Rain (The Quest Trilogy-Book Two) (36 page)

The instant Rain realized that the weight on his body was Earth’s, he caught her by the hips and swung her onto his lap, holding her there firmly.

“Let me go!” protested Earth, landing a sound thump on his shoulder.

Rain shook his sleepy head. “No. You woke me up, now finish what you began.”

Earth tried to wriggle free, saw the silly lopsided grin stretch across his face, and stopped moving.

“What exactly is the whole job, may I ask?” she said, irritably.

“Wash my face and help me rinse my mouth.” said Rain, his eyes still half closed.

Earth’s eyes widened into saucers. “Why, of all the preposterous …!”

A thought occurred to her then and she changed her demeanor to one of sugary sweetness.

“Actually, you’re right. I did wake you up so it is my responsibility to help you rinse your mouth.”

She turned to Heart. “Heart, will you bring me that container of water, please?”

Heart gave her a small pot filled with water seeing which, Rain opened his mouth wide.

“No, no.” said Earth, “we’ll do this my way.”

She tilted her head back and filled her mouth with water, then turned to Rain with her mouth full and sprayed the water straight onto his face.

“There! Now wasn’t that a nice rinse?” said Earth, her shoulders shaking with silent mirth.

Rain coughed and spluttered, grinning widely. To Rain, it didn’t matter what she was doing. All he cared about was that she was sitting on his lap, and he was actually holding her. Earth’s amusement disappeared and she made a face.

“Oh, so you liked that, did you? Then do tell me. What is my next duty?”

“Now wash my face.” said Rain.

“Wash your face? Of course.” said Earth, lifting the pot and emptying all of its contents over his head. He was still grinning.

Earth couldn’t help it. She started to giggle. From behind her, the sounds of everybody else’s laughter could be heard.

“What now, your royal Rainness?” said Earth.

“Now,” said Rain, “it’s time for a bath.”

Earth squealed as Rain looked skywards and the heavens opened up on them all. She tried to break free of his grip but he still wouldn’t let her go, holding her firmly and letting them both get soaked in the rain. Earth scooped up a handful of wet mud and smacked Rain on the chest with it. It worked. He released her to wipe the mud off his body.

Grabbing this slim window of opportunity, Earth scrambled to her feet and ran to where the others stood but not before scooping up another handful of mud and letting it loose in Rain’s direction. It hit him on the chest again.

Earth laughed and turned behind, only to find to her horror that Rain had got to his feet and was now advancing purposefully towards her with a glob of mud in his hands.

He let the dirt fly. Earth ducked behind Rainbow, and the ball of mud hit Rainbow instead.

“Hey!” yelled Rainbow, wiping the mud off and turning it a pretty shade of blue.

“Whoops! Sorry!” said Rain.

Angel let out a bellow and picked up a handful of mud, flinging it at Rain. Rain jumped out of its way in the nick of time and the blob landed on Subodh’s face.

Subodh’s shiny scalp turned red and he reached straight for his stick.

“Uh, oh.” said Angel. “Now I’ve done it.”

Taking advantage of this momentary lapse of Rain’s attention, Earth took another shot at him. Rain saw it coming from the corner of his eye, though, and ducked. Unfortunately for Rainbow, he was close to her and when he ducked out of its way, the little ball of dirt went splat on the back of Rainbow’s head.

“Arrgh!” yelled Rainbow. “You two are
so
dead!”

Earth squeaked and ran into the forest. Rain chased after her, followed by Rainbow, who was followed on the heels by Angel. Behind all of them, waving a stick furiously in the air was Subodh.

Heart, who had been playing silent observer all this while, turned to Destiny. “Looks like we are the only two mature people in this camp.”

Destiny raised an amused eyebrow and glanced meaningfully at the small lump of wet earth in her hands.

Heart looked at her in disbelief. “You’re not …!”

The mud ball came flying at him.

He lunged for Destiny, who screamed and ran into the forest after the other five.

*****

Globs of mud were flying in all directions and in the ensuing chaos, Subodh went about striking blows to the heads of one and all with his stick. Before long, the girls had ganged up together to form a team against the boys. They would have been outnumbered but Subodh decided he had had enough and left for the clearing.

