Drought

Is it ever going to rain? Chad Stark wondered. Bright late-winter sunlight made sharp-edged shadows and showed the leaves and windfall twigs on the dead front lawn in sharp contrast, like corpses on a battlefield. But was it ever going to rain? If it didn’t -- and soon -- there would be hell to pay come summer. Cat crept up behind Stark and placed a mug of hot coffee on the table in front of him. He turned and buried his face in the powdery smoothness where her robe had fallen open. She murmured, then giggled and backed away, gathering the robe about her and knotting the belt. “Cut it out,” she said. “I’ve got work to do.” Oh, sure, Stark thought. You’ve got work to do. And I haven't? “Come on,” he said. “All work and no play, you know....” “All things in due season, big fella.” Cat rumpled his hair. “Get your mind back above your belt and drink your coffee.” Stark worked his jaw and listened to a sound in his right ear like waxed paper being crumpled. It reminded him of times he went swimming and came away with an earful of water, except now he couldn’t make it go away by smacking the side of his head with the heel of his hand. Something else busted loose from the old airframe. Things falling apart in preparation for the great cosmic worm feed. “Hey, Cattie,” he hollered over his shoulder. “Listen to this and tell me it isn’t clever: all humanity’s falling apart in preparation for the great cosmic worm feed. I just made that up. How do you like it?” “You’re nuts, that’s what I think. Cosmic worm feed, my Aunt Fanny. And didn’t I just say to get your mind above your belt?” “So what’s below the belt about a cosmic worm feed?” “I thought you were speaking metaphorically. And autobiographically.” She laughed. It sounded to Stark like a seal barking. “Sorry,” Cat said after a moment, appearing in the doorway in slacks and a sweater. “That last, in itself, was a bit of a cheap shot below the belt, wasn’t it?” “Oh, dear,” Stark said, grabbing a banana from a fruit bowl on the table, peeling it ape-fashion and taking a huge bite. “Our conversation seems to have degenerated into descending degrees of silliness.” He sounded as if he was speaking with a mouthful of banana, like the late President Lyndon Baines Johnson. “Anyway,” Cat said. “If it doesn’t rain sometime soon, there won’t be any cosmic worm feed because there won’t be any cosmic worms. We’ll all just lie where we drop and crumble to dust in the merciless sun and blow away on the blistering wind. How do you like them apples?” “Won’t be any apples, either. God’s taking away the forbidden fruit along with the worms that live in ‘em. He tried a flood and it didn’t work. Now he’s gonna turn us all into beef jerky.” “Or maybe it’ll rain buckets tomorrow and we’ll be back to saddlesoaping the mold and mildew off all our leather stuff. You never know.” Stark finished his banana, stood up and tossed the peel into the sink. “I’m going out for a while,” he said. “Water doesn’t just disappear. It has to go somewhere. Maybe I can find it. You know? It evaporates, sure, but then it has to condense somewhere, doesn’t it? Matter exists as solid, liquid or gas, but it exists. Remove just one subatomic particle and the whole thing comes down like a house of cards, doesn’t it?” The sun had gone higher in the sky. Chad Stark kissed his wife and picked up the forked stick in the kitchen corner and went out in search of water.