Waiting for the Rain

They sat, as they always did, on the low stone wall by the field. The field itself, dry, cracked, and begging for some absolution from the sky, stretched out before them. Two men, neither young nor old, neither thin nor thick, merely there, as much a part of the landscape as the wall and the dirt beneath it.

One of them, Joss, picked at his boots with a stick. Not for any particular reason. He had stopped thinking of reasons long ago. His boots were covered in the dust of seasons that had come and gone with no care for the passage of time, much like himself. The other, Madd, stared up at the clouds—great grey lumps that sagged in the air but refused to burst. He scratched his chin, which no longer needed scratching, the beard long since worn away.

"Rain'll come," Joss muttered, more out of habit than belief.

Madd didn't answer. He never did. Joss, on some level, admired that. Madd didn't care about answers. He just sat, waiting. There was a kind of peace in it, Joss thought. Maybe peace wasn't the word. Maybe there wasn't a word. There were so few words left, and fewer still that mattered.

Joss sighed, flicked the stick away. Watched it roll a little before settling into the dirt. He thought about picking it up again but decided against it. It wasn't worth the effort. His eyes followed the clouds, grey and stubborn. They were always there, like the promise of something better, something wet and clean. But the promise was always broken.

"You think it'll come?" Joss asked, though he knew Madd wouldn't reply. He knew. The question wasn't for Madd. It was for the silence that always followed.

The silence came, as expected. It wrapped around them both, thick and oppressive, like the air before a storm that never arrived. Joss could feel the weight of it pressing down, the empty space between the words he wanted to say and the ones he'd forgotten.

"We could go inside," he said, breaking the silence just as it had begun to feel comfortable. "But it won't change anything."

Madd grunted. It was the closest thing to a conversation they'd had in weeks. Maybe months. Joss wasn't sure anymore. Time was as stubborn as the rain—there, but not really. He looked at Madd, whose face was carved into a frown by years of nothing in particular.

"I had a dream last night," Joss said. Madd didn't ask what about. Joss told him anyway. "It was raining. Pouring, really. The whole field was under water, and I was out there, trying to catch it all in my hands." He paused. "Couldn't do it. Slipped right through."

He waited for Madd to say something, but of course, Madd didn't. The silence returned, slipping back into place like it had never left.

The clouds hung heavy, indifferent, as always. Maybe they'd break, maybe they wouldn't. It didn't really matter. The wall would still be there. So would the field, dry and cracked, waiting for something that wouldn't come.

Joss scratched his chin and stared out at the horizon, which never seemed to get any closer. "We'll wait, then," he said, mostly to himself.

Madd nodded.