The Storm Makers

by Jennifer E. Smith

  “So,” she asked, “how bad was it?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Dad said quietly. “It rained today, right?”

  Mom walked over to the edge of the porch and sat down on the top step. “It’s not like we can depend on that, though,” she said, and Ruby could hear the weariness in her sigh. “The crops aren’t enough. I think we know that now.”

  “We’ll be fine,” Dad told her, his voice firm. “It won’t be long before I finish the TGI, and you were so close with that painting of the barn….”

  Mom patted the stairs beside her, and Dad took a seat. “This was just an experiment,” she said, “and if it doesn’t work out, then—”

  “It will,” Dad interrupted forcefully.

  She nodded. “And what if the rain doesn’t come back?”

  “If the rain doesn’t come back,” Dad said, dropping his head, “then I don’t want them to know how close we are to losing this place.”

  Mom turned to him sharply. “How close are we?”

  Instead of answering, Dad pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket, which Mom took from him and began to read.

  “He didn’t even have any X-rays,” she murmured. “How can it be so much?”

  The question went unanswered, and Mom leaned her head on Dad’s shoulder. They sat there like that in shared silence, and even through the screen, Ruby could feel the unfamiliar chill in the air, a long forgotten coolness that whistled through the corn and laced its way into the house.

  A few minutes later, when they finally stood to come back inside, Ruby hurried over to feed the dogs, her mouth chalky as she filled the glinting bowls.

  “Aren’t you about ready for bed, too?” Dad asked when he saw that she was still up. The screen door bounced shut behind Mom, who rearranged her face into something more cheerful when she noticed Ruby.

  “Yeah,” she said hoarsely, turning to leave. Mom reached out to give her a hug as she walked past, smoothing her hair and then kissing her on the forehead.

  “Thanks for all your help,” she said. “Simon’s lucky to have such a great sister.”

  Ruby nodded, worn out by all that had happened that day. There were so many questions still unanswered, so many things she still didn’t know, and—worst of all—nothing to do but wait for Otis to show up again.

  It seemed there would be no end to the things she could find to worry about tonight—huge things, terrifying things—like whether the man in the waiting room had been looking for Simon, too, and why Otis had disappeared so suddenly, and whether her brother was going to be all right.

  But what worried her the most was this: Simon had made it rain.

  He’d gotten sick, and the skies had opened up.

  Her brother, who ate ketchup straight out of the bottle and wore the same socks for days at a time, had apparently done the impossible.

  And that changed everything.

  Once she’d brushed her teeth and put on her pajamas, Ruby sat on her bed and pushed back the curtains, looking out at the barn, which stood silent and glowing, its chipping paint mottled beneath the yellow moon.

  After the morning’s storm, it was hard to believe how quiet the sky could be, but it was now vast and still and flaked with stars. She wondered if it was someone’s job to do just this, to close up shop at the end of the day, tuck the edges of the night sky in around the fields like they were putting the world to bed. It seemed a peaceful thing, a job for someone watchful and calm, and Ruby thought it might be something she’d be good at.

  After a moment, she closed the curtain and swung her feet off the bed, tiptoeing across the hall to Simon’s room. He was already asleep, making soft snuffling sounds, one foot poking out from under the sheets. Ruby leaned against the doorframe, her eyelids heavy, her mind still busy.

  There are days where time splits down the middle, and before and after no longer bear any resemblance to each other. Ruby already knew that this was one of those days—that everything had already changed, and that tomorrow she’d be faced with the unwelcome task of moving forward, whether she wanted to or not.

  But for now, she stood there and watched Simon sleep, the questions welling up inside her, the knot of fear in her chest pulling itself tighter. There was no way to know why he’d been chosen, or what would happen as a result. All she could do for now was go to sleep, and let tomorrow come.

  eight

  WHEN RUBY LOOKED OUT HER WINDOW the following morning, she was surprised by how much damage the storm had done. Most of the fields to the south looked as if they’d fallen victim to some sort of stampede, and the only trees in sight—two old elms that stood like sentinels on either side of the front door—were badly torn up, their branches littering the ground below.

