Rain Dragon: A Novel

“Amy’s reflection appeared on the passenger window, black shadows carving her warped features. The longer we stayed lost, I knew, the more her mood was prone to crumble. Pretty soon it would dip down to the level where it threatened our whole day’s experience. So much depended on a right mind in this kind of situation. An old barn could be construed as charming or dilapidated. An inarticulate farm manager could be hilarious or incompetent. And because Amy’s first impressions were usually unshakable, these mood questions were not insignificant. If she was still unhappy by the time we rolled into Rain Dragon, our future there might be doomed from the start” (10).

“I stood there, taking in the sight. So this was her space. A part of me was pleased by the mess. I found, a sure sign of Amy’s fundamental inability to fend for herself in the world. Given the chance, she always slid back into this squalor. If nothing else, she needed me around to remind her to change the sheets every once in a while. But mostly I felt a sense of calm. It was almost sweet, this exile I’d fallen into. Listening to Amy downstairs, straightening the closet, so close, I could feel my love seeping back into my body. What I’d felt on the bridge was still there, still growing. It just needed a little distance to expand in.

What a trick, I thought. In her presence, the feeling had all but disappeared, replaced by petty frustration, bruised anger. And now, a few steps away, it was back again, ringing like a bell. It was like some demonic law, I thought, some inverse ratio. The greater the distance, the stronger the love. Or maybe it was even more complicated than that. It was just the right distance. Not too close and not too far. A force field. All the pieces arranged just so. Maybe I would never go home after all, I thought. Maybe I would just stand here, one floor up from Amy, for the rest of my life” (240-41).

Damon and his girlfriend Amy have had enough of Los Angeles. Fitful and tired and dreaming of a simpler life, they leave the city to go work on a community farm. But they’ve scarcely arrived when their vague hopes start to come unraveled: What are they really doing here? Who are their friends? Are they truly testing themselves, or are they just chasing a fantasy that will never be fulfilled? By degrees, they

Damon and his girlfriend Amy have had enough of Los Angeles. Fitful and tired and dreaming of a simpler life, they leave the city to go work on a community farm. But they’ve scarcely arrived when their vague hopes start to come unraveled: What are they really doing here? Who are their friends? Are they truly testing themselves, or are they just chasing a fantasy that will never be fulfilled? By degrees, they realize that their dreams are not the same. For Damon, a career in the field of branding unfolds almost effortlessly, while for Amy, the menial labor of the farm leads to a satisfying but difficult new path. As the rift deepens, they are forced to evaluate fundamental questions of identity and fate, ambition and betrayal, compromise and lust. This novel is a fresh, searching story about the love of work and the work of love, and the life destinies that we sadly only recognize in retrospect.

It wasn't the first such obsession that had gripped her.

"We should probably get out and help, right?" Amy asked.
I responded, "I guess so."
"Do you know where my boots are?" She asked.
"Way in the back. Under everything." I told her.
"Ugh." Amy responded.

"I couldn't say I was exactly looking forward to what ever was in store, but knowing Amy was happy made everything a little better. If she was happy, I figured, then I must be happy, too."

My sense of noble purpose lasted almost an hour. It was around then that my back started to ache and my knees began to hurt. .... a sudden pang of loss bloomed in my stomach. Not that my former life was so definitively behind me, I could it for all its wonderful comfort and ease.