Ten Days Away

Part Six ~ Friday Afternoon

The day had turned quite warm as Tom sat on Ruby’s front porch.  The breeze died and the air had turned heavy and hot.  There was some kind of insect in the trees that made a constant buzzing sound that almost made him feel like the air itself was vibrating.  If it wasn’t for the fabric awning protecting the deck from the sun it would have been uncomfortable to sit out.  But the protected little haven was just right to enjoy this warm day.

His inbox had been full of notices from his Twitter and Facebook pages.  Most of his cast mates let their assistants send generic responses to the fans, but being that he was the least famous of the group, he hadn’t quite fathomed the fan base that he would attract.  He responded to a select number of posts on his own but tried to keep it to a minimum.  One comment from him would cause a downpour of responses from attention seeking fans.

Tom had never considered himself attractive to the opposite sex while he was growing up.  He had been the tallest of his year and very skinny even though he ate constantly, and his dastardly evil hair did not help matters either.  The unruly curls were a nightmare while growing up but now seemed to be one of the traits that his online followers adored about him.  Another trait was his voice, a follower of his posted that she’d enjoy listening to him recite the phone book.

A while later as he was halfway through an email response to his sister, he looked up and realized that the sky was beginning to darken and a cool breeze was starting to find it’s way through the trees.  A low rumble of thunder came from the clouds that had started to crawl across the lake towards the resort.

Tom snapped his computer shut and got up from the chair in the hope he could get back to his cabin before the rain began but as he started down the steps of Ruby’s porch the rain began to fall.  He went back up to the shelter of the covered porch and sat back in the chair to wait out Mother Nature’s show.

The rain drops were fat and each made a “THUD” noise as it landed.  This type of rain was new to him, and having grown up in England he thought he knew all there was to know about rain.  Tom stood up, walked to the edge of the porch to hold out his hand into the rain.  As he stood there marveling at the size of the drops there was a bright flash of light over the hill behind the cabins.  The clap of thunder that followed made the little hairs on the back of Tom’s neck stand up, and seemed to open the heavens.  The rain began falling heavy enough that the resort was covered in a haze of fog and rain spray within seconds.

Another thunder clap came from the clouds, and as it rolled away Tom noticed a pair of headlights coming up the road through the sheets of rain.  Half of his brain wanted it to be Ruby, while the other half was mortified to be caught on her porch without her permission.  His mortified side lost, it was her.  As her car pulled up to the cabin, the passenger side window slid down.  Ruby was grinning at him from the driver’s seat.

"You lost, Mister?"

"No, sorry Ruby darling, I wasn’t quite finished with my email before the heavens opened up.  I’m afraid I’m trapped at the moment."

"No worries." Ruby laughed. “Give me two seconds."

The window slid closed and the Jeep pulled out of sight.  After a few moments, Tom could hear the clatter of Emmy’s nails on the wooden floor inside the cabin and the sound of her whining.  The front door opened and the dog burst out the door towards him.  For a split second, Tom’s fear of the dog coming to attack him was there but when he saw the expression on her face, it was gone.  Her tail was wagging and the ‘doggie’ smile was there as it had been that morning for someone else.  She put her nose under Tom’s hand and nudged it as she did the day before so that he was in perfect position to scratch her ears. Ruby followed the out the door taking off her rain soaked jacket, hanging it on the chair next to him.