THE SKY

Dark grey, almost black, clouds filled the sky as far as the eye could see, looming over the town. A flash of lighting sliced through the icy air, lighting up the night for an instant and followed a few seconds later by a distant rumble of thunder.

The rain, which up until then had been merely a light drizzle pattering off rooves, chose that moment to begin in earnest as the clouds released their full burden. A torrent of water fell from the heavens, billions of tiny droplets thundering onto deserted sidewalks and spattered on windowpanes in a never ending drum roll, each illuminated by streetlamps for the briefest of instants before being broken and smashed upon the cold unforgiving surface of the earth. Night turned to day and day to night once more, and still the rain came. It flooded the roads, forming swift moving streams in gutters that threatened to pick up unwary insects and carry them far through the streets.

As the second night drew to a close, there came a faint clearing of the sky in the east, where the first hints of light were beginning to creep over the horizon. The patch of blue slowly grew, staying just above the rising sun as it began its ascent. The golden light shot through the town and touched the underside of the remaining clouds, setting them aflame.

The rain eased back into its original light drizzle, and over the town a rainbow could be seen faintly forming as the sun’s rays mixed with the falling water. The brilliant colours bled into one another seamlessly and were reflected blurrily in the now subdued gutter rivers, like a small child had tried to capture the moment but didn’t have the steady hand to produce a true mirror image.

The day drew on, with the clouds retreating further and further from the heat of the sun. It rose higher into the sky, and now the infinite specks of water that coated the town shone with a dazzling light, each containing a tiny rainbow, so that if one were to look closely at a group of them, it would seem as though there was an entire world formed inside of every miniature orb of water.

But the brightest and biggest rainbow of all was the first, the one that hung above the town, a constant reminder of hope and beauty and a testament to the fact that the rain will never last forever.