Rain Reign (13 page)

Mrs. Kushel puts on her thoughtful face and taps her pencil against her fingers. “Raze?” she suggests after a moment.

“Yes!” exclaims Parvani. And then she can't help herself. She jumps out of her seat, runs to my desk, and cries, “Rose, I thought of a triple homonym—‘raze,' ‘raise,' and ‘rays'!”

I have thought of that triple homonym before, but I know this is not the time to mention it. Instead, this is the time for the feeling of friendliness. Since a friend would probably not say, “I already thought of that,” I grin at Parvani and exclaim, “That's a great one!” I put enthusiasm into my voice.

Parvani places her palm in the air. “High-five,” she says.

I give her a high five, and then we go back to our compositions. We are both smiling.

 

41

My Father Makes a Mistake with Pronouns

“What is this?” My father is asking the question. (This is not when he makes a mistake with pronouns.) He's holding out a newspaper.

Uncle Weldon has just dropped me off after school, and I'm walking through the front door, Rain at my side because she's been waiting for me on the porch.

“It's a newspaper,” I say.

My father's face is hard and there's no smile on it. “Of course it's a
news
paper,” he replies. He throws it at my feet. “Sam Diamond gave it to me this morning. He said there was something in it that I would want to see. He was right. Is there anything you want to tell me?”

I feel confused, but more than that, I feel frightened. “No,” I say.

My father picks the paper up and turns the pages so fiercely that they rip in his hands. He turns the pages three times and then he stops and shoves one of them at me. “What is this?”

It's the second time he's asked that question.

I look at the page. I see a picture of Rain. And an article—a long one—titled “A Girl's Brave Search.” The author of the article is Sheila Perlman.

“It's the article Mrs. Kushel called you about,” I tell my father.

“Nobody called me about any article.”

I hand the paper back to him. “Mrs. Kushel did.”

My father pauses for a long time and his eyes wander around the room. I know he's suddenly remembering the afternoon when he came home from The Luck of the Irish and the phone rang. He picked it up and said hello, and then he frowned and the next thing he said was, “What did Rose do? Is she in trouble again?” He put his hand over the mouthpiece and whispered to me, “It's Mrs. Kushel.”

“Okay,” I said.

My father reached for the remote control and aimed it at the television. He pressed the Mute button and flicked silently through channels. Every now and then he said “Unh” or “Uh-huh” into the phone. Eventually, he hung up. “What did you tell your teacher about Rain for?” he asked me before he turned the volume back on.

Now my father shakes his head. “This is our private business, Rose. Our private family business. And now it's all over the paper. Everyone in the county will read this. I look like a thief.”

I back away. Rain backs away too. She does not take her eyes off my father. “Talk to Uncle Weldon,” I say. I know my uncle hasn't had time to return to his office yet, but I don't want my father to call Mrs. Kushel and yell at her. “I need to take Rain for a walk,” I add. “Let's call Uncle Weldon when I get back.”

I hustle Rain outside and we walk up and down the street until I think Uncle Weldon is at his desk at work. Then we cross the planks into our yard again.

My father is sitting at the kitchen table, doing nothing. I pick up the phone and dial Uncle Weldon's number. I tell him what's happened and he says, “Let me speak to your father, please.”

I feel a little mad at my father now, so I stand by the table, staring at him and listening to his end of the conversation. At first he doesn't say much, but then he shouts, “
Okay!
I won't phone anyone. I won't make any trouble.” He hangs up without saying good-bye to Uncle Weldon. Then he looks at me. “Sit down, Rose.”

I don't want to sit near my father. “Where?” I say.

My father kicks a chair away from the table. “Right there.”

I perch on the edge of the chair.

“Why are you doing this, Rose? Why are you looking for Rain's owners? She was my gift to you. My
gift
. Not to mention that you got her twice. Once from me and once from the shelter. You should count your lucky stars.”

