“Didn't it rain, children – didn't it rain, oh my Lord!
Didn't it? Didn't it? Oh my Lord, didn't it rain!”
At first, the beautifully aged baritone of Thomas Stepforth Sr. was clearly audible next door to the Lees as he sang the great Negro Spiritual for his family and they clapped and sang along, but then the rain intensified until there was nothing to hear but that from the world outside as the remnants of Hurricane Justicia settled into Lofton County, VA and then slammed into the Blue Ridge Mountains and stalled. Still, there was relatively little wind or thunder … but …
“Didn't it rain?” Mrs. Lee said, and smiled at her husband.
“Mr. Stepforth has a wonderful voice to hear before the end of the world as we know it,” Col. H.F. Lee said.
All the porch lights were on at the Ludlow, Lee, and Trent/Stepforth homes, illuminating silver sheets of water pouring down over Tinyville, VA and rushing off into the happy-enough fields beyond to receive it, for there had not been much rain that summer.
“It's actually beautiful in a way,” Mrs. Lee said.
“It is,” Col. Lee said, “since we are out of the way of all the danger, and since everyone who would have been is also out. Whatever happens from here, it is just to things, and not to people.”
“And you did so much to make sure we got to that end,” she said.
“Thank you, Maggie,” he said. “I hate that I came from thirty years behind on it, but, I was 16 years old then, so … .”
“It's not your fault,” she said.
“I know,” he said, “and this situation also has helped me realize survivor's guilt from age 18, and age 38, is still kicking me in the hindparts. Some new ground for me to talk with my therapist about.”
The second Mrs. Lee knew about the death of the first when her husband was just 18, and about that mission called Five Bright Nine. Both of those cases were impossible for the colonel to handle any better than he had; in the second case, the young colonel was hailed as a miracle worker for getting most of his men home with the victory! But he still blamed himself for the deaths of his men, and his first wife and child, even though he was not at all at fault. What he had done with his life, on both occasions, was get even better – the next people down the line were going to be even more prepared and protected if he had anything to do with it, and thus he had carried on for 28 years.
The second Mrs. Lee felt in her husband's body that he was at last ready to take that burden off. His body kept good score; he lived under incredible tension, and Lee family history said that the men tended to do that and it shortened their lives dramatically. However, the colonel's Lee grandfather and great-grandfather had enjoyed extended longevity, and grandfather Horace was still going, hearty and hale at 88 – they knew how to put down worrying about anything in the world that truly was not their responsibility, and their descendant was learning.
“I'll deal with that tomorrow at my regular appointment, but in the meantime, although I am on furlough today from the Big Loft police, I may be called up for emergency response duties by the county, so I need to catch up on sleep.”
“I'll make you some tea,” Mrs. Lee said.
“No need. I am very tired and I am feeling it right now, and this is a pleasant place to rest, right here … the sound of the rain is beautiful and of course you are right here, so there is nowhere I would rest better.”
They embraced and held each other as the sound of the rain washed out any knowledge that anything in the world but just them existed. She had not slept much either, concerned about and praying for Col. Lee, so both were soon deeply asleep, and would wake up in the bright sunshine that signified that the storm had passed over.
Thank you!