  It took her a moment to remember all that had happened the night before, and the thought was slow to take shape in her mind: that it was Simon who was responsible for all this. Her skinny, rumpled brother, who had to lean with all his weight against the barn door to get it to open, had single-handedly inflicted all this destruction.

  Ruby yawned and pushed back the covers; she hardly remembered grabbing a blanket last night, but she’d needed it for the first time in a month. She fished the barometer out from the pocket of yesterday’s shorts, peering down at the little swaying needle, which was now pointed to fair. She still wasn’t exactly sure what she should be looking for—what she should be hoping for—but after yesterday’s storm, fair seemed just fine to her.

  The light from the window fell in angled squares across her bedroom floor, and she padded through them in her bare feet, wondering if Simon was up yet. She pulled on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, then hurried out into the hallway, where she saw through the open door that his bed was empty and unmade.

  Downstairs, Mom and Dad were in the kitchen, reading about the storm in the newspaper. Dad waved a piece of toast at her as she walked in, but Ruby had more important things to worry about than breakfast.

  “Where’s Simon?”

  “Barn, I think,” Mom said. “He was up early.”

  “And he’s feeling much better,” Dad said, wafting the toast beneath Ruby’s nose.

  She grabbed an apple from the bowl on the table. “Back in a bit.”

  Outside, the world still looked as if it were drying out, the sky shot through with silver, the ground soft and damp. When she reached the barn, Ruby heaved open the door and then stood there for a moment, letting her eyes adjust. Simon was lying on the pile of hay in the back, his head propped on his arms as if he were stargazing. But the only thing to look at was a collection of cobwebs on the pitched ceiling of the barn, and a small jagged hole in one corner that Dad had been meaning to fix for a year now.

  “Hey,” Ruby said, stepping into the wedge of light made by the open door. “How’re you feeling?”

  Simon rolled his head to one side and squinted at her from across the long floor of the barn. Between them, Dad’s workbench and various instruments littered the open space, and Ruby stepped carefully around them.

  “Better,” Simon said quietly. “I guess.”

  He certainly didn’t look better. As Ruby took a seat beside him on the hay, she could see that his face was still thin and drawn, and there was a slight creasing at the corners of his eyes that perhaps only she could detect.

  Simon had always moved through life with such ease, and he’d settled into the farm much quicker than Ruby had. Almost as soon as they’d arrived in Wisconsin last year, he’d tried out for the town’s junior baseball team, quickly becoming their starting pitcher. But by the time school started, Ruby had realized that just because her twin brother was a baseball star didn’t mean she got to dodge all the standard new-kid issues, too. Especially since she was the type who preferred books to baseball, who was good at science and not so good at small talk.

  Early on, Simon made an effort to include her, but Ruby quickly grew tired of trying to keep up with his new friends, who were only ever nice to her in a tolerant sort of way. It had
all just seemed like further evidence that she and Simon were growing apart.

  But it also made it all the more alarming to see him like this now, the usual confidence behind his eyes replaced with something like worry.

  “You okay?” she asked, and he shrugged.

  “I didn’t sleep much last night.”

  “Me neither,” Ruby said, leaning back.

  They sat in silence, watching the wind in the doorway whip the puddles into miniature whirlpools. A spider crawled across the bale of hay beside Ruby and she studied it for a moment, trying to figure out what to do next.

  In the light of morning, everything Otis had told her yesterday seemed completely ridiculous. There was simply no good way to say it: that a man who’d been lurking in their barn had appeared on a hay wagon, foretold her brother’s illness, then showed up at the hospital and claimed Simon could control the weather.

  The thought of saying that out loud, of giving voice to something so completely insane, seemed to Ruby like admitting she was as crazy as Otis was.

