After the Rain

Chapter Two

     The clouds rose high and swift, covering and uncovering the sun, casting the sloping green cemetery in shadow and light. Life was like that, Tommy thought, the world one day a dark and dreary place, the next bright and full of promise. But death he couldn't think about right now. It all seemed so black and hopeless.
     Terri was dead.
     They stood by the grave, dressed in mourning, on a low hill that looked through tall trees to an orchard and a wide watermelon field beyond. It was a pretty place, he supposed, if you had to be buried.
Sauli was present, as were Natalie, Adam, and a minister, but pitifully, Ellie had not been able to come pay her last respects. She was in a children's clinic under heavy supervision. She'd suffered a serious head trauma and amnesia. Though Ellie could hardly remember her mother, she had explained everything that she could about what had happened that night, and Sauli, in charge of the paranormal research unit in the hospital, had been shocked and mystified. He had Jarrett, Natalie's cheerful best friend, take Ellie to the clinic for research and monitoring.
     No one except for Tommy had known about Ellie's connection to Terri's death, or that Terri had had a daughter. Her husband had left after she discovered she was pregnant, and hadn't wanted the news to be widely known. It just hadn't seemed worth mentioning, even more so now that she was gone. Tommy refused to talk about his beloved girlfriend. The pain was simply crushing and unbearable.
     The minister read a psalm about the shadow of the valley of death and having no fear, and Tommy felt that for Terri it was a proper reading, for her life, more than anyone's that he had ever met, had been truly righteous. At the close of the prayers, they each stepped forward and laid a rose atop the casket. The casket was not an expensive one, nor was it very big. But it was enough.
     Tommy came next, at the end of the line. The last two days, no one had seen him shed a tear, nor had he at any time failed to say the right words. He did not ask for sympathy and he continued to stand tall. Yet he had become a robot. His spark was gone. Perhaps it would be gone for a long time.
    He stayed behind as everyone went to their cars, to the parking lot at the bottom of the hill, nice and far. Tears stung his eyes, and he hated his watery weakness. Tommy swiped at his eyes before they could fall with quick, angry motions, choking on the despair that weighed down his chest. He clenched his hands into tight fists amd yelled, "Terri!"
The cry echoed over the cemetery and through the orchard. Of course, there came no answer. The fury left Tommy's face as quickly as it had come.
    "I'm sorry, Terri..." he croaked softly. His suffering silence filled him with as much awe as sorrow. He had never cried so much or felt so crushed and defeated. With a wedding you could always throw rice, but there never seemed to be a good way to end a funeral.
His tears—he should have run out of them yesterday—bubbled up again. "Damn it," he mumbled, swiping the tears away.
     For the last several minutes, the sun had been hidden behind the clouds and it appeared that a storm was truly on its way. Here they'd been cooking for last few weeks and now when summer was about to officially begin, they were going to get rained on.
     Tommy stuck his hands in his pockets and felt something small touch his right hand. When he took out the small satin box, his heart shrank into a small, sharp, painful rock. He remembered this morning as he numbly took it from atop his dresser and slid it in his pocket, planning to put it on the casket, but he never thought it would've been so hard.
     He opened the lid. Inside, nestled in the soft black satin, was a white gold ring with three circular-cut diamonds. The one in the center was the largest, the two surrounding it about half its size. Despite the gloomy weather that had rolled in, it sparkled faintly as the light caught it when Tommy's hand started to tremble.
     Terri's engagement ring.
     He had planned to propose to her on her birthday, only a month away.
Tommy's hand closed around the box and it shut with a hollow snap. The sound seemed deafening on the quiet hill. Another meltdown with tears swept over him.