The cold liquid splattered the glass with a sharp rattle that startled the sleeping man awake. His eyes opened abruptly, take in his bedroom, assessing the situation. He faced the window and through the slightly ajar blinds he could see the grey sky and its contents, the rain. The water covered the glass, washing down its smooth surface, rapidly dissolving the thick, reinforced material.
The day before had been a glorious British one. He had spent the morning picking up the kids from their mothers house, three of them; Julie, the eldest, who would rather of spent the day with her boyfriend, Karen, 11, who was slowly moving away from being ‘Daddy’s little girl’ and always mimicking her sister and the youngest, Dylan, football mad, just to impress his father. The had spent the afternoon in the garden together, he made burgers and sausages, all slightly burnt whilst the kids played in the garden, Karen and Dylan on the trampoline together, having water fights, much to the annoyance of Julie who lay on a chair with her feet up, sunbathing, stopping occasionally only to text her boyfriend.
He had enjoyed that day, he did not see the children often and like to spend as much time with them as he could. He and their mother had split whilst the kids were all much younger, they were on much better terms now. So much so that it even prompted Karen to ask him; “Daddy, are you and Mummy going to get back together soon?”
He simply replied with an “I’m not sure” although he knew the true answer to be “No.”
Before he had gone to pick up the kids he had checked the weather, as everyone did religiously. It had said in the big green triangle: NO CHANCE OF RAIN. Brilliant he thought, he could leave the house protection for one more day. He had been expecting the rain warning any day now, the winter was closing in as the days became gradually shorter and shorter, but that big green triangle, insuring him that he and his family would be safe. He had fallen fowl to the weatherman.
The man wasted no time in getting out of bed, no more than two seconds after realising that it was raining he was out of bed, pulling on pants, trousers and a t shirt, all dirty and scattered around his dirty, unloved bedroom. He ran to the youngest two’s room and burst through the door. He yelled at them, startling them awake.
“Daddy, what is it? Why are you shouting?” Dylan rubbed his eyes, clearing the sleep from the corners in which it had built up. They had not heard the rain, they were not in panic mode.
“Come on guys, we’ve gotta get up and go!”
“But Daddy,” Karen was also awake now and disputing what her father was saying. “Why do we have to, it’s so early.”
“Just do it.” The seriousness of his voice told them that they were to do as they were told or else. As he ran to the next room the kids were jumping out of bed and getting dressed.
He ran on to the room at the far end of the house. He knocked loudly out of respect for his daughter who was already nearly a woman. She did not answer so, shoving respect aside he opened the door.
“Come on baby girl, we have to go.” Her head was buried beneath a screwed up pile of covers, her head itself propped up by a ridiculous amount of pillows. Just like her mother he thought.
“Julie come on, we have to go!” He was quick in his delivery. The house was already starting to groan, the metal framework disintegrating under the rain.
She groaned beneath her nest and he mumbled something along the lines of “Go away. I’m sleeping.” Although no one could have been sure.
“Julie, look at me, I’m serious. I mucked up and now we have to go.” She knew that tone, when he and her mother were going through the rough patch just before their divorce she had heard that tone a lot, always directed to her, always a command to protect her.
She removed her head from under the duvet and turned to face her father. “Ok, check on the other two, I’ll chuck some clothes on and meet you downstairs.”
As he turned to run back to the younger two’s room he smiled, his baby girl had grown up, if they made it through this, he’d tell her that, he’d let her have her freedom, heck maybe her boyfriend can even stay round the next time he has them all over.
He entered Dylan and Karen’s room and found Dylan to be staring out of the window, face pushed right up to the glass. “DYLAN! Get away from there!” His son turned and looked at him as though he were crazy but caught his fathers’ eye and saw that he was crazy, but deadly serious about it.
“Daddy, what’s that water doing outside?” The boy was confused, he had never seen the rain before, he had only visited his father in the summer season, this was the latest he had ever been out here and his mother never got the rain where she lived.
“Ok, you, downstairs. I’ll tell you when we’re downstairs.” The two children didn’t move, the flashed a glance at each other and the man knew he’d have to tell them, to scare them into moving. “OK, OK fine. Look, did mummy ever tell you about the rain?” They shook their heads in unison. “The rain is very bad, you don’t get it where you are because the air is so hot, so you have water from your taps to make the plants grow. But daddy, daddy has the rain and the rain is very bad, it kills things. Burns them right away, just melts it.” He was holiding back tears, he knew they were in trouble, he should’ve protected his family, he knew the rain was due.
“But then why do you live here?” The man looked out of the window. The rain was coming down faster and had already cut through three layers of the glass.
“Because I can afford it. Look normally a man on telly tells daddy that it’s time to put up the shelter, and daddy goes into his house until the summer comes again, but the man got it wrong, so there’s no protection up at the moment. So we have to move quickly ok, the car should be ok for a lot longer than the house.” He made a motion to leave but his children remained rooted to the spot. The fear had worked too far and had now paralysed them. The man leant down in front of his children and put his arms around both of them.
“Heeeeey guys, com’on. It’ll be ok yeah? We’ll be ok, your big ol’ daddy will take care of you!” He smiled at them and they smiled back, reluctantly following him as he led them, out of the room, hand in hand.
They took the stairs two by two as the rain intensified once again, causing the house to groan even louder, it wouldn’t be long now. Julie was already downstairs, she was in her coat and smiled a worried smile to her father.
He knew the coat wouldn’t help her, but if it gave her some kind of comfort then he would not argue with her.
He let go of his youngest children’s hands and allowed for Julie to help put their coats on, Dylan in particular, who struggled to do the simplest of tasks.
The man looked out of the window, between two slates in the blind. The car was on the drive way, the paint had corroded away, stripping it of its expensive wax that he had applied earlier in the week in the guarantee that it would remain summer for the remainder of the month.
He turned to face his children and saw Julie tying Dylan’s laces, he smiled at them. He missed seeing their faces everyday and recalled, at that moment Karen’s question and wished with all his heart that the answer had been yes.
Just then, as he was smiling at his children the house groaned again. This one was different however, it seemed to shudder the whole building, shaking its foundations. Then a crack and a crash as the rain finally ate its way through the metal supports for the flat roof and it came crashing down. Dust came racing down the stairs, causing them all to shield the eyes and cough, desperately trying to clear their lungs from the years of dead skin and dirt that had accumulated in the loft space.
The man had lost his house and he wasn’t about to lose his family. He turned ran to his kids, back still hunched over and rounded them up. He had a decision to make, run for the car and risk minor burns, perhaps worse or find some kind of protection to get to the car and risk being flattened when the rest of his house collapsed. There was no time for consideration he herded them towards the door and pulled it open. The destruction wouldn’t matter to him if he could just get his kids safe. He could drive to the underground station, they were always safe.
The family looked outside at the pouring rain, saw it drop onto the concrete floor, steam rising as it melted loose unprotected particles and dirt. The man had always appreciated how clean it was because of the rain, but now feared that his children would be burnt away just like any other piece of litter.
He pulled his hood up and his children did the same. They ran for the car, out into the rain, hoping that they would make it to the protected vehicle, themselves only protected by a plastic hood.
They ran in the rain, they ran for their safety.
