Thunderstruck

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                             Thunder Struck
                            (MF, cons, rain)
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                      (c) Copyright - August 1998
                          All Rights Reserved
                            Crimson Dragon 
                          (dcrimson@yahoo.com)
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Kathleen could almost smell the sharpness of ozone as the sudden
cacophony woke her from a glowing dreamscape. In the disturbed dream
she had been approaching a girl in diaphanous white, slowly walking
towards a raised marble dais. She'd been whispering unknown
syllables, the sounds falling rhythmically between her parted lips,
passing through heady incense, and mingling with the gentle singing
voices surrounding her. The quiet rhythms of the haunting dream
melody had shattered into a million shards, like a mirror broken
from the sudden force of a hammered fist.
She was conscious of the next strike before she had fully awakened,
its luminosity lighting her retinas through the blinds and her
closed eyelids. The subsequent crashing was immediate and close,
shaking her lungs and rattling the bed in which she lay.
She curled up, drawing the covers under her chin and softly
whimpered. She opened her eyes again, dreading the next strike,
hoping that the thunder would move away and leave her alone. She
wasn't alone. His face on the pillow beside her, softly illuminated
by the dim light from the window, was strong and relaxed in sleep.
She looked at him with envy, wondering how he could sleep through
the storm and wishing she could rejoin him in dreamscape. She
reached out tentatively and traced his cheek with one slender
finger. He murmured and rolled over at the touch, not waking.
Another strike, not as close, rumbled through the darkness. She
jumped at the flash and then again with the thunder moments later.
Kathleen swallowed, suddenly thirsty. Her heart reverberated a dull
rhythm in her ears.
Lifting the sheets damp with her perspiration, she swung her bare
legs from the bed and sat up. Another flash illuminated the room
like an eerie strobe. She cried out as the thunder washed over her,
but her small sounds were no match for the power of the storm. Her
tiny cries were the squeak of a mouse fighting the mighty roar of a
wolf.
As she rose to her bare feet, the rain began to tumble to the earth,
released in a torrent of tears from the heavens above. Even through
the insulation of the attic, she could hear the staccato beat of the
rain against the shingles. She looked at the stippled ceiling above
her and silently thanked a higher power that she had a roof over her
head, and that she was warm and dry. Despite her protection from the
elements, she shivered. She hugged herself as she walked carefully
out of the room, leaving the prone man sleeping, blissfully unaware
of the storm or her distress. Her bare feet whispered across the
hardwood and down the flight of steps to the main level of the
house.
She poured a tall glass of milk in the dim glow of the refrigerator
lamp. Sitting at the kitchen table in the dark, she could hear the
rain whipping into the glass of the windows. She cringed as
something heavy began to hit the house, the new beat low and
dangerous.
She tightened, lowering her head to the table, her heart racing, her
stomach in knots. Tears threatened and spilled as another bolt of
light streaked across the sky, its roar carried and simultaneously
shattered by the wind.
She wanted to call for her father. Her father would protect her,
stop the storm, stop her fright, stroke her hair ever so gently
until it ended, infinitely patient with her. Her sisters had always
made fun of her, taunting her. Their voices echoed through her
memory.
"Baby. Baby. Afraid of the thunder. Grow up little baby." She could
still hear their singsong voices tormenting her through the
intervening years.
Her father, long gone now, chastised the imps who couldn't possibly
understand, but it had only stopped them while in his presence.
Engulfing her small hand in his own, her father lead her to the
window, parting the curtains, showing her the storm, forcing her to
confront it, forcing her to confront herself, gently teaching her.
He had picked her up, at last, soothing her by the window, cradling
her in his arms, both of them staring out at a long ago
thunderstorm. She had been dry and safe in his arms as she had
witnessed the fierceness outside, her heart at last slowing to his
soft murmurs.
She tried desperately to remember the lessons, tried to remember her
father, but even his face was obscured, and with his absence the
fear returned. Her heart ached and hammered as another bolt slammed
into the earth outside.
She found herself in front of the patio doors, her fingers touching
the blinds. She had no recollection of moving to the doorway.
