Umbrella in the Rain

I felt light but happy. We had dinner in the café. I had pasta while he had spare-ribs. A wolf eats spare ribs, don't they not?

"Your name, dearest?" He asked.

I told him my name. I asked for his.

"Rob." He said.

He asked me about myself. And I found myself opening up to him. I told him about all my travels and my current job.

"You're a brilliant person." He said, caressing my fingers on the table.

Oh God, he and my mother must have had the same English teacher.

"Why do you say that?" I asked.

"You know so many languages and you have a very interesting job." He said.

I blushed. My cheeks went from pale to pink and then to a rosy sheer.

In reminiscence I was very happy. It was the first time I ever opened up to anyone like that. Maybe because he was a stranger. Maybe I felt naughty. I wanted something impermanent but interesting. I felt safe because I was leaving town soon so these things which I told him would never come back to haunt me.

Yet, now mellower and wiser, I realized he did not tell me anything about himself. Not even his last name or where he lived exactly. He said he was running a business but he did not elaborate. I did not ask because he asked all the questions. I was doing all the talking. I did not notice then that I did not know anything about him.

I felt wanted and I felt someone was really listening to the ugly parts of my soul, but not judging me.

Finally we had to leave the restaurant. It was getting late.

"You said we could have dessert somewhere else?" I asked.

"You really want to, my sweet one?" He asked.

I nodded.

He took me back to his apartment which was actually near the bar. Just two blocks away.

I forgot what my parents taught me about not following strangers. I was too enamoured with him to care. I wanted his love. I wanted anything he would give me.

However he really meant dessert in the literal sense. I thought he had meant more. He chalked up some chocolate ice-cream from the fridge and scooped some for the both of us.

There was a knock on his apartment door while we were having ice-cream.

"I'm sorry. There is some business I have to attend to." He told me, gulping down in a hurry the last bit of ice-cream.

I was perplexed. I got ready to leave. My romantic thoughts now turning into ashes.

He opened the door and there stood a burly man with tattoos all over his arm.

"New woman, huh?" He asked, looking at me twice.

"No. Just a friend." Rob answered, at the same time pushing me out of the door.

"Rob, wait..." I said, on the way out, feeling as much hurt as I was inside with his words.

Of course, there was no rationality in that. I was not his woman and barely his friend. It was only our second meeting.

"Will I see you again?" I asked.

He did not answer. He looked at me with some unfathomable expression. I tried to read it but I could not.

"Yes. I'll pick you up tomorrow at seven at the hotel lobby." He said finally.

The next day, we met at the lobby. He looked anxious.

"What is it, Rob?" I asked.

I had longed to see him since morning. Only God knew how much I longed for him. He attracted me for some reason. I struggled to stay concentrated at work. I blundered up on the interpretations. This time, they had noticed. However they were civil about it for want of personnel available.

"Tell me, my sweet one. Why were you crying when I first met you? Outside the pub when you were waiting for the rain to stop." He asked.

"You knew?" I was silent for a long while.

I thought that he had not noticed.

I raised my eyes to his, at the same time trying not to clutch my fingers so tight.

"It's the rain. It had this effect on me. It made me think back about my whole life in a flashback. The raindrops are like sharp blades. Silly of me, but they seemed to slash right into my heart." I said.

H nodded and subsequently he asked, "Are you happy?"

He said my name then. It never sounded more beautiful when he said it. He said my name with feeling. He peppered a simple name with flowers when there was none. He made a simple name sound so gorgeously heartfelt.

I shrugged.

"I have everything I could want. I have a good job, a travelling life." I said.

"Are you happy?" He repeated his question.

His arms enveloped me, giving me a warm hug.

"Sometimes I get lonely. I resent all the travelling. I make friends and then I lose them. Even now I make friends with you and then I have to leave. It seems I keep travelling whether or not I want to. The past keeps repeating itself. I am rootless, but I don't want to be so. I try to stay, I really do. Yet I am also afraid of staying. " I said.

His embrace on me was tighter. He stroked my hair, and towards my back. His hands were steady. And so very warm. It felt tremendously comforting.

"My sweet one, tell me, are you happy?" He asked for the third time.

"No." I barely whispered.

Then I said it again; a firm and resounding "No."

I sobbed but it actually felt good to acknowledge that I was all but happy. I felt like I had come to terms with myself.

"Hush now, my sweet one. It is okay. You are not alone. I too, am not happy." He said.

"But first, you must listen to me. I want to tell you something really important." He said, stroking my hair.

And then he told me his life story. His real name was not Rob. It was just a call-name. His real name, was something beautiful and so much like him. A wolf with haunting eyes, always searching for something.

He told me he was a drug-dealer and he had served time in prison. He found it very difficult to start life afresh. Now that he was released from prison, his old gang came back to haunt him. They wanted him back in the business. To do drugs. The burly, tattooed man was his former associate and the pub where we were in was their operation headquarters. He said the part of town where we were was a seedy area. It was his former territory where he was one of the main dealers of higher ranking.

He used to have what he thought was everything. He had money, women and drugs. Until the day that he was caught by the police and served five years in jail.

I was taken aback. I loosened his grip on me.

"When I first met you, I saw you were uncomfortable in the pub. Under my eye, I warned the other men to leave you alone. But you were a brilliant person indeed. You walked out before the men could approach you." He said, trying to reach out to me again but I moved further away.

"Why be bothered about a total stranger?" I asked, aware that I was far from attractive.

"There was something about you I could not resist. It was your eyes. I had to talk to you. But so much for my talking that rainy night." He continued.

