It’s raining today. I have very mixed emotions about this. The rain is beautiful, but cold and dreary at the same time. I walk outside. Okay, maybe it’s not as cold as I thought. And the water feels good on my fiery skin. The music of the raindrops splashing into the puddles is my soundtrack, the dirty, grassy ground under my feet, my stage. Tilt my face up in the rain, close my eyes. I barely notice that my wet clothes cling to my skin and the water dripping down my face creates no sensation of discomfort. The magic in this moment drowns out every thought of anything but itself. Deep breath. Feel the rainwater filter through my hair, run down my back, and drip to the ground. Even in the dim, cloudy light, the plants around me seem greener, stronger. The flowers more colorful and the animals more calm. The world more alive.

I don’t know what impulse makes me want to sing- but I act on it. Words come pouring out of me like a river to the beat of the rainfall. I walk farther and farther away from all that’s civilized, feeling the ground, soft and muddy, under my feet. The grass rustles in the slight wind, splattering raindrops. I don’t let my song drown out nature’s noise. Rather, I do my best to sing in harmony with it, to compliment each other. It’s been too long since this has happened. Oh-so-often as a child I had lived this way, felt this magic. But the handhold of maturity and the foothold of time had pulled me- almost against my will- away from the ground, away from here. But I’ve found this place again, here in my new world. And I need it, need this. I sit down in a puddle, disregarding the water and mud soaking my clothes, lay down in the water, the grass my pillow and the wind my blanket. My voice trails off, slows to a stop as my song is over. But nature continues its graceful, never-ending harmony around me, a counterpart to its self now, and content in that in a way I wish I could be.
I smile when I feel him lay down next to me in the grass. I told him to meet me here today; not knowing the graceful array the world would set up for us.
“Hello, love.”
“Hey baby.”
We really need say naught else, for we both know the words that the other would speak if they were to be aloud. Lay my head, dirty and wet, on his chest as he wraps one arm around my muddy back. I’m a mess- and I’m getting him dirty. But I know he doesn’t care. The magic of the rain is increased tenfold by his presence at my side, everything that could bother me in my other world, the one you surely know as the real world, is gone. He is here and I am with him and in that we have all we need, hiding in the long grass that rises above our heads.
I look up at his face. His eyes are closed and his mouth is still. I see in him the most beautiful thing in the world. The music of my nature has nothing on my other half. I see every intricacy of his face, his mind, and nothing I have ever known has ever had this effect on me. This angel lying next to me surely must return to heaven soon- but then I remember. He’s mine. My angel. And for some strange reason, he chooses to stay here with me.
His eyes open. He smiles down at me, a tad of a question in them. I look down, embarrassed, but then I feel his hand on my chin tilt my face up and he kisses me gently on the mouth. The world is gone. There is nothing but me and him here. Nothing else.
“I love you,” the worlds are a whisper, but the low volume has no power over the impact. I decide to stay with him, here, forever.
It’s raining today.