Free write - 5 min

Sam wasn’t sure if it was a wonderful sign or a sign of disaster, but Sam knew, without any hint of a doubt, that it was a sign that an enormous change was about to overcome the small town now laid out along the valley floor below her.  The dark, pneumatic clouds were the epitomized threat of an oncoming downpour. 

But after three days of them and not a drop of rain, the townspeople were no longer fooled.  Sam’s eyes followed the lay of the earth out to the horizon where there was barely a glimpse of sunlight beyond the rise of the mountain.  The valley people couldn’t see this, for, of course, they did not have the vantage point that Sam did, emotionally as well as geographically.

The radars could not see it either, however, and that was particularly frightening.  The national weather service’s local branch had been flooded with reports of the damned cloud, but they couldn’t see it.  At least, not with their new technology.  No, this was something which could only be seen with the naked eye.  It was felt, however, in every cell of every organism which lay in its shadow and it was terrifying.

Sam picked her way down the hill, her hand protectively cupping the lower portion of her abdomen, at the same time transferring the weight to be evenly distributed across her shoulders.  She had hoped to raise her child in this loving and peaceful town.  But with her ‘empathy’, as they called it, screaming into her own consciousness, she knew that the worst was yet to come.  So, having reached the road at the base of the mesa, she climbed into her Jeep, aimed it for the east, and drove until she found the rising sun.