Glancing back, her milk was unfinished, still sitting resolutely on
the table. As she parted the venetian blinds with a flick of her
wrist, another bolt of lightning showed its rage to the cowering
land beneath. The flash lit her, framing her in the glass of the
doorway. Her bare breasts uplifted, nipples painfully tight, as she
caught her breath. Her mostly nude body beckoned the storm as her
toes gripped the tile beneath her bare feet.
The neighbourhood was dark; it was sleeping or carefully ignoring
this storm venting the Gods' rage outside. She normally wouldn't
have exposed herself like this, in only her pink panties, but she
had to see the storm. Had to embrace it. Had to tame it. Her father
had taught her so long ago. She concentrated, willing it to end,
willing it to subside before her.
The Gods smiled down on her simple beauty and her determination. For
a moment, the winds died down, and the freezing hail ceased to
descend. Quiet gripped the world.
Kathleen sighed, silently shaking. As she turned away from the
glass, the Gods, perhaps upset at losing sight of her beauty,
relinquished their hold on the elements. Another crash of lightning
lit up the gray sky, turning it shades of pink and rose, blinding
the girl into stumbling away from the patio doors. A large maple
shrieked in pain as the thunder nearly shattered the glass
protecting Kathleen.
As she sank to her knees, she glanced up at the clock lit bright
blue on the microwave. 4:24 AM. Her eyes had begun to adjust to the
lower light levels though streaks of orange suffused her vision.
Tears ran down her face, blurring the clock. She blinked once,
trying to clear her eyes of the moisture threatening to blind her.
In a heartbeat, the blue luminescence of the numbers flashed into
darkness. The refrigerator stumbled and fell silent. The rage of the
storm intensified in the sudden silence. Instead of being satisfied
with the damage it had wrought, the storm seemingly took joy in the
cessation of electricity, inspiring further violence.
Kathleen whimpered like a small child afraid of the monsters in the
dark. She desperately conjured up the image of strong arms, safety,
warmth and dryness. She rocked on her knees, silently crying,
paralyzed, staring at the rain thundering into the deck beyond her
gate of glass.
She closed her eyes, hugging herself below her breasts. Inhaling,
she took long deep breaths, still silently praying for forgiveness
for whatever sins she had committed. Again, her father's image came
to her, wrapping his strong arms around her, whispering comfort into
her ear, stroking her strawberry blonde tresses. She slowly opened
her wet eyes, actually feeling the arms around her. But it couldn't
be her father.
Slowly she turned her head, feeling soft breathing in her ear.
"The storm, isn't it?"
She nodded, unable to speak.
"Come back to bed?" he asked her gently.
She took a deep breath. Not answering him, she spoke quietly, her
voice quivering. "Did I wake you?"
Even though he was kneeling behind her, gently pulling her back
between his knees, she could feel him smile. "No. Some small noise
woke me, and you weren't there. I figured you'd be here."
He tilted the glass against her lips and she drank her abandoned
milk, savouring the taste. She could feel the solidity of his arms,
nearly as firm as her father's, but not quite. She was grown now and
solidity was a relative measure. He lowered the glass after it was
empty, letting her catch her breath.
"The Johnson's maple isn't very happy either ..." her voice trailed
off.
"And you like giving the neighbours a show?" he asked playfully as
his finger traced down across her bare nipple.
"I ... wasn't. I forgot my robe upstairs."
"It's alright. Power's off. No light to see you by. Only this." His
finger lightly traced down her other breast. She shivered against
him but made no move to avoid his caress. Distracted, her hammering
heart had slowed with his presence. His touch ignited a quicker,
different beating.
She closed her eyes and tried to return to the dream. Incense.
Singing. Women in white. Calm. The storm receded, though
peripherally she was aware of the hail and the intermittent flashes
beyond her closed lids.
She felt herself gathered in strong arms and lifted. She could
almost believe she was still eight, and her father was returning a
frightened, half asleep little girl to bed. Relaxing, finally, she
allowed her husband to carry her, felt him stumble at the last
stair, but didn't flinch. If the storm couldn't attack her in his
arms, then the threat of a short fall didn't frighten her either.
She felt his lips against hers as she was lowered to the bedclothes.
