Rain Bear

Rain fell in torrents against the small countryside house as Gladys shuffled around her kitchen. She took a tarnished kettle from her old stovetop and filled it at a nearby sink.

“Gramma!” 

Her arms shook as she held the kettle. Fingers that carefully gripped its worn handle were wrinkled and spotted, her knuckles bulging under the skin despite efforts to calm the ever-growing arthritis. Gladys sighed, replacing the kettle on her stove. 

“Gramma!” The voice yelled again, this time louder. It came from the ceiling. 

Gladys winced. “Zig, do you want tea or not?”

“Well yeah.” A pause. “Why’s it taking so long?”

Retrieving a lighter with a thick handle and long grey tip, Gladys clicked it twice and held the flaming end under her kettle. Flames rushed upwards from the burner in a great woosh and died down as Gladys adjusted the burner knob. “This isn’t a microwave. It takes time to boil water.” A loud thud sounded above her head. Gladys looked up. “You alright?”

“Yeah, just got another big one.”

Gladys replaced the lighter. “Drag it over and I’ll help.” She followed the sound of something sliding above her until she reached a thin ladder propped into little grooves in the floor. The ladder led up into a dark, yawning hole; the entrance to the attic. Boxes of varies sizes lay scattered around it on the floor. 

Rob – the old fart – almost broke the rungs the last time he tried investigating what all was stashed up there. Since his death, Gladys hadn’t dared climbing the ladder. Partially because her weight likely exceeded Rob’s by now – she didn’t want to break another hip falling – and partially because she didn’t want to do it alone. 

Preparing for inevitable death was best done with company. 

Spring cleaning, she told her granddaughter. Haven’t been up there in ages. Gotta declutter while I’ve got the help. It wasn’t a complete lie. It needed doing. Better to get it out of the way now than have Zig and her mother do it while mourning. 

The corner of a cardboard box slid into view above her. Gladys stood in front of the bottom rung and held her arms out to catch it. 

After some muffled grunting, Zig cried, “It won’t fit!”

“I got it up there somehow. Push harder.”

The box bulged downwards slowly. 

“Oh come on,” Gladys said. She squatted as much as her knees would allow. “What’re you doing? Poking it?”

“Gramma!”

Gladys chuckled. She was cut off by a flood of objects raining down from above and stumbled back. Steadying herself, Gladys looked up into a large hole torn in the bottom of the box. She huffed. “Zig.”

“You told me to push!”

“Are you okay?”

“Are you? You’re the breakable one.” A pair of jean-clad legs descended, followed by a torso in a green shirt, a head of long blonde hair, and a pair of arms lugging the remainder of a once-whole cardboard box. “Sorry,” Zig said, plunking the box’s remains next to the others. 

Together they surveyed the chaos. 

A modge-podge of what appeared to be books, picture frames, candle sticks – why were those even there? – and several old clocks littered the floor. A flash of red caught Gladys’s eye, and she pulled it and the fluffy brown lump it was attached to out from under the pile. 

It was a stuffed bear. A bear in a red raincoat. 

“What’s that?” Zig asked.

Gladys blinked, inspecting it. “My old bear.” Something like dirt came off on her hand as she brushed her fingers over its little head. Its fur was matted and stained, the red of its coat quite faded. But it was still the same bear she remembered. 

“You’re too old for a bear.”

She shot her granddaughter a look. “You’re too young for makeup. You should look eleven, not fifteen.”

A sharp whistle sounded from the kitchen, halting Zig’s response. “Tea time!” she hollered, bounding out of sight. 

Gladys followed, the animal held gently to her chest. 

“This should be illegal,” Gladys said from her perch under the school’s roof. It stuck out just far enough to provide shelter from the torrential Abbotsford downpour. The clouds, the ground, even the school – it was all such a dull grey that even the sky sobbed. 

“What?” asked the girl, whose name was Evie. She splashed in puddles out in the rain, her red raincoat a vibrant dash of color against their surroundings. “The rain?”

“That too.” Gladys said. “But I meant, going to school on your birthday. I’m a teenager now. I should be celebrating!”

“Can’t we celebrate anyway?” Prancing around the center of a large puddle, Evie spread her arms wide. “Happy birthday!” She laughed joyously, tipped her face into the oncoming rain, wet red hair plastered all over her face. 

Holding a hand out to droplets that fell from the roof, Gladys caught several and held them until the cold was too much. She wiped them away on her pant leg. “So. You gonna give me by present or what?”

“What makes you think I gotta present to give?”

“You never put anything in those pockets,” Gladys said with a smug smile. “and that one’s stuffed full.”

