Rain, Thunder, and Tea

Autumn Harvest, a soft wheat yellow kirin with a soft orange mane and red scales, walked next to his mommy through the market they were buying a bunch of things for the storm tonight. He had no idea what a storm was but all the village was buying supplies for it. Autumn Harvest had come to the conclusion that this ‘storm’ thing must be some kind of party of sorts given that everyone was buying things like candles and extra food. It must have been a minor party, because mommy hadn’t dressed herself and him up in the festival clothes, and daddy still had to go work at in at the mines, which would have been closed if this was an important party.

“Mommy, mommy!” He softly tugged at his mother’s tail. “Look, look can we get some honey for the storm?” Autumn Harvest pointed at a small stand in the kirin market that sold the sweet tasty gold treat.

“Harvest, sweetie, why do we need honey for the storm?” She asked. As she bought a bucket.

“Because we don’t have any treats at home, and you and daddy always get treats for the parties and festibals.” He gave his mother his best pleading face he could. She looked down a him a little confused for a second.

“That’s right this is your first storm isn’t it. You don’t quite know what that is do you?” Autumn Harvest shook his head side to side. “Hmmm.” Mommy tapped her chin before smiling. “Right, let’s go get some honey for our bread and tea, for the show tonight.” She smiled as Autumn Harvest started bouncing around her excitedly.

“Honey! Honey! Sweet and tasty honey on my bread in my tea. Honey! Honey! Sweet and tasty honey yummy, yummy, yummy in my tummy!” Harvest sang as mommy bought a jar of the gold sweet treat for them. She put the honey in her saddle bag and continued on Harvest following right behind her. “Mommy, what’s the bucket for?” He asked as they trotted back home.

“Well last time we had a leak and we don’t get a lot of rain, so I can’t remember if the leak was fixed or not. So, if we still have it this bucket take care of it.”

“Rain?” Autumn Harvest asked. “Is that a game we play on this festible?”

“Rain isn’t a game, it’s a thing that happens during a storm. It’s like water that comes down the waterfall, but it comes from the sky in a bunch of little drops.” She answered. “If there is a light rain before the storm you can play out in it for a little bit, but not to long, to much activity in the rain can make you sick.”

“Like to much honey give a tummy ache?”

“Something like that.” She nodded opening the door of their home.

They stayed inside for several hours before Autumn Harvest noticed that there was something strange going on. Despite it being three hours after his nap the sky was starting to get dark, and all of the fluffy white clouds had become dark gray to black. The wind was picking up to causing the wind chimes to start ringing a lot more than normal to. “Mommy somethings going on!” He ran to his mother who was preparing their afternoon snack.

“No nothing is wrong sweetie. This is just the storm coming in.” As she said there was a soft tapping on the roof. “And there’s the rain. Do you want to go and see it?”

“I’m not really sure mommy it’s kind of scary.”

“Come on you don’t need to be afraid Harvest, let’s go see it.” She opened the door to their backyard and stepped outside. Harvest stepped out staying underneath her. As little drops of water splashed all over the place. “Go on this is a very light rain.” Mommy motioned for Harvest to go out and play in the yard. He hesitated for a second before stepping out from underneath her. A couple of rain drops hit his face. He wiped his nose and then looked around before laughing.

“Mommy it’s like the sprinklers!” He ran around in the yard splashing in the small puddles that were already starting to form. Mommy watched from the back porch until the rain started to pick up.

“Okay Harvest it’s time to come in!” She called. “The storm is about to blow in and the rain is picking up!” Harvest ran back to mommy as the sky got darker.

“Mommy, it’s getting really dark now. Can the sun come back out?” He asked. “It will come back tomorrow sweety but this storm is going to last for most of the afternoon. This is just going to be an evening thunderstorm.”

“Mommy what’s thunder?”

“It’s like a kirin hitting a drum, it comes after lightning?”

“Lighting?”

“Flashes in the sky. It’ll start up soon. Let’s get inside before thing start picking up.” She ushered him inside and closed the door behind them. Mommy started floating out the candles and lighting them around the house. Before getting out the honey and smearing it on bread and starting a pot of tea.

“Yummy, yummy honey!” They sat down at the table nibbling on the honied bread. Mommy sat next to him at the table and took a bite out of her slice of honied bread looking out the window. Suddenly there was a flash of light. Harvest jumped then looked out the window before there was a loud boom that shook the house. He squeaked and bolted into mommy’s hooves.

"It’s okay sweety it’s okay. That was just the lightning and thunder I was telling you about.” She held him in her lap looking out the window floating over a teacup and pouring the tea into the cup and adding a little bit of honey she took a sip and let Autumn Harvest have a sip as well. “Watch the sky sweetie the storm is going to give us a light show.” Another flash of light and roar of thunder but this time Harvest laughed watching the lightning in mommy’s hooves.

The storm lasted for most of the afternoon and Autumn Harvest watched the lightning and listened to thunder nibbling on the honied breed. At the end of the storm his eyes went wide as a beautiful rainbow covered the sky. “Wow what’s that?”

“That’s a rainbow it happens after all the storms.”

“It’s so pretty, can we have more storms mommy?”

“Maybe sweetheart maybe.”

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