DESERT BLOOMS
Mary Stacy

The first drops fell; large, loud spatters that left tracks like paw prints across the windows.

Amanda held her breath, afraid that it was all a dream and she would wake to now all too accustomed dry, brittle wind, scattering sand instead of treasured moisture.

The day had started like any other, at least to her untrained and still alien eyes, but as it wore on, strange electricity filled the air, pressed on by an unfamiliar west wind. A welcomed wind, different from the arid gusts that drove troublesome sand into every conceivable corner of the house, and after a time, she began to imagine it smelled of a far distant sea, a once favored fragrance that now seemed exotic.

By mid-day, looking out across the desert, she could see a dark line grimly marching across the Llangons, an army of heavy gray clouds which marked time over the mountains and then across the stretch of plain that stood between the towering obsidian peaks and the city.

As the ominous horizon drew closer, she became aware that the very air seemed filled with life. Not just the steady swell of the wind against the garden chimes, but it seemed every living thing made busy in some way, from the scurrying of the small animals that inhabited the garden, to the whirling insects that frantically stirred in every direction, to the birds flying in great arcs before the approaching storm, squawking out orders to those below to take cover.

Then finally, the thick heavy raindrops fell. She had looked up from her desk at the first sounds, running to the window. When her hopes were confirmed, she took off to the bedroom, where the balcony held an unobstructed view to the desert below. Flinging open the doors, she could see the storm boiling in, lightning zigzagging across the sky.

She stood transfixed, taking it in, the wind whipping the gauze pleats of her dress like streamers outlining the gentle swell of her frame. Then a sudden bolt of thunder, coinciding with a hand on her shoulder made her jump, and Amanda felt herself gently being pulled away from the crashing scene that filled the horizon and back into the room.

“It is not safe.” Her husband steered her away from her vantage point, making sure the doors clicked and locked, storm shutters now in place, firmly secured behind her.

“But it’s so beautiful—and rain, Sarek, rain?”

“It happens on occasion.”

“But in almost two years, I’ve never seen rain!”

“And now you have, so come, it is almost time for the evening meal and you must eat.”

She allowed him to lead her away, but not without craning her neck to see what she could along the narrow sidelights, the wonder of rain, “How long will it last?”

Life seemed so filled with miracles lately. Her head filled with a myriad of questions, which echoed through dinner and on through the dark moist velvet of the night.

~~~~~~~~~~oo00oo~~~~~~~~~~

Throughout the night she struggled to sleep against the now unfamiliar sound of rain as it beat against the house, finally giving into a much-needed slumber in the small hours of the morning.

On waking, Amanda had felt strangely invigorated despite what seemed like not much more than a mid-afternoon nap. She eagerly ran to the balcony doors, again pulling them open to the desert below.

But the desert had disappeared.

The rain had stopped and the heavy clouds had dissipated, having given their all in the course of the night. Below, across the broad expanse of what had been sand and stone, the sun danced across a rainbow of color and chaos before her eyes. She gasped in delight and turned to call her husband to share in the view below, but Sarek was already at her side.

“They will be gone within a few days and it will return as it was,” He sighed and she felt a touch of wistfulness in his voice that none would ever hear but her.

From this day on, even if she never experienced it again, she would always view the desert differently now that she was aware of what lay hidden within the seemingly barren landscape, waiting for just the right moment to showcase its riches. Amanda felt a sudden kinship with the sands, keeping close the hidden seeds that had held the promise of those wondrous desert blooms. Where once there had seemed no hope of life, something had changed, and the impossible had been made possible. It was a foreshadowing of that day soon, when their secret would be known as well, not to disappear in the light of the day but to hopefully flourish in its loving gaze.

She laid her hands upon the barely perceptible swell of her belly and smiled in contentment, pulling her husband’s arm tight around her. One day soon…

And for the first time she felt the flutter within…