Theories of rain

"What is it that interests you?" Mr. Wells said. Which no one ever asks me.

"What you would expect," I replied, and told him what I would tell you, if you were here. "How a cloud floats, when water is much heavier than air. How cloud particles form from vapor; and how raindrops grow from those particles. Whether the winds drive the particles together, coalescing them."

He looked puzzled, yet also, I thought, interested. "There are rains of manna and quails in the Bible," he said. "And in Pliny the Elder, rains of milk and blood and birds and wool."

What I wanted to say was this: It was raining the day they took us from each other.

Q. What kind of rain?
A. A light rain, a drizzling rain.

Q. You remember that?
A. It is almost all I remember. On the muddy ground our household burns without flame, the smoke rising up through the fine rain falling down. You have no face. Your figure, clad in damp homespun, disappears into a cloud.

What I said was, "Rains of fish." [106-107]

Barrett, Andrea. "Theories of Rain." In Servants of the Map : Stories. W.W. Norton, 2002. ISBN 0393043487.