Worthy of Rain

by Elizaveta Fehr

  Get out, get out, get out. Look for a way out.

  I moved faster towards the light, my legs scraping noisily against the ground. The patch of light was growing brighter and bigger by the second, as if the sun was rising behind it. The light was shining through the crack in the ceiling.

  Just a little closer, and I’d be there. I could look for a way out.

  And then, I saw it. The outline of a figure sat watching just beyond the edge of the light raining from above. And when it finally stepped out of the shadows and into the patch of light, I found myself too frozen to scream.

  The golden fur along its back seemed like it was on fire in the sunlight. His mane looked like the halo of a demonic angel. I watched his massive paws stand firm on the stone, his eyes as cold and vibrant as a hunter’s eyes should be.

  I could hardly move.

  The massive animal sniffed the air and swung his head back and forth, scanning the darkness. I sat perfectly still.

  Please don’t see me, please don’t see me.

  I knew my scent had betrayed me when the animal turned his head and set his heartless eyes right on my crouched figure. He stared me down.

  The perfect invitation.

  My heart sank and he held my gaze as he stalked forward, heavy paws padding silently on the stone. He was so close now that I could feel his breath on my face. I closed my eyes, hoping it would be quick. I couldn’t help the tears that rolled down my face.

  There was a slimy noise—like the sound of saliva when you open your mouth—and his whiskers brushed against my wet cheeks. All I could do was wait for the blow.

  Instead, I got a full-blown roar to the face and a fist-sized amount of saliva. His hot breath huffed against my face, and all I heard was the unmatched sounds of our breathing. I opened my eyes.

  There he was, a portion of his body now cast in the sunlight. He was poised contently on his haunches and his long tongue licked around his lips. He yawned and glanced at me with lazy eyes. I laughed. Relief washed over my body in a wave and I was thankful I was already sitting because I knew my legs would have given out.

  “Do you want a fork and a knife or something?” I asked out loud.

  “Lions can have manners too, you know.”

  I whipped around, peering into the now dimly lit corners of the cave. The voice could have come from anywhere. His words echoed fully around the cave.

  “Don’t worry, they won’t bite. I’ve been here all night and not one of them has touched me.”

  There, in the corner of the room. A figure shifted in the shadows, and I stared at the shape approaching me in the dimness.

  “Them?” More shadows moved in the darkness at the sound of my words. I froze, alarms sounding in my head.

  “It wouldn’t be a lion’s den if there was only one lion.”

  Another soft body brushed past me, his overwhelming weight almost sending me backwards. The shadows shifted into the light and two more of them appeared, stretching their legs in the sun. I heard the echo of the voice disappear in the cave, and it almost sounded…familiar. Like the lingering voice of someone I once knew.

  “What are we doing here?” I decided to ask instead. I warily circled the figure who hadn’t emerged from the shadows just yet.

  He chuckled. “I am not certain why you’re here, but I’m here because I was punished.”

  I glanced at the lions resting lazily in the sunshine. “Some punishment.”

  The figure stepped forward. I could almost see the white in his eyes. His figure had become more pronounced. “When you believe in a god who can shut a lion’s jaws, there’s nothing that could come close to punishment.”

  I stared closer at the figure’s face that was coming into view. My mind searched for recognition.

  “I was good friends with King Darius. I was one of his top administrators actually. But the others were jealous. They convinced him to make a law targeting my religion. They found me disobeying the king’s law and sentenced me to death. King Darius didn’t know of my faith, but he told me he’d believe if my god would come to save me.”

  The figure stepped out of the shadows, the light hitting his features in rays of sunbeams. He was older, maybe around eighty or ninety years of age, but his eyes and his smile were the same as I remembered.

  “Daniel,” I breathed.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  “A stone was brought and placed over the mouth of the den.”

  Daniel 6:17 NIV

  His laugh echoed against the stone walls of the cave.

  “I don’t know how you got here,” he began. “But you certainly haven’t aged a day.” I ran to hug him, and his fragile but firm arms tightened around me.

  “I thought I’d never see you again,” I mumbled into his tunic. I looked up at him and stepped back to see him fully. “The others…what they did to them…it was awful. I just stood there and watched them get thrown into the fire. It happened so fast—”

  “I know, I know,” Daniel rested both of his hands on my shoulders. “But they were saved, just like I am now.”

  “How? How do you have the faith to believe in such things?” I remembered me asking the younger Daniel this question. Would he have the same answer after so many years?

  Daniel let his arms drop and smiled at me. “His love is like nothing you will ever feel from anything on this earth. That’s worth living for.”

  It wasn’t the same. It was even better.

  Before I could respond, the walls began to shake as the ceiling rolled open, light cascading into the cave like a waterfall. I shielded my eyes from the sun and tried to angle my face towards the opening appearing above us. The silhouette of a face appeared at the edge of the pit.

  “Daniel! Servant of the living god! Are you alive?”

  Daniel turned so that most of his body faced the figure peering over the edge. “Yes, King Darius, I am saved.”

