian Greene

-

Another morning.

I glared at the sun. How dare it shine so brightly? I covered my head with my blanket and tried to reclaim sleep.

Instead, I laid awake, staring at the dim green light that managed to leak through the sheets. I closed my eyes and saw the whole terrible drama again, playing out before me like a movie. Pain, tears, and blood.

How had it come to that?

I opened my eyes and grabbed my phone. I tapped my music app and scrolled through my albums. I needed something, something to drown out the soundtrack of horrible words that I could still hear, even now, a week after leaving.

My whole bright future was shattered in my ex-fiancé's final tantrum. I had finally seen, finally understood, who he was. Not a man who loved me, but a man who wanted to own me.

No, that's not quite true. I hadn't seen in that moment, I'd seen it later, sitting in the office of the relationship counselor I'd reached out for couple's therapy. My ex hadn't shown up, but I'd talked to the counselor anyway.

My mother had warned me, my friends had warned me, and I'd ignored them. I'd been so obsessed with the idea of a great love that I'd blinded myself to reality. Maybe I should blame him, but I blamed myself more.

Oh, people may say it's not your fault. But when it was me who walked right and let the abuser take control, I couldn't believe that. I had left him. Yes, I had done that one thing right. But I had let it get much too far, had let it continue much too long. And while I'd left physically, my mind was still stuck somewhere on the way out.

Lady Gaga's 'Speechless' beat out from my phone's tiny speakers as I nestled into the couch and tried to forget.

"Irena!" My mom called as she knocked on the basement door, her voice just barely piercing through my music.

I groaned and swung my legs over the side of the old basement sofa that I'd been sleeping on for the past week. My bedroom had been taken over when I'd moved out four years ago. I was just lucky my parents had a finished basement that I could use.

I trudged up the stairs, unlocked the door, and opened it.

"Yes, mom." I tried smiling. I knew my mom was worried about me, and it kind of broke my heart.

"We're going to the beach today, the one at the lake. You should come."

"Ok, mom." I agreed. No part of me wanted to go to the beach, but I would do it for my mom.

I could see her hesitate, as if she wanted to say something else, but in the end she just walked away. I could hear my younger siblings laughing and screaming as they chased each other around the house, getting ready for a fun day at the lake.

I was the oldest by twelve years. I'd moved out when the next oldest was just six, so my three siblings were more like nieces and nephews to me. Listening to their squeals of delight, I tried to remember what it felt like to be so excited by anything.

I shook my head and smiled. A real smile this time. I needed this, to be out with people, to remember that life wasn't over. This was just a little bump in the road of my life, I told myself.

Feeling a bit better, I pulled a bikini out of one of my suitcases. Anything I couldn't fit in my two suitcases was left behind in my ex's house, and I would never go back for any of it. Let him keep the paintings I'd made for him, the gifts he'd bought me, the memories of our love. I didn't want any of it.

I tied on a long wrap skirt over my bikini bottoms and pulled my light brown hair back in a braid that trailed halfway down my back. I thought about cutting it all off. I'd grown it out because my ex liked it long. Why keep it now?

I grabbed a pair of sunglasses and my hip bag and headed out to join my family. The five of them completely filled one sedan, so I drove their other car. The parking lot was nearly full when we pulled in and I ended up having to park quite far away from my parents and siblings.

I rubbed on some sunscreen before getting out of the car. I didn't really need it. I didn't burn, I tanned. But it was a habit to put it on. And then I remembered why, it was because my ex didn't like when my skin got dark.

I wanted to scream.

Was there nothing that wouldn't remind me of him? Of how I'd made myself over to meet his desires? I took deep breaths and held back the tears the threatened to fall. This sucked.

Every part of me wanted to turn my car back on and head home, bury myself in my borrowed bed, and try to forget. I couldn't do that forever, though. I sighed and plastered a smile on my face. Fake it till you make it, right?

I scanned the crowd and spotted my family setting up blankets and chairs. As I walked over to them, I watched the people all around me. Happy people, full of life and laughter and joy. How long until that was me again?

I settled on one of the beach blankets, leaning back and watching my siblings splash into the lake. Next to us a group of young men played beach ball. It was not possible to avoid noticing their strong bare chests and arms. I felt I should have been aroused at the sight, but all I saw was my ex, in love with his own beauty.

