When the Rain Cleared, So Did My Love

The rain came down harder, until everything blurred.

Before long, the hum of an engine sounded behind me.

Richard and Delilah sat in the car, watching me like I was some kind of joke.

"Rosamond, you've been walking for half an hour. The suffering act is getting old. That's enough."

"Get in the car and come home with me. Apologize to Delilah, and I'll pretend none of this ever happened."

I bit down hard on my lip and dragged my bad leg forward.

I was swaying on my feet, but I didn't stop.

Richard kept blasting the horn, then threw open the door and came at me.

"Rosamond, are you done yet? I'm giving you a way out, and you'd rather make a spectacle of yourself in the middle of the road?"

He was strong. He wrenched both tablets out of my arms.

"Give them back!"

Richard knocked my hands away and hurled the tablets to the ground.

Then he lifted his foot and stomped down without a shred of mercy.

"Richard!"

My eyes went wide with rage. He only looked down at me from where he stood.

"You're going to fight me forever over a couple of worthless wooden tablets?"

"You won't listen to the living, but you cling to dead people's things day and night to sicken everyone!"

"I'm crushing them today. Let's see you keep acting out after that!"

I knelt down in the rainwater, my hands shaking as I tried to piece the fragments back together.

There was nothing left inside me. I slowly raised my head.

"Richard, from now on, I will never appear in front of you again."

Panic flickered across his eyes, but he crushed it down fast.

"Rosamond, quit talking tough. You love me so much you can't survive without me. You think I don't know that?"

"Where else could you go, besides coming home to the Farley family with me?"

He hadn't finished when a low voice came from behind us.

"Rosie, I'm here to take you home."

Richard turned his head, startled, and the moment he saw who it was, he froze where he stood.