When it Rains
*
Sometimes the sky falls with it.
The drive home stretched before me, and Robert’s enigmatic text occupied my thoughts. My mind spun through possibilities, each one more troubling than the last. I called his number, but it went straight to voicemail.
“Hey, babe, just calling you back. Your text was a little cryptic, and you know how that shoots my anxiety through the roof. Call me back. Love you. Bye!”
I tossed the phone onto the passenger seat and tried to shake the unease.
The two pints I’d had at lunch left a warm buzz in my system, making me feel lighter than I should’ve.
As I exited the parking garage and turned onto the eight-lane road leading to the highway, I couldn’t help but notice how dull everything looked.
Every building wore the same tired shade of beige as if someone had spent the day drinking Baileys and then painted the entire city while tipsy.
Who had chosen this hellish color palette, and where were they now? I wanted to find them and make them pay.
My thoughts darkened. What if I got pulled over? What if I blew over the limit? I’d get arrested, lose my job, and Robert would leave me. Everything would collapse.
The familiar chime of my phone jolted me back.
I glanced at the passenger seat—empty. “Shit, shit, shit,” I muttered, fumbling with my seatbelt and reaching down.
The phone kept ringing. I swerved into a parking lot and stopped beside a rusted sedan, frantically scanning the floorboards.
Finally, I spotted it buried beneath a pile of empty sparkling water cans.
Robert’s face glared up at me—his Wolverine cosplay photo still his contact pic—just as the call ended.
“For fuck’s sake!” I shouted, slamming my hand on the steering wheel. A passing family jumped. The mother gave me a sharp look. I offered a sheepish wave and mouthed a “sorry,” then grabbed my phone and waited for the voicemail alert to call him back.
He answered on the second ring. “Are you still with Hope?”
“No, I’m free. Hope sent me home for the day,” I said lightly.
“Why?” His voice tightened.
I bit my lip, trying to keep things casual. “Nothing serious. What happened with your counselor?”
Robert exhaled slowly. The silence crackled with my overactive imagination:
I can’t finish the program. I’m dropping out.
I’m switching careers to become an eSports professional.
I’ve fallen in love with an eighteen-year-old intern; her millionaire parents are taking me in.
His voice pulled me out of the spiral. “…this could be great for us. You’ve always wanted to live in Europe, and now we have a chance.”
“What?” I blinked, trying to catch up.
Robert chuckled. “Were you even listening?”
“Yes,” I lied, sitting up straighter.
“They invited me to join a program in the UK,” he explained. “I’d finish my bachelor’s, get certified, and move straight into my master’s. The tuition is more affordable, and my counselor says I’m a perfect fit. They’ll even help with the paperwork.”
I stayed silent, trying to process. Then Robert added, “I’m excited to never worry about seeing a red truck again and thinking it’s Tony.”
Right. Tony—his father, well, adoptive father. The man who beat him for years while pretending to be a model parent. An ocean between them would be more than symbolic; it would be safety.
The afternoon sun poured through the windshield, forcing me to squint. “When would we move?”
“This summer,” he said. “I’d finish my last semester here and graduate. After that, we’d go. They can’t transfer more credits, so we’d need to make the move then.”
I nodded slowly, letting the weight of this opportunity sink in.
“Bree—are you still there?” he asked gently.
“Yeah. I’m here,” I said, forcing a breath. “It’s just…a lot.”
“I know. We’ll go over everything when I get home, okay? I’ll bring dinner and some wine, and we’ll figure it out. This move will be worthwhile for us. I believe that.”
We said our goodbyes, and I hung up the phone. I leaned back, staring at the car’s ceiling as the enormity of his news hit me.
Moving to the UK could be the fresh start Hope had discussed—a real escape from my past. However, now that it was real, the fear returned. Could I find work before we moved? Where would we live? What would we do with all our stuff? How would my parents react?
That last question echoed the loudest. My mother, who saw betrayal in everything, would view this as unforgivable.
When I moved out at eighteen, she retaliated by cutting me off her health insurance.
When I married at nineteen, she didn’t congratulate me—she criticized me.
Moving across the ocean would feel, to her, like abandonment.
I exited the car, hoping the crisp November air would calm my nerves. Instead, the cold amplified the nausea bubbling in my gut.
I saw her face in my mind—lips curled in that disapproving sneer, eyes narrowed in judgment. “Why would you do something so impulsive? You’ll fail. You’ll be back in a year.”
I leaned against the hood, gripping the cold metal for balance.
Hope called it a lifeline. Now, I just had to decide if I was brave enough to grab it. Yet, after all these years of running in circles, trying and failing to cut the cord, what did freedom from my family even mean? Did I deserve it?
A moment later, the nausea won. I doubled over and vomited onto the grass at the edge of the lot as cars whizzed by, indifferent.
Hope’s food poisoning excuse was more accurate than we had expected.