He looked miserable and pained.

No longer were his eyes sparkling like they did when we were having dinner together just yesterday.

"I observed you from the window and saw you crying in the rain. It struck a chord in me." His voice was raw and unsteady.

Touched by his broken spirit, I wanted to say something but could not. Instead, I handed him the lavender umbrella I bought for myself.

He took it immediately.

"But it's yours." He said, almost in a whisper.

I shook my head.

"The rain does funny things to me too. It makes me think of my past. I was not a good man. I led life on the fast lane. Much of our drug dealings took place in the rain when there were less people around." He said.

"It was always the rain. So much trouble during the rain. All the running away, all the secrecy. A life lived on the edge."

He gripped the lavender umbrella tight.

"It's ours now." I said, not looking at him, but at the umbrella.

"You mean?" He asked, colour returning to his pale face.

I smiled shyly. I nodded.

He dropped the poor umbrella on the floor. He hugged me tight. I felt his happiness. I tasted his tears. Our fears and joys mingled together.

I whispered into his ear.

"I figured out the reason why I was so unhappy was because I never took chances. I let life dictate my actions. I always played safe. When travelling, I built a wall around myself so that when I left, I had nothing to lose. I was always clogged up inside. I found it hard to adapt when I left that lifestyle. I found I could not commit because I was afraid to lose. Subconsciously I let history repeat itself."

I paused, soaking in the fine lines in his face. Those worry lines and diminished scars only served as a reminder that life could change at any time. Yet in humanity we show the courage to plod on and forget the once deep scars of our life. It is our duty to be the best that we could be.

Snugged close to his beating heart, I raised my face so that I looked directly at his.

"Why did you not offer me an umbrella in the first place? You left me standing there, alone outside the bar."

He cupped my cheeks into his palms.

"I thought it safer that we never knew each other. I thought twice of offering you the umbrella so that we could walk together. But I feared for what might happen. I feared what if I fell for you even more than I already did? That short encounter was enough to throw me off balance. What if I did fall head over heels with you? "

I pressed my face against his cotton white shirt. Tears glistened down my face. I made no effort to wipe them now.

"I am happy to be by your side. As long as you would want me." I said.

He did not say anything. He planted me a deep kiss on my cheeks.

"How could I not want you when you're so special to me? We barely know each other and yet..." He asked.

"When you missed our seven o'clock appointment, I was heart-broken. I never expected to feel that deep for a stranger I barely knew. Yet deep in my heart I thought it would be for the better. You were better-off without me..."

He would have continued. I silenced him with my fingers on his lips.

"But I was there wasn't I? We bumped into each other on the streets again. It was not coincidence. It was fate." I said.

"Still, I pretended not to see you. I walked on. I just did." He said.

A look of regret, making him look old; appeared on his world-weary face.

"I did not. I pranced into you with the umbrella." I said.

He laughed suddenly. We both laughed.

"Shall we get out of Augusta then?" I asked later.

His reply was simple yet final.

"No, we do not run away. We stay here, rooted. You couldn't, could you?" He asked gently.

"What about your old gang?" I asked, concerned about his safety.

"Sooner or later they will realize that I am no longer the man they used to know. I am now getting a job as a chef. I vow to open up my own restaurant one day." He said, confidently.

"You don't have to vow to do that." I said.

"Huh?" He asked.

"How about vows for me?" I asked shyly.

"I vow to take care of you as much as I love you." He said, looking deep into my eyes.

I looked deep into his eyes too and I could finally read the depths of it. He was serene. He let me see through him, finally.

I felt whole. I felt good.

It rained heavily that night in Augusta in a period of three days. Yet now when we look at the rain, we see faith and courage. The sharp blades of rain are now swords to protect us. We are sheltered; we are loved. And those two umbrellas; the lavender and the blue; we have kept ever since.

Thus is this story of how I met my husband. He is loving; he is kind, and I would not say that I am brilliant, but he is. He was the truly brilliant to have found me that one rainy day, in that bar in Augusta. Not me. Certainly not me.

I was woken up from my stroll down memory lane with some noise at the door. I gazed at the door. It was my husband. See how he never fails to jolt me up. He has made me jump, jerked me up and scared me into anticipation over and over again.

He was at the door. He grinned.

"You always jump when you see me." He said, before planting kisses on my face.

"Certain things never change, I guess." I said sheepishly into his chest.

"But I always come home at seven. Straight on the dot." He said.

"Hmm..." I said.

"You didn't bring the umbrella, did you?" I asked, while helping him off his coat like a butler.

"How could I not remember? Just how could I not?" He asked.

The blue umbrella was in his hand; barely noticeable. It had become part of him; glued to him.

"It seems like it has become part of who I am. It reminds me of a woman; a stranger. Some two years ago, she took my breath away and has, ever since." He said.

My warm wolf is back home. I am happy. I am contented. And now he is going to cook me dinner. While he cooks, I imagine him more of a snow wolf. Pale skin, dark eyes and hair.

I looked outside. The rain had finally stopped. There was an unusual brightness in the sky. A tint of sunlight beamed from the clouds.

I felt rigid arms envelop me from behind; enveloping me so that I would not be able to move. I felt safe. I did not mind. He is just so stable and strong. I felt his breath on my hair. A warm tingling possessed me.

"I have never loved you more, my sweet one." My dear husband said; hugging me even tighter.

My eyes rose to meet his.

"I have never loved you so well, my snow wolf." I said.

We watched as sunlight streaked through our glass window and as drops of snow miraculously filled the landscape.