In the fight that commenced, the girls were turning out to be clear winners, taking full advantage of the fact that the boys were holding back out of respect for their feminity.

This was war. Who said anything about wanting to play fair?

Rainbow had Heart straddled firmly beneath her while Earth and Destiny plastered him with muck.

Rain and Angel stood in the sidelines, helplessly watching their comrade get mauled.

“Rain!” sputtered Heart, “you started this! Now do something to stop it.”

“All right, you girls,” said Rain, trying to make his voice sound stern, “that’s enough.”

“You’re next!” Earth informed him gaily.

“Look, if you girls don’t go, we’ll start taking a shower right here.” threatened Rain.

“Yeah, we’ll be taking our clothes off right here, too.” added Angel, foreseeing the danger to his person in the near future and trying to prevent it. The girls ignored them.

“I’m serious.” warned Rain.

Earth stuck her tongue out at him and then resumed pummeling Heart with mud-balls.

“Fine, have it your way, then.” said Rain, reaching for his jeans and unbuttoning them.

He was about to pull down his zipper when the girls shrieked and released Heart. They made a quick exit from the scene, laughing all the way.

Heart staggered to his feet. “Thank-you for saving me again, brother Rain.”

Rain shrugged and grinned.

“Now make it stop raining so we can all get back to normal life.” said Heart.

“I can’t. It’s not me.” said Rain.

“It’s not you?! All this time, I thought …”

“I know. You guys thought it was me. Well, it isn’t.”

“Let’s go back to camp.” suggested Angel.

“No. you two go ahead. When I said I intended to give myself a shower, I wasn’t kidding.” said Rain, removing a bar of soap from his belt.

“Where did you get that from?” asked Heart.

“From Mt. Chimpu, where else?” said Angel, scrutinizing the bar of soap.

“See you later, guys.” said Rain, shooing the two of them off.

“Later, brother.” said Heart, following Angel out of the woods.

*****

Earth couldn’t stop smiling. She had really enjoyed their little mud-fight. In any relationship, it was extremely important to have fun – and Rain was so much fun! He was witty, easy to get along with, and thankfully, had a sense of humor.

But for any relationship to really work, you needed more than that- you needed to have chemistry.

Did the two of them have good chemistry? This, she wasn’t sure of yet. Sure, there were some magic moments but those had been sudden and spontaneous. She spotted Angel and Heart walking into the clearing.

“Where’s Rain?” she inquired, searching behind them.

“He’s still in the forest. Says he wants to take a shower.” said Angel.

Earth frowned.

Was this some plan that the boys had hatched to get back at them? Why would Rain be in the forest taking a shower when he should be here, stopping the continuous downpour instead?

Earth decided to go find out.

*****

Earth was hidden among the trees.  Rain had his back to her and he was rubbing soap suds off his body. Was he really taking a shower, then? Well, at least he hadn’t taken his pants off, thought Earth with relief. She continued to watch him from her secret vantage point. Guilty pleasure.

And then the thought struck her – now was the perfect opportunity to test if the two of them really had any chemistry.

Earth crept up to him as silently as she could from behind. It wasn’t difficult. The pouring rain muffled all sounds of her approach. When she was at touching distance from him, she reached out from behind and splayed both her hands over his flat stomach.

The instant she touched him, a jolt passed through Rain’s body and he froze where he was.

He knew who this was. He knew what she was doing. He only didn’t know why.

Earth slowly took her hands up his body, feeling the muscles in his stomach tauten as her hands traveled upwards. The way he was reacting was right. Very right.

But the way she was reacting, wasn’t.

Her heart was racing and her skin was burning. Her hands were stuck to his chest, where under her palms she could feel his muscles leap at her touch.

She had somehow been expecting to have more control over herself. But she had miscalculated. She had absolutely no control whatsoever on her hands as of now. She tried to pull away but instead, her hands pulled her forward until their bodies touched and Earth rested her head gently on Rain’s broad back. She could smell the floral scent of the soap on his skin and it only compounded the way she was already feeling. She had to stop. Now. Before she did something that they would both regret.