I looked away. But, in every direction it seemed, where hot, athletic men. There, two were wrestling in the water as their friends hooted at them. And further away, there were more with a group of young women, all laughing and chatting.

I laid down and closed my eyes, deciding that watching the red insides of my eyelids as the sun beat down through sunglasses and skin would be less painful.

A ball thudded into the sand next to me, spraying me with fine grains of beach dust. Instinctively, I flinched.

"Sorry!" A man called as he ran over to retrieve his ball.

My heart thudded in my chest as he loomed over me. Fear, hot and raw, set my adrenaline running.

The man's grin faded as he saw my expression. Was he angry at me for not smiling at him? I didn't want to know.

"It's Ok." I said and smiled, trying to make him believe it.

He left with his ball, and I breathed again. Why had I expected him to be angry? Get a grip, Irena.

I didn't want to be sitting here anymore. I got up and walked down to the water near where my siblings were playing. I folded up my long skirt until it was knee length and waded in.

"Ireny!" My brother called excitably as he saw me. He ran over and grabbed my arm, splashing me with water. My sisters trailed after him, both older than him.

I laughed and took turns running into the water with each of them. It wasn't long before I was completely soaked. I was glad that my hip bag was waterproof because I was having the most fun I'd had in as long as I could remember, just being silly with my siblings. There was nothing in this to remind me of my ex, thankfully.

After an hour of goofing off we all tromped back to our parents to have some of the snacks that we'd brought along.

"Looks like a storm is coming." My dad said as he eyed the horizon.

I looked up. Where the sky had been open and blue an hour ago, now there were fluffy white clouds drifting overhead. And, in the direction my dad was looking there was a line of dark gray clouds crowding into view.

My mom got up and started packing up to leave. All around us, people were doing the same. The parking lot was already only half full.

"I'm going to wait a bit," I said, "maybe it will blow over."

I didn't want to let go of this good feeling, this feeling of being alive I'd found here. I wasn't ready to go back to the basement and be alone with my memories again. Being alone here was better, somehow.

"Alright, jellybean." My mom said and gave me a hug.

I squeezed her back tightly. "Thanks for making me come," I told her.

She smiled and waved and then they got in their car and drove away. The wind was blowing hard now, whipping my braid and skirt around me and the beach was nearly empty. The last few holdouts were grimly getting ready to leave too.

Enjoying the feel of the warm wind, and the heat of the day without the glare of sun, I pushed my sunglasses up on my head and walked towards the lake edge. I stood there and stared at the coming storm. There was no chance that it would blow over.

The clouds were angry black and nearly on top of the lake now. Fat drops of rain began to fall, and seconds later the downpour was on me. Water ran down my face in rivulets, along the bridge of my nose, in the crease of my lips, down my arms and off my fingertips into the sand.

I tilted my head back and opened myself to the power of the fierce rain.

A crack of thunder sounded and reverberated in my heart. I yelled as loudly as I could into the storm. My voice was drowned in the pounding of rain on the lake and my tears mixed with the rain drops. I felt I was becoming one with the storm, like it was a manifestation of my sorrow.

And the rain continued.

Finally, I sat down, exhausted by the power of nature and my own emotions. The lake lapped at my feet in small waves, driven by the storm's wind.

"Incredible, isn't it?"

Startled, I turned to towards the voice and saw that there was someone sitting next to me. The rain made everything more than a few feet away blurry and hard to see. It was like the entire world was just me, this unexpected man, and the rain.

"I hope you don't mind that I joined you?" He asked me. His voice was just loud enough to hear above the sounds of the rain. It wasn't that he was yelling, but it was the pitch, the tone of his voice that seemed to cut through the white noise.

"I've never seen rain like this before." He continued when I didn't answer.

He was wearing swim trunks and nothing else. His biceps were large with well-defined muscle mass. I couldn't see his stomach as he sat with his knees pulled up towards himself, but I was sure he had a good set of abs.

His black hair was short and stood up, even under the onslaught of the downpour. His eyes, I saw when he looked at me, were black too. His face was angular and sharp, but his nose had a slight bulge in the middle, as if it had been broken too many times. I glanced at his ears and saw that they were distended and misshapen.

