When it rains in the desert

Dying Artists

We were around an hour away from my parents house, we'd stopped off to use the bathroom and get food at around 4 am. Whist she was using the bathroom, I filled the tank. We'd stopped off at this shabby little corner that had a McDonald's, a 7- eleven and a gas station.

It was warm for an autumn morning, still breezy but a warm-ish breeze. "What are you doing? " I asked as I noticed that she was getting a blanket out of the trunk.

"Well Mr Mendoza, we can't sit inside the car and eat, that would be boring" She said, placing herself in the boot and looking back at me to follow her. I shrugged my shoulders and sat next to her. She wrapped the blanket around us and handed me my coffee. We drank our coffees silently for a few moments, both just staring at the sun slowly rising in front of us. Ahead another car was pulling up at the gas station. a small man came out of the car and began filling his tank.

"you know-" Celia started, causing me to shift my gaze from the man to her. "My brother wanted to be an artist." She smiled at the memory of her brother. I was about to ask why he never pursued it but I thought it would be a painful question to answer. "My uncle had other plans for him but he was so talented. I never understood how so much talent could just manifest in one person." She took another sip of her coffee.

I listened, grateful that she was opening up without me prompting. It made me feel like we'd accomplished something, that she felt comfortable. "He used to say that when an artist dies, God lets them design one last sunrise for people to wake up to and one last sunset for people to fall asleep to. "She looked at me smiling and resumed " Kind of like a "one last masterpiece" thing."

She was silent for a few seconds again, i could tell she was filtering the information, making sure she wasn't revealing too much.

"When her -erm- when I got the phone call in the airport from the hospital, they told me he had left a note for me and they would be mailing it over along with some of his things and I couldn't concentrate because I looked out of the window and the sun was rising. It was the most beautiful sunrise i'd ever seen. The kind where the sky had patches of pink and orange." She rested her head on my shoulder and I felt her deflate and she relaxed into me, as though she was releasing all her grief into my bones. "Every time I see a pretty sunset or sunrise, I like to think that carter is up there somewhere designing it."

"That's beautiful Celia" I said wrapping my arm around her so her head was now resting on my chest.

"Yeah" she whispered. We sat there for around an hour until the sun had completely risen, we got back into the car and carried on the drive to my parents house.

As soon as i started to recognize the streets and the houses I began to smile for a reason I couldn't explain. I felt like I was 5 years old again and I was learning to ride my bike. Celia turned into the street and said "wow" as she was looking around at each of the houses on the street.

She laughed a deep laugh and said "You were really that kid huh?" i looked at her, question in my eyes,

"What kid?"

She looked back at me and said " Oh come on, you know, the red picket fence kid, the kid who went to karate and football on the weekends " I told her to turn into the drive way at the end of the street as she carried on. " I bet you had family BBQs and play dates" She said, still giggling. She turned off the car and took off her seat belt to turn to look at me.

"For your information I played soccer and the only friend I ever had was Aaron and my parents never liked him" She smiled at me again, so very amused

"For your information, in England, we call soccer football" and booped my nose before opening the car door and getting out.