something brief to tide me over writer's block.


While the people around her ducked into shops for shelter from a coming rainstorm, Ororo would lift her face to the darkening sky and wait for the first drops to fall. Sometimes, her big sister would pull her to the nearest alleyway or nearest friendly fruit stall and warn her about catching her death. At that time, Vi could never understand her little sister's utter fascination with the storm. (She learned early on that buying 'Roro slickers, boots and umbrellas was an utter waste; she never ever used them.)

Rainy days that she was on her own were the best kind. Ororo would stand in the middle of a steadily emptying street and welcome the raindrops like a friend that no one else wanted to play with. She could never understand that - why did people hide from it, when it felt so gloriously cool on the skin? Rainy days meant less busy streets and an empty plaza: fewer people to pickpocket for funds for dinner, yes, but it also meant all the space in the world for dancing in the rain. She would skip over puddles and spin delicate little pirouettes in time with the thunder. Sometimes, if she closed her eyes, she could imagine herself soaring high above the clouds with the sky as her stage, lightning spotlighting her every move.

Rain was a beautiful, wonderful thing, and Cairo did not nearly get enough of it, in her opinion.