Only Happy When It Rains

I was wearing multi-coloured gloves with the fingers cut out that I’d bought in Edinburgh and a long coat to shield me from the wind. I was regretting coming out. The rain sounded nice, inside. I liked to hear the pitter-patter of water fall rapidly on the tiles of the roof and then fall with grace down towards the mud-sodden ground. I had wet hair, (recently cut short) which had decided to curl and stick to my face.
I was singing to myself. It’s usually some acoustic song that no one’s really heard before. Today it was Honey and the Moon, by Joseph Arthur.

But right now
Everything is turning blue,
And right now
The sun is trying to kill the moon,
And right now
I wish I could follow you
To the shores
Of freedom,
Where no one lives

I crossed the deserted street, down by the river and decided to take a short cut along through the park. I pushed open the tall wrought iron gate, which creaked, and a mixture of rust and moss came off on my hands. Maybe converse weren’t a good idea to wear, either. There was no one around. At all. The busiest village in probably the whole of West Yorkshire had been deserted, even by the most avid of tourists. I couldn’t see, for there were waves of misty stuff blowing over. Crap. Not wind as well. I must have looked like a right, well, weirdo, all soaking wet and tramping through the streets. I saw a little girl skipping towards me, mother in close pursuit. I realised that she was my neighbour and her daughter, Rosa. She had, clutched in her little hands, daisies. She was wearing one of those coats that make children look like ladybirds. She ran at me, and hugged my legs, a smudging together of arms, legs and wet clothes. I bend down, as she was about to topple me over. She placed a flower in my hair. It sounds nice, but I think walking along with a wilting flower, drooping in your hair is not that good a sight. “You have pretty hair and eyes” she said to me.
I laughed, the rain dripping off my face, and went on. I looked back at Rosa, running home. Why I’d decided to come out, I don’t know. Sometimes I have ideas and then they turn out to be not so good ideas. I suppose I just wanted to get out of the house. And then I saw him. I looked down, and carried on walking, towards the Post Office and down towards the car park. Oh Jesus, I thought. How long has he been there? It wasn’t as if he was staring at me. Just…there. With his friend. And anyway, I thought, what does he expect? When someone tells you that they love you, and have done for like, two years, and you don’t really like them back, it makes things a teeny tiny bit awkward.
Impressive, I thought. I always manage to get myself into these situations. But I liked it outside.
Seeing the things that you see all the time, but being surrounded by all that history and cobbled streets, with the toymaker and the bakers right next to each other, the steep road leading out to somewhere unknown. I trudged up to the bench, where I could see the whole of the village, the entrance to the ice cream parlour, the little toy town, with the little ant people walking around. I could see everyone, watch Rosa’s way back to her house, the one with the golden windows in summer. Well, it was summer, just with November rain. I had my guitar. The old one, the one that I got wet when I went for walks like this. I played something to myself, sat on the peeling green bench. And I may have been soaking wet, bogged down with coursework, and having problems with certain male people at school, but it didn’t matter. Because I was happy, right there, with my colourful gloves on, making music, and watching little cars wind their way up to the top of the hill, past all of the old stone cottages with the rain drizzling down the panes of glass, the chimneys letting out a steady stream of smoke from the hearty warm fires down below.
I may feel dissatisfied sometimes, but I like it here. It felt peaceful, wonderful, and I was contented, there, on top of the world, with the rain on my eyelashes and my guitar in hand.