“But if you hadn't let Rain out during a superstorm,” I say, “I wouldn't have had to get her back.” I look down at Rain, then up at my father again. “Why did you let her outside during the storm?”

“Rose, for the love of Pete.” I see color rising in my father's face.

“But why did you? Rain had never been outside during a storm before. Not by herself.”

When my father speaks again his voice is very low, but not in a gentle way like when Mrs. Kushel reads to our class. It's a different kind of low. “You should count your lucky stars and your blessings, Rose. You have your frickin' dog back.”

This is not logical. “I wouldn't have had to get her back if you hadn't let her out. Why did you let her out?”

My father slams his hand down on the table so suddenly and so hard that Rain and I jump. “Look, you little brat. I brought that home for you.” He points to Rain. “I was trying to do something nice.”

“Rain is a ‘she,'” I inform him, “not a ‘that.'”

My father gets to his feet and stands over me.

 

42

Protecting Rain

“What did you say?” my father asks.

I shake my head. He's so much bigger than I am. I hadn't noticed. I hadn't noticed how thick and hard his hands are, how wide his shoulders are.

Two, three, five, seven.

“Answer me,” my father says in that same low voice.

I slip off the edge of my chair and sidestep toward my bedroom.

“Come here.”

“No.”

“All right.” My father takes two giant steps toward me, his arm raised, his fingers clenched into a fist. I can see each white knuckle, as hard as a stone.

He's never raised his fist to me. Not once that I remember. This is because of not wanting to be the kind of father that his father was.

I'm looking from my bedroom door to the front door, trying to decide which one is closer, when a blur of blond fur hurtles into the air and leaps against my father's chest, growling.

“Rain!” I cry.

She lands on the floor and gets ready to spring again, but before she can, my father lowers his fist. He brings it down on Rain's back and she lurches sideways and crashes into the legs of the table. I hear a crunch, and Rain's yelp of fear and pain.

I turn and fling myself beneath the table so fast I skin my knees on the floorboards. I gather Rain into my arms and slide us under the very center of the table. My father reaches for us and I scoot us away from his grasp, again and again, like we are targets in a game.

“Don't touch her!” I cry. “Do not touch her, do not hurt her.”

I won't let go of Rain. After a few moments the hand disappears. I hear footsteps crossing the room to the front door. The knob begins to turn, then stops. I slide forward a few inches and peer out from under the table.

“If you say one word about this to anyone, Rose—
one word
—” My father is breathing heavily. He has to pause before he can continue speaking. “If you say one word to Weldon, to Mrs. Kushel—” His gaze drifts to Rain who, although she's trembling, has also poked her head out from under the table. He glares at her. He doesn't finish his sentence. He doesn't have to. I slide Rain behind me so that she's out of his sight.

My father grabs his keys and slams the front door behind him. I hold Rain for a long time. We're breathing heavily too. My breath comes in gasps, and Rain pants and drools.

When I hear Sam Diamond's car start up, I crawl out from under the table. I pull Rain after me and we sit on the couch. I pat her whole body, over and over. Nothing seems to hurt her. I make her walk across the floor. She doesn't limp.

Later I feed Rain her dinner. I walk her earlier than usual, even though this is an unwelcome change in our schedule, and then I close her into my room.

I wonder how I'll be able to protect her when I'm at school.

*   *   *

I'm still up when my father comes home. I'm sitting in the living room with the TV on.

My father stands before me and says, “I'm sorry, Rose. It won't happen again.”

I look into his eyes. I don't know how to read what I see there, so I say nothing.

“Really,” my father continues. “I'm very sorry. Very, very sorry.”

“Okay,” I say.

This may be a sincere apology.

 

43

What Mrs. Kushel Says

Time passes in school the way it always does. Mrs. Kushel changes the bulletin board from
HOLIDAYS
to
WE ARE ALL ARTISTS!
Some of the snow melts and for a while the playground is muddy and wet instead of snowy and wet. The next holiday will be Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

On a morning that is dark and rainy and chilly, Mrs. Leibler walks me to our classroom as usual. But something that is not usual is that Mrs. Kushel takes me to the back of the room as soon as I have hung up my coat and put my things in my desk.