  But what if he was right?

  Beside her, Simon yawned, pulling a stick from the bale of hay and jabbing it absently into his other hand. “I had the weirdest dream last night,” he said. “There was this guy in my room at the hospital….”

  Ruby swiveled to face him. “What?”

  “He was talking about clouds or something. Storm clouds, maybe? I can’t really remember.”

  Ruby took a deep breath, waiting for him to continue.

  “He was just sitting there, like he belonged in the room, and talking and talking and talking, and I couldn’t wake up.”

  Ruby wasn’t sure what made her ask the question, but it seemed important somehow. “Were you scared?”

  Simon shook his head. “Not really,” he said. “I mean, it wasn’t a nightmare or anything. I just wanted to know what he was trying to tell me.”

  Ruby bit her lip. “Was his name Otis?”

  “How would I know?” he asked, looking annoyed, and when she didn’t answer, he tossed the stick of hay and stood up. “It was only a dream.”

  “Simon,” she said, and he paused, lowering his gaze to meet hers. Ruby took a long breath. “What if it wasn’t?”

  nine

  ABOUT A MILE FROM THE HOUSE, there was a small pond surrounded by a grove of narrow trees. It sat on the edge of their property, a patch of green woods sprung up from the yellow farmland like a desert oasis, and they walked there now in silence, tracing a route along the western fields.

  The edges of the water were swollen from the previous night’s rain, and one of the trees had been split clear down the middle by lightning, part of it fallen at an angle to create a kind of steeple. Ruby walked a circle around it, running a hand along the rough bark.

  “So?” Simon said, planting his feet and raising his eyebrows. She’d promised him answers once they were here, but once again, Ruby had no idea where to begin.

  After a moment, she reached out and tapped the splintered bark of the tree with her palm. “I think you did this.”

  He shook his head. “I haven’t been down here in weeks.”

  “Simon.”

  “What?” he said stubbornly. “I haven’t.”

  Ruby took a few steps closer. “That guy in your hospital room? It wasn’t a dream. I brought him there.”

  Simon was looking more and more confused, and Ruby couldn’t really blame him. Maybe this was a mistake after all. Maybe she was as crazy as Otis.

  She looked at the broken tree once more, the fallen limbs, and then back at her brother, whose hands were on his hips in a gesture that fell somewhere between irritation and defiance. It seemed impossible that he could have been the one to do this. That his fever could have downed a whole tree. A tree.

  How would he ever believe her, when she wasn’t even quite sure she believed it herself?

  But then he kicked at the dirt, and the wind picked up, plucking dried leaves from branches and sending them flying, and Ruby’s eyes widened.

  “That,” she said, pointing at the ground. “I think you’re doing it now.”

  “Doing what?” he asked, glaring at her. “This is stupid. If there’s something you want to tell me, then tell me. Otherwise, I’m going back up to the barn.”

  Ruby took a deep breath. “I think…” she said, then hesitated. “I think you can control the weather.”

  Her heart thudded in her chest as she waited for Simon to respond, to laugh at her or storm away or demand more of an explanation. But to her surprise, he did none of these things. Instead, after a long moment, he simply shook his head and let out a breath.

  “Well,” he said with a grin.

  Ruby stared at him. “Well, what?”

  “The way you were acting, I thought it was going to be something really awful.”

  “I don’t think you get it….”

  “I do,” Simon said, and Ruby was struck by how calm he was, and how certain he sounded. She’d been prepared to defend herself, to have to convince him. That morning, she’d slipped the button into her pocket, and she still had the barometer, too; she was carrying them around with her like some kind of proof that Otis had been there after all. She’d thought she would need evidence. She’d thought she would need to make a case.

  But she’d been wrong. Simon appeared to be absorbing this information with roughly the same amount of astonishment reserved for Mom’s daily announcements about what was for dinner. Ruby stared at him as he paced back and forth along the edge of the water, apparently deep in thought.