He was a fighter. Professional or amateur? I wondered.

Oddly, I wasn't afraid. I should have been, out here and isolated. A strange man who was obviously at least occasionally violent, next to me. But I wasn't.

I felt calm. The man seemed to radiate calm.

"Do you always sit outside in storms?" He asked me.

"No." I said, finally speaking.

"Ah, it's just my lucky day, then." He nodded, looking pleased.

I couldn't think of anything to say to that, so I just looked at him. It was odd how he could demand my attention as much as the storm. I watched as water dripped over the curves of his bicep muscles, like little rivers making new paths through mountains, I thought.

I wanted to paint him. No, not him, I wanted to paint just his arm, with this water running down it. I would use acrylic to build up the texture of his muscle, I mused. I considered which of my paints I could use to match his beautiful tan skin tone. And then a bit of a lighter shade, with deep purple highlights for the water reflecting the storm.

The arm I was watching flexed, breaking my train of thought. I glanced up and met his black eyes. They sparkled and the corners wrinkled with amusement.

"Sorry," I blushed. "I was just thinking about painting you, your arm I mean. I mean the rain on your arm is beautiful - like mountains. Not, not like that, like a canyon in a desert. I... Never mind." I looked away from him and back towards the storm.

"My arm is like a canyon in the desert?" He asked.

I didn't answer.

"Usually women describe my arms as 'hot' or 'buff', or sometimes 'sexy.' Never heard about mountains and canyons. I like it."

A flash of lightning lit up the skies, turning the world a lighter shade of purple for a moment. The crash of thunder sounded almost before the glare of the lightning had faded from my eyes.

"That was close." The man commented. "It might be a good idea to not be so close to the lake, don't you think?"

I nodded.

The man stood up and reached his hand down to help me up. His hand was large and warm in mine. I looked at it, fascinated by how each knuckle was engorged, a knot in the long bony lines of his fingers. His nails were short and blunt, each one flattened out across a wide fingertip. I could feel the thickness of calluses on his palm.

Unexpectedly, heat shot through my pelvis. I rubbed my thumb over the back of his hand.

"And what do my hands remind you of?" He asked.

"They are branches of an oak; each knuckle a knot formed by trauma to the tree." I said, without thinking.

The man raised his other hand to his face and examined it thoughtfully. "I see a tool in this hand, just a tool."

"A hand is so much more than that. It's the link that connects your soul to the world, it's the extension of your will."

I gasped and dropped the man's hand. My cheek burned with the remembered red imprint of my ex's hand, slamming into my face. An extension of his will to cause me pain, to control me.

"I'm sorry," I said, not wanting this man in front of me to think that I didn't like touching his hand.

"Nothing to be sorry about," he said. "Let's go sit in the grass."

I nodded and followed this stranger. In the dim light I could see that he had a large tattoo covering his back, but I couldn't make out what it was. I should probably go, get in my car, and drive home. But I didn't want to leave the storm, to leave the rain, to leave this calm man.

We sat next to each other in the grass and watched as the lighting struck closer and closer. A bolt drove from the sky into the lake. Would I have still been sitting there if this man hadn't come to talk to me?

I reached out and touched his hand, lightly. He took my hand in his, gentle. I squeezed and returned the gesture softly.

"Do you always sit outside in storms with strange women?" I asked him.

"No, this is my first storm. And I haven't met any strange women here, only you."

"Am I not strange?" I asked, I felt strange, had been feeling strange for weeks now, or maybe longer.

"No, you're not strange. Just a bit sad, that's all." The man replied with a gentle squeeze of my hand.

"How could this be your first storm?" I changed the subject, "you said you'd never seen rain like this before."

"I'm from Wyoming. We don't get storms like this, with this much rain all of a sudden. At least not often, anyway. When everyone started leaving, I thought it was a bit of an overreaction. I guess the locals know best, though. Anyway, the rain started so fast, and I was already soaked, so I thought I may as well watch for a while."

"I should have gone home," I said.

"I'm glad you stayed," he said.

I shivered a little. It wasn't cold, in this warm summer rain, so there was no reason for it.