  I gasped and stared at my hands as they started to turn into golden dust. No, no, no. I wasn’t ready to leave yet. I still had so many questions. I took a step forward to attempt to reach Daniel, but my legs gave way as the story dissolved into dust.

  I blinked. Everything was gone.

  After the bus dropped me off at my stop, I walked in the other direction towards the library. It wasn’t a particularly warm day. A slight breeze chilled my bare skin, but I was enjoying the fresh air. It helped pull myself out of the fog that was threatening to fill up my head.

  The back entrance swung open and I sidestepped another person exiting the building with a stack of books in his arms. The bell on the door tinkled as I walked in. I made my way to the main floor. The smell of books hit my nostrils in one strong waft. I inhaled, breathing it in, and meandered through the shelves nostalgically. I let my fingertips graze the books as my eyes skipped over the titles. Just like when my mom and I used to go there together.

  Jace would be here any minute, but I came a little early just for this part.

  I saw him at the door with his backpack flung over one shoulder. Parting miserably with the books, I walked over to him.

  “Want to find a spot?” I asked, turning to the tables and chairs scattered throughout the main room.

  He nodded. “Sure, let’s go over there.” He jerked his head towards a set of tables nestled in the back of the room. He headed towards them and I followed after.

  I hugged my backpack closer to my body. Maybe he had been nice to me earlier. So what? He was still Jace—ignorant and arrogant and rude.

  I glanced at the back of his head. But what if…things changed?

  “Alright, first things first—we do our research.” Jace’s voice jerked me out of my daydream. “And that means looking at our main source.” He tapped the book he had placed on the table while I was busy gaining my composure.

  It was a Bible.

  “Fine with me,” I said placidly. I wasn’t sure how to act around Jace anymore. I sat across from him in one of the padded rocking chairs placed around the table.
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  “I’ve already read the beginning of Genesis. You said you did too, right?”

  I sighed. “I’m not as…familiar…with all of this stuff as much as you are.” I pulled out my own Bible carefully, hoping the edges wouldn’t tear in front of him. The book wasn’t exactly in the best condition.

  Jace snorted. “Believe me, I used to be in the same boat.”

  I shot a troubled glance at him.

  His face went pale. “I guess I don’t really show it much at school.”

  I shrugged. “I mean…not really.”

  “There’s a lot you don’t know about me.” Jace cleared his throat and stared a little too closely at the project rubric he had set out in front of him. “How about you work on catching up, and then we can start researching outside of the book? I’ll start brainstorming ideas.”

  I pulled the Bible closer to me and opened to a page. The letters in each word seemed to dance, as if itching to morph and fold me into a new time period.

  I covered the page quickly with my palm. I forgot. As soon as I read, I’d be gone into another story. I didn’t know enough about my little talent to figure out if anything happened to my real body while I was gone, and, quite frankly, disappearing in the middle of a library in front of Jace didn’t seem like a great idea.

  But hadn’t I already been through Genesis? I hadn’t been able to go back through in the past, but I wasn’t sure.

  I wasn’t about to take that chance. I opened up to the table of contents and lifted the book up in front of me. From behind the fat pages, I heard Jace settling and rustling through a stack of papers and scribbling notes.

  Well, this was going to take a while.

  I stared at the first heading marked with the first page number next to it. It still weirded me out that my name was in a book I’d never read before. Was I named after it, or was it some bizarre coincidence? After what I felt was about ten minutes, and after counting how many of each letter of the alphabet was on the page, I closed the book shut.

  I jumped back. Jace’s intense green eyes were staring back at me in my now open view. I stumbled for words. “What…um…uh…how long have you been…staring…at me?” I said too defensively.

  “You haven’t turned one page in the last ten minutes.”

  I tipped the rocking chair back and forth nervously. “What—what do you mean? Yes, I have.”

  He closed his book loudly. “Look, if you don’t want to do this, I get it. It was a lot to ask anyway. Obviously, if reading the Bible is too much for you, this project isn’t going to work.” He sounded disappointed, like he had been excited about this whole thing and I had just shot it down. He was standing up, gathering his belongings together in quick sweeps.

  “Where are you going?”

  He zipped his bag shut and slung it over his shoulder. “Home.”

  My stomach lurched. “No, wait. I do want to do this, it’s just—”

  He turned to face me. “It’s just what, Genesis?” The heading on the page played back in my mind.

  I gulped down the knot building in my throat. “It’s just…you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” I expected him to ask what I was talking about. But he didn’t. He nodded, and said, “That makes two of us.”

  I leaned over to tug on his unoccupied shoulder strap. “Please, just sit back down.”

  His face was cloudy, wheels turning a million miles a minute. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking about. Maybe that scared me a little, maybe it didn’t. Regardless, he seemed to be considering.

  He chewed on his lip for a moment, then replied, “Okay,” and sat back down.

  I tipped my chair forward again. “Er…tell me about some of your ideas,” I said, glancing at the wadded-up papers in his hand.

  He unfolded them and pushed them forward slowly, still a little reluctant. I flipped them around so that the papers faced me.

  They weren’t notes. They were drawings. Tons of drawings. Little sketches littered the corners of the paper. A waterfall, a sun, a tree, the elephant. And they weren’t little stick figure sketches. They were actually pretty good. He even shaded.