“I want to speak with you privately, Rose,” she says.

I wonder if I have done something that she and Mrs. Leibler will write about in the weekly note to my father.

“Okay,” I say, and think about homonyms.
Tied
and
tide
is a new one.

“I wanted to let you know that the newspaper got a call about Rain yesterday.”

Tied, tide. Died, dyed.

“Are you listening to me, Rose?”

“Yes.”

“A man named Jason Henderson phoned. He said someone had just sent him the article and that Rain is his family's dog. The newspaper put him in touch with Happy Tails, and Mrs. Caporale is certain that he and his family are Rain's original owners. All their information matches up with the information from Rain's chip. Also, they have lots of photos of themselves with Rain.” Mrs. Kushel pauses and looks at me seriously. “I don't know whether this is good news for you or bad news.”

“The article worked,” I say.

“Yes, it did. Would you like to know how Rain got separated from the Hendersons?”

“Yes.”

“They always took her collar off when she was in the house so that it wouldn't get snagged on anything. One day the Hendersons went out and left Rain at home alone. A neighbor dropped by to leave something in their kitchen and Rain slipped outside without her collar. The neighbor didn't see her leave, so it was several hours before anyone knew she was missing. This happened two days before your father found her, Rose.”

“The Hendersons weren't irresponsible after all,” I say. “It was an accident.” Rain left their house without her collar, just like she left our house after the storm without her collar.

“Yes. A sad accident. We'll never know how Rain wound up so far from home, but she did. The Hendersons looked for her in their town—they put up flyers and placed an ad in the paper—but no one called to say they had found her.”

“Because we had her.”

Mrs. Kushel cocks her head to the side. “But now you've done a very brave thing, like Ms. Perlman said.”

“Okay.”

“The rest of the story you learned yourself. The Hendersons had to abandon their home after the storm, and they're living with relatives now. That's why it was so hard to locate them.” Mrs. Kushel pauses. “They want Rain back, Rose. They love her and miss her and want her very badly.”

“Okay.”

 

44

Good-bye

The very next day Uncle Weldon picks me up from school, as usual. He drives me home, as usual. When we reach our house, I cross the planks as usual, and I see Rain watching me from a window. What is not usual is that Uncle Weldon is still sitting in the truck. He's waiting for Rain and me.

I put my school things inside. Then I clip Rain's leash to her collar and walk her around the yard for a while. She pees and poops, and sniffs at her favorite things—a stump, the bottom porch step, a particular spot near the garage door. Uncle Weldon watches us from the truck.

My father is not at home. He's probably at The Luck of the Irish. But I can tell that he was working on the new bridge this morning.

I think my father doesn't want to say good-bye to Rain.

I lead Rain to the truck. She sits between Uncle Weldon and me as we drive along. She looks out the window seriously.

The other day Mrs. Leibler told me to try to see things from someone else's perspective. “Put yourself in that person's place, Rose,” she said. “What do you think she's thinking? What is she feeling?” I'm not sure what Rain is thinking or feeling now, but she looks like she's watching the road for people who are making driving mistakes.

Uncle Weldon and Rain and I ride to Happy Tails. We don't say much. Our space in the truck is very quiet.

I stroke the white toes on Rain's front feet. Her toes are as soft as pussy willows.

Uncle Weldon turns onto the drive to Happy Tails. He parks the truck and then he looks at me for a long time.

“Are you all right, Rose?” he asks.

I stare out the window and remember my father whacking Rain on the back and fishing for us under the table.

“I think the Hendersons will take good care of her,” I reply.

I help Rain out of the truck and lead her along the walk to the door of Happy Tails. Rain starts to shake, which makes me believe that she remembers Happy Tails and that she isn't happy to be back here. Beyond that, I don't know what she's feeling.