She had to stop … for his sake. Some vestiges of sense finally broke through the haze in her brain and Earth slackened her hold on his chest.

Rain felt Earth loosen her grip, sensed she was about to let go, and caught both of her hands with his to prevent her from leaving. He heard her gasp behind his back and turned his body around to face her. Her eyes were alive, her cheeks were flushed, and her face was glowing like the moon.

To him, she had never looked more beautiful.

Rain jerked her forward – into his arms and into a crushing embrace. He buried his face into her neck with a sigh.

“Never… ever… do that again.” he breathed in her ear.

And then, abruptly, he let her go and walked away with long strides, never once looking back.

Earth let her knees buckle under her and sank down on all fours. Yes, she conceded, chemistry definitely existed between them.

*****

The rain didn’t stop for a long time. And Rain didn’t return for even longer. By evening, when he still hadn’t made an appearance, Earth began to get worried. Had she gone too far? She knew what she had done was terribly foolish and she now she regretted every second of it. After all, she was the one who repeatedly asked him to keep his distance from her. And now, she had gone and freely toyed with the strings of his self control. Was he mad at her? He would be justified if he was but all the same, Earth hoped he wasn’t.

Evening turned to night with no sign of Rain and everyone began to speculate that maybe Rain had left for another of his Quest’s. Earth heard their reasoning’s. Wanted to believe them, even, but she knew in her heart that wasn’t the reason why Rain was absent all day.

She didn’t, of course, tell anybody what had taken place in the forest today after the mud fight. She was killing herself with guilt already. She didn’t need others to help her along the way.

Time dragged on like needles on her skin, until it was time to turn in for the night. Earth spread out her sleeping bag and after a moment’s hesitation, spread Rain’s out next to her own.

As she lay down and closed her eyes, more worries began to haunt her. What if he never came back at all? Please, please don’t let that be so, wished Earth desperately.

Earth lay with her eyes closed, listening to any and every sound around her carefully. Subodh’s snores were the first to start. Then Destiny began tossing around.

Destiny was a restless sleeper, who fell asleep with some difficulty. Several minutes later, Angel began to hum softly. Earth waited for the slap from Rainbow that she knew was about to come.

It did.

Angel stopped humming. A short while later, both Angel and Rainbow began to hum together in their sleep. Earth sat up in her sleeping bag and let out a heavy sigh. She looked at the empty sleeping bag next to her’s and stroked a finger down its length.

A soft, rustling noise disturbed her reverie and Earth squinted into the darkness. Someone was coming towards the clearing … Rain!

Earth’s heart gave a stutter, stopped, and then restarted at full throttle. She quickly slid into bed and turned her back to the approaching sounds. If he didn’t want to sleep next to her, it would be far less awkward if she wasn’t sitting there, staring at him while he pulled his sleeping bag away.

She heard him walk straight to where she lay and then pause. She heard him remove a shoe, fling it aside, then remove the other shoe and do the same to it. Was he going to stay, then?

She felt the air rush around him when he sat down on the sleeping bag. Then, he slid into it.

Earth unclenched her jaw and let her body relax, taking in a relieved breath, almost smiling to herself in the darkness.

To Earth, this would have been more than enough but to her pleasant surprise, sometime later his hand quietly snuck over to her and he twined his fingers around hers.

If someone had told her just an hour earlier that she would sleep in peace, she would not have believed it but now, Earth found herself drifting off to sleep with a smile upon her face.

*****

CHAPTER 31

The morning air was chilly as usual, but she was warm and cozy. Earth didn’t know why, but it sure was conducive to her sleep. Earth stretched and sat up. The eyes were going to take several minutes to open, so she sat there waiting and listening to the voices around her, ticking off their names mentally. Angel … Rainbow … Heart … Rain ….
Rain
!

Earth pried her lids open. Was he still here? He was. And he was smiling at her.

Earth smiled back tentatively. He was looking at her expectantly now. Earth looked around herself. Was she missing something? Yes. She was covered in a quilt. She knew now why she was feeling so snug and cozy today.