Evie stopped spinning. “Rob told you, didn’t he? That traitor.”

Gladys jumped excitedly, “Give it!” and Evie handed a wrapped lump into waiting hands that eagerly tore the soggy wrapping paper. Gladys held her gift apprehensively. “What is it?”

“A bear.”

“I’m too old for stuffed animals now.”

“You’re never too old. Plus,” Evie reached through the curtain of rain to tug at the bear’s coat. “he’s got my raincoat, see? Makes him special.”

Gladys rolled her eyes. “How can you stand it? Aren’t you cold?”

“Nope! It’s great. You should try it sometime.”

“Aw c’mon. You’re soaking. Just duck under.”

Evie shook her head. 

“What’s so great about rain, anyway? It’s cold and it’s wet,” Gladys turned the bear around in her hands, fiddling with its raincoat. “and when I’m old enough, I’m moving somewhere dry.”

“It just feels good, Glad.” A sparkle twinkled in Evie’s eyes. “It makes me feel alive.” 

“You’re crazy.”

“Takes one to know one.”

The funeral was held on the sunniest day of March. 

Sitting numbly with all the others crowded into rickety chairs outside, Gladys listened to the eulogy and watched a small black casket get lowered into the ground, hands held limply in her lap. The service was short. There wasn’t much life to retell for a deceased preteen. Only mourning to be had at the life she’d never live. 

Slipped, they said. Playing on the rocks, they said. A tragic loss, they said. 

Evelyn May Carlton. 1941-1953. 

Evie would’ve hated it. 

Gladys said nothing at the funeral, her mouth dry, palms sweating. But as numbness melted into sorrow and the next day brought rain, her sorrow blistered into fury. Standing in the center of her bedroom, Gladys shook with rage. Rain crashed against the only window in her room, blurring the outside world into something unrecognizable and throwing gasoline on her temper.

Dull light cast itself across her bedside table where her bear sat just as she’d placed it last week. 

The week of her birthday. 

Snatching the bear and rushing out onto her family’s porch, Gladys hurled it into the yard. “You stole her!” It struck the ground and tumbled into a puddle, bobbing out of sight. She stared sorrowfully into the sky. “Why?”

She stood for several minutes. Staring, yet seeing nothing, the patter of rain ringing in her ears.

A cold gust of wind snapped Gladys to her senses. 

Guilt propelled her into the rain, to the puddle where her bear lay. Gladys could just make out the color of red under the water’s muddy surface. She picked up her sopping bear and clutched it to her chest. 

“I’m sorry,” she said. Bowing her head, Gladys touched her forehead to the little bear, her tears joining the rain to soak its fur. “I’m sorry.”

“Ouch!” 

“Blow on it, or it’ll bite you again.”

Zig scowled. She sat hunched over a steaming grey mug at Gladys’s small kitchen table, her grandmother seated opposite her. “I did.” 

“One blow isn’t enough,” Gladys said. Her elbows were propped on the table, and identical mug clasped between raised hands. “Like this.” She leaned forward and blew several times at the steam rising from her drink. The scent of peppermint wafted through the air in a soothing presence. Gladys sipped her tea lightly.

Zig tried again with no luck. She sat back in defeat. “It’s too hot.”

“Wait for it to cool down.” 

Chair legs scraped on the floor as Zig stood. “Fine. I’m going outside.”

Her granddaughter disappeared from sight. Gladys set her eyes on the little bear, propped as it was against her favorite napkin holder on the tabletop. Zig reappeared.

Shock forced Gladys to set down her mug. “Where did you find that?”

“In the attic,” her granddaughter said, doing a little spin in the raincoat. “It’s old but it’s cute. Can I have it?”            

“Will you use it?”

“This is Abbotsford. Of course I’ll use it.” 

After a moment, Gladys gave a small nod. “It’s yours.”

With a squeal of glee Zig shot out the front door, leaving Gladys to catch her breath. Rubbing a calloused hand against her forehead, Gladys sighed. She rose to follow. 

The house Rob had built for them shortly after their marriage sat at the end of a large rectangular field – one of many on Abbotsford’s outskirts – like a guardian to watch the grass that swayed around them. Its porch was small but sound, crafted from dark wood, a rocking chair flaking blue paint creaking in the breeze as Gladys stepped past it. 

Rain speckled her face as she stood on the porch’s edge and looked into the distance. 

Shades of grey colored the world. One shade blended into another where sky met horizon and horizon spilled into yard and yard crept up to house – with one exception. 

Zig clomped gleefully into the wet grass, her red raincoat a vibrant splash of color in all that grey.