"Are you cold?" the man asked. He unhooked his hand from mine to open his arm, but he didn't put it around me. It was an invitation, not an order.

I scooted closer and leaned against him, feeling his warmth spread through my body from where we touched. Gently, he laid his arm around my shoulder, his hand wrapping around my bare upper arm. I reached for his other hand with mine, feeling that I still needed a hand in mine.

We sat quietly for a while.

"Thank you," I finally spoke.

It felt so nice to be held like this. It felt safe, somehow. And it stirred my sex too, drew my arousal out of its deep slumber. His fingernails brushed the side of my boob where they wrapped around my arm.

His swim trunks were too big and loose to tell if he was aroused or not, but I was sure that the tightening of my nipples was very visible. Yet, he didn't make any move to touch me more than I invited. If his hands were the extension of his will, then his will was to accept what I offered and ask for nothing more.

I tried to remember my first date with my ex, had he been patient, back then? Or had he pressed me, and I hadn't noticed. Well, I noticed now. Maybe this was the kind of thing that I would always notice, now...

I sighed unhappily.

"Do you want to talk about it?" The man asked.

I shook my head. Maybe someday I could open up, talk about being in love with someone who hurt me in anger, who blamed me for everything, who called me ugly and weak, but not yet. Maybe someday I could talk about how I stayed when he broke the furniture, how I forgave him when he screamed at me, how I hadn't wanted to leave even when he struck me.

Someday, maybe, I could talk about how it had taken someone else to tell me I was worth more than that, deserved better. Not my mom, not my friends, but a stranger. It had taken a stranger to make me see.

No, I wasn't ready to talk about that yet.

We watched as the lightning faded and the storm moved on, the rain slowed to a drizzle and the clouds became lighter and lighter. And then, finally, the sun shone again, drying up the sand and our skin. People started coming back, arriving in droves. And we stayed sitting, quietly.

"What's your name?" I asked, as reality returned around us. And in the real world, you knew the names of men who held you in their arms and used their body as a tool to offer protection.

"Robert, but everyone calls me Bobby. What's yours?"

"Irena."

"I'd like to get to know you, Irena." Bobby said.

I felt like I already knew him, his soul, and he knew mine. But I understood what he meant. We'd shared a special moment here, in the storm. But Bobby wanted more. He wanted Irena in reality, not Irena in a storm dream.

"I'd like that," I said. I hadn't thought I would be ready to date again, already. But this man, Bobby, he was so calm, the calm in the storm. I wanted to feel more of the peace that I'd felt with him in the rain.

I just, didn't trust myself to make good choices, though. I thought he seemed kind and gentle, but I could also see he was a fighter.

I wanted him to meet my mom. She'd told me the first time she met my ex that he was no good. If she could see that then, then I wanted her to see this man and tell me if he was good or not.

But it was weird to ask a guy to meet your mom on your first date, and this was even before our first date. Really weird. I thought about just trying a date with him - a normal coffee date, and I felt anxiety fill me. No, I didn't care if it was weird, I needed my mom's blessing.

I tensed up and Bobby stroked my arm.

"I want you to meet my mom," I said, feeling stupid. A grown woman who couldn't make her own choices without mom's approval. But it was just, that's where I was now.

"Ok," Bobby agreed easily.

I couldn't believe that he'd just accepted it. But that was what he'd been doing since he'd sat down next to me in the storm, just accepting me. No man was this perfect, I worried.

Get a grip, Irena. Just see what happens. You're not committing to anything.

I took a deep breath.

"You're ok with meeting my mom?" I asked.

"Sure, moms are important. I don't know why you were screaming in the storm, Irena, but it's clear your struggling with something. I not going to object if meeting your mom will help with, whatever it is. I'm just glad you're willing to give me a chance." Bobby said.

"I feel like a wild bird being tamed by a song and seed." I said, my imagination carrying me away again.

"I kind of feel that too, that tension like you want to run." Bobby agreed.

I laughed, surprising myself. "I was a lot more tense before you sat with me, Bobby."

"Mmmm." Bobby said thoughtfully.

I pulled out my phone and called home.

"Mom? Can you come back to the lake? There's someone I want you to meet."

I felt like a young teenager again, introducing my mom to a guy I wanted to go out with, needing her permission.