Red Rain

Like beans in a pie pan. That’s what it sounds like. No warning. Deafening. Andrew and I head to the porch to watch. Rain! Finally! Pouring. Pounding. Drenching. It lightens to a steady even shower, cleansing the air and leaves. We grab our flip-flops (Mom said to wear shoes) and run out the gate. It tastes dirty and feels gritty, but it’s soft and wet and cool. The road is already becoming a river—the red dirt turning into opportunities for navy expeditions, treasure hunts, and all sorts of adventures at sea!

“Wait, let’s get Little Andrew to join us!” hollers Andrew as he climbs over our neighbor’s wall. He’s soon back with our tiny towhead neighbor—Andrew VanIngen—and I realize I’ve just been demoted from first mate. “Let’s go! It’s raining!” shouts my brother, the Captain. “Follow the stream!” orders the Dutchman.

The water, to our ankles, pushes black plastic bags, empty Fanyogo packets, and all other forms of trash past us. “Do you ever wonder what we might be walking in?” asks the Dutchman. “Don’t think about it,” says the Captain. A sandal floats past—the cheap plastic kind sold all over the market. “Let’s follow it! I’m sure it will lead us to our treasure!” shouts the Captain. “Aye aye captain!” the Dutchman yells.

We follow. The rain continues. A man pedals furiously by on his bicycle. A taximan honks and hollers as he splashes his way around us—his cab holding enough people and produce to have a market inside. Onward we go. We pass the boutique where we buy our baguette in the morning. No one is there except the man with the cigarette who owns the place. He watches from the open doorway. The sandal, bobbing and drifting through the street, leads us on.

The walled houses with gates break into smaller courtyards with one or two small square huts. No one is outside. A girl with a baby on her back runs into a courtyard further down the road. My flip-flop gets stuck and in trying to pull it up, the strap breaks. I take both shoes off and send them floating down the river like two green sailboats about to get lost in the red sea. “Lindsay, come on!”

I catch up to the boys just in time to see our treasure map disappear into the ravine. We’d reached the end of the road. Trudging back, empty handed, it is still raining. The road-river is deeper. Thicker. So much mud.  The Captain throws some on the Dutchman who retaliates. The rain runs the dirt down their head, arms, and legs in red streaks. We approach the courtyard that the girl and baby walked into. Inside is a pond melting the lines of wall, brick, and clay.

“I feel sorry for the people who live here,” the Captain says.

“Why?” I ask, squishing my toes in the warm wet earth.

“What do you think happens to a mud house when it rains?”