Saving Rain

by Kelsey Kingsley

“What the fuck are you doing here?!” she shrieked. I dropped my bag on the kitchen floor. “I don’t have anywhere else—” “Hey, Soldier.” After almost ten years of being away, there were voices I was sure I wouldn’t recognize if I heard them again. I knew I wouldn’t be able to pick out my old boss from the grocery store out of a lineup, and if you asked me to recognize my first-grade teacher by voice alone, I wouldn’t be able to. But there were some voices I’d always remember, and when I dropped my hand, not caring about my mother’s nudity anymore, I was faced with the wicked grin time wouldn’t let me forget. “Levi.” Levi Stratton stood in my mother’s living room, zipping his pants up. He was missing his shirt and shoes, and given the casual way he moved around, it didn’t take a genius to figure out he was comfortable here. I wanted to throw up. He walked over, every shitty tattoo on full display, and looked me over. “God, how long has it been? Oh”—he tapped his temple—“that’s right. Just short of ten years, isn’t it?” Mom had turned her back to me and hurried to pull a shirt on as I managed to ask without wincing, “You’re fucking my mom?” He grinned and offered a nonchalant shrug while Mom hurried, barefoot, to thrust her hands against my ungiving chest. “I told you not to come back!” she shouted, frantic. “And where would you like me to go, Diane?” I asked, turning my narrowed glare from Levi to look at her. The woman who hadn’t changed her mind the way Harry had said she ...