Free The Value Of Rain by Brandon Shire Page A

commitment had left upon me; this dirty crazy fag in the green jumpsuit beside him.
    “Charles?” Caufield queried with an irritated eye motion toward my father.
    I turned only my head. “Do you think rain has any value?” I asked him.
    I thought he would take a quick what-the fuck-is-this look at Caufield and shorten his stay down to a few brief moments, but he didn’t. He glanced past me at the falling snow outside Caufield’s window.
    “Do you mean besides its inherent beauty and cleansing properties or as a mere monetary valuation?”
    Caufield smiled at his response, his look of angry disappointment at my question fading with the realization that my father would not be so easily maneuvered.
    I turned and looked at him fully now. Henry Rathborne was old. Very old, it seemed to me; too old to be my biological father. He was short and stooped and handling a cane that I had not heard thumping against the floor when he came in. His hair was sparse and white and his skin was aged with wrinkles. But his eyes were young and they sparkled like sapphires in shallow caves.
    “Cancer,” he told me after searching out the question in my face. “Dr. Smith told me you lost a friend yesterday. I’m very sorry.”
    I looked at Caufield hatefully before I turned back to my father. “He was a lover, not just a friend.”
    The shock I intended didn’t seem to faze him any. “A lover, or a loved one?” he asked closely, pushing for a change of rhythm in our conversation.
    I looked down at the hands he had steepled on his cane and began a study of his well manicured nails. Was I trying to vilify this man for his abandonment or to make myself more easily rejectable?
    “A loved one,” I admitted quietly.
    He watched me silently for a moment. “I arranged for a funeral. It seems he had no family.”
    “That cared,” I snarled.
    My comment seemed to embarrass him somewhat. “But you cared, wouldn’t you like to attend?”
    “What’s your interest in this?” I demanded, suddenly pissed off at his interference.
    “You’re my son.”
    “And after twenty fucking years you’ve suddenly decided to take an interest?” I barked.
    He blanched and glanced at Caufield. “I didn’t know,” he said to me. “Charlotte never said a word. We were only married a few weeks when I realized what a mistake I’d made. She changed so fast after the ceremony it was like I’d married the evil twin by mistake. I couldn’t stay. I…”
    He stopped and looked down at his hands, knuckles white around the cane like a driver on the verge of misfortune. I followed his gaze and met the same sight; my mind’s eye contemplating him as an engineer, the long slow bridge beneath him crumbling into a ditch of moving filth. A sign, miles back, would have read: Charlotte’s Bridge Works: Under perpetual destruction.
    My grandfather’s description of Henry came to mind and I thanked him for the invitation before I jumped up and walked out. My first trip to the outside world would be to attend the funeral of the latest victim of my love. The final one.
     
    *****
     
    A week later I had a pass in my pocket, clutching to it like an elementary student on an emergency run to the bathroom. Caufield had laughed when I asked for one, claiming it unnecessary, but had finally acquiesced when I became demanding. He wrote it on a piece of plain cream colored stationary, the Birch Building logo stenciled on top.
    “No one’s going to ask you for papers, Charles. We have day trips all the time.”
    “Humor me.”
    “I am,” he said as he flourished his signature and pushed the paper across the desk. He held it in place with his fingertips when I tried to pull it closer. “Just because you were raised in insanity, doesn’t make you insane, Charles. You can overcome these years. You’re still young and this is only your first step toward a new life.”
    A life of solitude I wanted to inform him, but I only nodded and followed him to the outpatient wing of