The rain intensified, beating as though to interrupt, furious that
it had been balked. She returned the kiss hungrily, reaching for
him, pulling him to her, kissing fiercely, biting gently at his
upper lip.
She could feel her fingers tracing his skin, then removing the wispy
bit of pink cotton from her hips. She could feel his fingers
touching her, stroking her, teasing her as their lips met in satiny
lushness. Again, the storm receded, as though to give them privacy.
Her body responded, her sex tingling and pulsing slowly - pulsing as
though to the beat of the almost constant thunder crashing around
her.
He entered her in one smooth motion. She cried out at the sudden
penetration, but immediately relaxed, enjoying the sensations of
fullness. She pushed herself against him, wanting him pressed into
the depths of her. Tears fell slowly from her eyes as she cried out
softly, again, her voice intermixing with the storm's rage.
Desperately, she moved with him, the waves of desire warring with
the shore of irrational fear. Slowly, her insistent passion eroded
to the centre of her being, the fierceness of the storm paled beside
the fires building in their slow kisses and motion. Vaguely, she
could hear the gentle squeaking of the bed through the white noise
of the storm, above even her soft sighs. His joining with her
exorcised the daemons of her fear. The waves built until she felt
him stiffen inside of her with a muffled cry, spilling gently into
her. His final deep thrust touched her, sending her cascading over
the valleys and mountaintops of her onrushing climax. As she arched
into him, her head fell back into the pillows, a bright light
illuminated her senses. As she screamed out his name, the thunder
embraced her, driving its bass into her core, joining her cry of
triumph and pleasure.
As her pulse slowly returned to normal, she hugged him as the
thunder had embraced her moments ago. She held him close, laying her
head upon his shoulder, whispering nonsense quietly into his ear.
For a while they remained, comforting and near. The thunder had
moved away after the final strike of rage at her defiant pleasure.
Kathleen could feel her body demanding sleep, her eyes heavy and
stinging. The aftermath of the tempest and her satiation flowed
through her like an insistent whisper calling to her. Together, they
lay, her head cradled in the crook of his arm.
"Better?" he asked her sleepily.
"Have I told you I loved you lately?"
"I'll take that as a yes," he replied quietly.
"Oh yes," she sighed into his rapidly slowing chest.
She was aware when he fell asleep again, his breathing telling her.
She lay with him for some time, listening to the receding,
ineffectual rumbling of the storm seemingly in rhythm with his
breathing.
Her body ached from the love making, but it was a nice ache. Pangs
of tears rose unbidden to her eyes. Carefully, she slipped out of
his sleepy embrace, padding across the hardwood again. She shivered,
this time because her body temperature had dropped. She hugged
herself, but didn't slip on the bathrobe hanging on the back of the
door.
She opened the blinds covering the bedroom window. She quietly slid
the glass open, exposing the night. The distant rumble of the
thunder carried more clearly to her ears. The sweet smell of summer
rain infused her, and she inhaled it, savoured it, let it flow over
her senses. She had conquered it, defied the Gods once more. She
shivered as a cool wind caressed her bare breasts, raising small
bumps as though she'd stepped from the shower. Drips of water fell
irregularly from the roof onto the deck below, sounding like a
faucet in need of tightening. The neighbour's maple had fallen
across the grass, mute testament to the ferocity of the Gods. She
would help the Johnsons with tomorrow's clean up.
She sighed, feeling the heaviness of sleep invading her aching body.
As she softly closed the window, she heard the sudden hum of the
refrigerator fill the quiet house. The bedside clock flashed 12:00
in bright red bursts, as though thankful to her for freeing it from
exile.
She padded back to bed, slipping nude between the sheets. Warmth and
peace flooded through her skin. She curled up, tucking the
bedclothes back under her chin. Her musk permeated the room, mixing
with the smell of fresh rain, providing a calming, airy elixir. She
cradled her head against the familiarity of him, kissing gently at
his chest. He stirred, but didn't wake.
The storm passed. She listened to the last of the distant rumbles as
they faded into safe obscurity. It was as though the storm had never
been. Darkness and peace overtook her, and she gratefully joined her
mate in the world of dreams.
Her dreams were filled with gentle summer rain, women in white, and
incomprehensible words. But no thunder.