  “I knew there was something strange going on,” he was saying. “I mean, think about the dogs. Haven’t you noticed how weird they’ve been around me?”

  “Yeah, but…”

  “And the toaster yesterday?”

  Ruby nodded, not sure what to say.

  “I mean, if it’s true,” he said, “then that would explain a lot.”

  Ruby walked over to the pier where they kept the little rowboat tied up. She kicked off her sandals to let her bare feet dangle in the water, and after a moment, Simon joined her.

  “So you knew?” she said quietly, and he shook his head.

  “Not exactly. But something’s been weird lately.”

  “For how long?”

  “Not long,” he said. “Maybe since school let out, since our birthday. Not long.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?”

  “Would you have believed me?”

  Ruby shook her head. “I’m not sure I even believe it now.”

  “Me neither,” Simon said with a grin.

  “That note you found yesterday?” she said, and he nodded. “It’s from this guy named Otis Gray.”

  “The guy from my dream.”

  “Right,” Ruby said. “Well, the guy from your hospital room, anyway. I saw him come out of the barn yesterday, and then I ran into him when I went out on my bike. He knew you were sick.”

  Simon bent his head, peering down at the water. “What else did he say?”

  “That there are these people who can control the weather,” she said. “They’re called Storm Makers. And you’re one of them.”

  “Wow.” He exhaled, fighting back a smile. Ruby could tell that however amazed he was, however impressed, he was trying hard to play it cool. But it wasn’t working.

  “This isn’t a game, Simon,” she said, sweeping an arm at the trees behind them. “All that damage? It’s because you got sick. Whatever this is, you need to figure out how to get it under control.”

  “Jeez,” he said. “Can you give me a minute here?”

  “Fine, but don’t be an idiot about this, okay? It’s not a magic trick. It’s real.”

  “I almost got electrocuted twice yesterday,” Simon said, annoyed. “I obviously get that it’s real.”

  “Fine,” Ruby said.

  “Fine,” he shot back.

  Neither of them said anything for a moment. Simon picked a splinter of wood out of the edge of the d
ock, and Ruby leaned over and searched for fish in the muddy waters.

  Finally, Simon cleared his throat. “Look, just because you’re not—”

  Ruby scowled. “Not what?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Just because I’m not one, too?” she said, struggling to her feet. “I should’ve known you’d be like this.”

  Simon stood up. “Like what?”

  “Even worse than you’ve already been lately.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing,” Ruby said. “Otis is coming back tonight, and hopefully he’ll explain about everything then.”

  “Great,” Simon said, shoving his feet back into his flip-flops. “I’ll tell him you say hi.”

  Ruby glared at him. “I’m coming, too. You don’t even know where it is.”

  “Fine,” he said, turning to walk back to the house.

  “And you better be in a good mood.”

  He paused. “Why?”

  “Because,” she said, hurrying past him, “I really don’t want to have to ride out there in the middle of a tornado or something.”

  ten

  BY THE TIME they made it back up to the barn, much of their anger seemed to have melted in the sun. Though he was about four paces ahead of her, Simon dropped back as they neared the house, which was his way of apologizing. Ruby reached over and punched his shoulder, which was hers. There were too many possibilities to discuss, too many things to marvel over; this was simply too big for them to stay mad at each other for long.

  As they ducked into the barn, Dad looked up and waved a wrench in greeting. “Anyone want to keep me company?”

  “No,” they both said at once, laughing.

  Simon grabbed a couple of mitts and a baseball, and for once, Ruby didn’t argue. They trooped back out into the heat together, zigzagging between the puddles on the gravel drive, which were already drying up again.

  Behind the house, they spread out, and Simon tossed the old baseball in her direction. They played in silence for a while, like actors going through the motions, pretending things were normal, though they were both keenly aware of the hours still left before they were due to meet Otis.