  “Oh…wow,” I breathed, scanning the page.

  “The idea hasn’t really pieced together in my head yet, but I was thinking we could really make this project pop with a miniature sized model.” His eyes seemed to brighten a little as he pointed at the scattered drawings.

  I looked up at him. “What? You mean, like a diorama?”

  He leaned back in his rocking chair, his arms resting behind his head. “Precisely.”

  I perused the drawings one more time. It wasn’t a bad idea. But in the back of my head, I thought back to the first time I’d opened that Bible. With this new project, I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to keep my newfound talent a secret any longer. It’d be best to call it off. That’d be the logical thing to do.

  But instead, I nodded and slid the paper back across the table.

  “You know, I might have just the thing for it.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  “Hey,” I greeted my dad as I dropped my book bag by the kitchen table. He was sitting with his laptop in front of him, reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. He looked down and tapped my bag with his foot.

  I huffed and picked it up to move it to the couch.

  “Back already?” he called from the kitchen as I pulled my shoes off. I tossed them in the hallway and unzipped my bag.

  “Yeah,” I responded distractedly. “We got a bunch of ideas for the project, but nothing solid.” I heard the movement of the kitchen chairs groaning under his weight, and he appeared at the entryway to the living room.

  “How was school?” He crossed his arms and smiled, leaning against the doorframe.

  “Good.” I looked up. “How was school?” It was our ongoing joke.

  He chuckled. “Just as interesting as ever. High schoolers are crazy,” he continued. “Just you wait for next year when you’re a freshman. You’ll see.”

  I rolled my eyes. My dad loved every minute of his job, but he never quite understood what it took to tame a classroom filled with wild sixteen-year-olds. I squeezed past him in the entryway and grabbed a pretzel from the bag. Its contents were spilled out on the counter.

  “These are stale,” I mumbled sticking out my tongue. He grimaced as he saw the ground up bits of pretzel stuck to it.

  “I could have told you that,” he winked.

  I groaned, “Daddddd,” and spat out the rest of the pretzel in the trash can. I grabbed a cookie from a box on the counter instead and popped it in the microwave, right on the crusty tray. We really needed to clean that.

  “What is this project about anyway?”

  I pulled the cookie out after fifteen seconds and broke a part off. I let the chocolate melt in my mouth and chewed, buying myself time. I didn’t want to share my secret with my dad just yet. It didn’t seem…right. Not yet anyway.

  I guessed the best kind of lie was the one closest to the truth.

  “It’s a history project, actually.”

  My dad lifted his eyebrows, interested. “Ooooh, maybe I can help.”

  I gave him a wary glance and hid my face behind the refrigerator door.

  “You know, I think we’re good. But thanks.” I pulled out a carton of milk. “Mrs. Whitaker really stressed how much we needed to do it on our own, without parental help.” I tried to sound convincing.

  “Okay. Just let me know if you need anything,” he responded good-naturedly.

  I sighed with relief and closed the refrigerator door. My dad turned to exit into the living room and smashed my white Converse sneakers under his foot. He picked it up and flung it at me lightly. “I swear, the biggest reason why this house is so messy is because you leave your stuff lying around everywhere.”

  I gave him a shrug and poured a glass of milk into a cup. I thought back to his question about school. Okay, maybe I had lied a little. School wasn’t good. And I was only partially talking about J
ace and the whole locker room incident from the day before, because it wasn’t about him—not entirely.

  Earlier that day, I waited for Aven at our usual spot by the oak tree. I texted her I didn’t want to sit with the group today. I wanted it to be just us again. Like it always has been.

  But she never showed. And when I went back inside as the ending lunch bell rang, I saw her sitting with Alex instead. She texted me later that she just didn’t see my text, but it was hard to believe her.

  I was still trying to brush away the sting.

  I took my dad’s spot at the table and shoved the computer to the side. A stack of papers plummeted from the table and landed in an almost perfect heap on the floor. I decided to leave it. Ever since mom died, it had been this way around the house quite often, and I was pretty sure it wasn’t entirely my fault.

  I looked at the stack and sighed, bending to pick them up. I should be better. If not for me, then for Dad, because, at this point, we were all we had.

  A part of me wanted to, but a bigger part of me didn’t. Because I knew, underneath all of the crap we had piled up over the years, I was afraid to find the memories that were buried throughout the house.

  Maybe it wasn’t so bad if we never really saw what it used to look like.

  “Oh my goodness,” I gasped as Jace handed me a wooden figurine. It was an elephant carved out of birch. He had even nicked details into its feet and head, sculpting its wrinkles and fan-like ears.

  “How did you—”

  “My grandfather,” he interjected, “used to have a woodworking shop. He taught me how to do some of it.” He scratched his head as his cheeks warmed.

  “Your tent…at the market.”

  Jace nodded.

  “He…used to have a woodworking shop?”

  Jace shifted uncomfortably in his seat and looked down at his folded hands. “That day you came…I might have made it up that it was still my grandpa’s tent. Well, it was, and it still is. But after he passed away last year, I’ve been running it for him.”