Whisper Wood

The Rain Falls Upward on Tuesday's

Esme woke to the sound of rain against her cottage window. When she pulled back the curtains, she found herself staring at rain droplets that hung in the air like tiny crystal orbs as they drifted up….

"Well," she murmured, reaching for her morning tea blend, "that's new."

Each droplet rose from the earth with the deliberate slowness of soap bubbles. Drifting skyward in graceful spirals before disappearing into the gray clouds above. Mesmerizing. Magic sprung back this morning in the most ‘magical’ way imaginable.

Cosmo pressed his nose against the window and made a sound that was somewhere between a purr-snip and a question mark. Outside, the upward rain caught the morning light and fractured it into tiny rainbows that danced across the gardens like scattered jewels.

"The cats seem delighted," Esme observed, watching as several of the village's feline residents had gathered in the town square. They pawed at the ascending droplets wuth pure joy.

Mrs. Holloway's tabby, Duchess, was attempting to catch individual raindrops as they rose, spinning in circles and mewing with excitement. Even the usually dignified Persian that belonged to the innkeeper was rolling on its back, batting at the ethereal precipitation with abandon.

The cats had discovered that the upward rain responded to their presence. When they pounced at a droplet, it would pause mid-ascent. Hovering just within reach before continuing its journey skyward. Some of the more athletic cats had learned to create entire cascades of dancing raindrops. Turning the square into a playground of liquid light.

"Purr-snip-caaaaa!" Cosmo announced. His new word for this particular phenomenon.

Esme dressed quickly and stepped outside. Raindrops brushed against her skin like gentle butterflies. The air itself was charged with possibility. The entire village transformed into a place where physics was merely a suggestion.

Henrik was already in the square, of course, standing beneath the rising rain with his arms outstretched and his face turned skyward. He was laughing like a child experiencing snow for the first time.

"Esme!" he called out, his voice bright with wonder. "Have you ever seen anything like this? The rain tastes like starlight!"

She joined him, tilting her head back to let the droplets rise past her face. Henrik was right. Each drop that brushed her lips carried the flavor of distant galaxies, cool and clean and somehow familiar, like a memory from a dream she'd almost forgotten.

"It's beautiful," she said as she watched a particularly large droplet spiral upward. It carried within it a tiny constellation of silver lights. "Like we live in a champagne bottle! But why is it happening?"

"Tuesday," said a voice from behind them.

They turned to find Revilo emerge from the direction of the library. His clothes still carryied the scent of sea spray and his hair glittered with drops of the upward rain.

"Tuesday?" Esme repeated.

"The day of the week when magic gets creative," Revilo explained. He caught a handful of ascending droplets and watched them pool in his palm before slowly rising between his fingers. "In the old stories, Tuesday was always the day when the rules relaxed. The magical stars just relit. So Tuesday. Rain falls upward, cats speak in riddles, and the boundary between what is and what might be becomes thin as morning mist."

"The translation glitch is acting up again too," Henrik giggled. "Mrs. Holloway just tried to tell me that her stones were ready."

"Tuesday's magic," Revilo said with a knowing smile. "It affects language as much as weather. The words get playful, and start experimenting with meanings. By Wednesday, everything usually settles back to normal."

Bibliotheca appeared in the doorway of the library, her starlight hair moving upwards in the strange currents created by the ascending rain. "The upward rain has awakened some of the more unusual books. The entire meteorology section is practically vibrating with excitement."

"Meteorology section?" Esme asked, intrigued.

"Third floor, west wing," Bibliotheca replied. "There's a particularly fascinating volume titled 'The Emotional Lives of Thunderstorms.' Today they're all singing in harmony."

The cats in the square discovered that if they jumped high enough, they could briefly join the upward rain in its skyward journey. Duchess managed to leap nearly ten feet into the air. Her paws outstretched as she rode the ascending currents for a moment before gracefully descending back to earth.

"They're flying," Henrik observed with delight. "The cats are actually flying."

"Only on Tuesdays," Revilo said. "Something about the reversed gravity makes everything lighter, more possible."

Tom the baker's apprentice came running from the direction of his shop, his apron flapping behind him and his face bright with excitement. "The bread!" he called out. "The bread is floating!" Aromatic clouds of bread, rising with the rain toward the gray sky. Mrs. Holloway in pursuit, a butterfly net in her hands, attempting to catch the wayward baked goods.

"Tuesday bread," Tom explained breathlessly. "I hope they taste like clouds for a few days."

"Like clouds?" Esme asked.

"Fluffy and sweet and sort of... sky-flavored," Tom clarified. "We will call it 'Tuesday Toast'."

The floating bread was creating quite a spectacle. The loaves drifted through the ascending rain like golden ships sailing an invisible ocean, occasionally bumping into each other with soft, musical chimes.

The cats had immediately taken notice and leapt high enough to catch the flying bakery goods. The square became a three-dimensional playground of rising raindrops, floating bread, and gleefully acrobatic felines.

"This is magnificent," Henrik said, spinning in a slow circle with his arms outstretched. "I feel like I'm in a dream."

"Better than a dream," Bibliotheca said. "Dreams fade when you wake up. This is Tuesday magic, which means it's real enough to remember but strange enough to wonder about later."

A particularly bold ginger cat ~ one that Esme didn't recognize ~ managed to catch a small dinner roll in mid-air. It purred loudly as crumbs drifted upward like tiny golden snowflakes.

"Whose cat is that?" Esme asked.

"Mine, I think," said a new voice. They turned to see a young woman approach through the upward rain. Her clothes simple but well-made. Her auburn hair braided with what looked like strands of silver light. She moved with the careful grace of someone who wasn't quite used to walking on solid ground.

"I'm Luna," she said, extending her hand to Esme. "I arrived with the rain this morning. The cats led me here.”

"The cats led you here?" Henrik asked.

"Oh yes," Luna replied casually. "Cats are excellent guides when the rain falls upward. They know all the best currents. My cat, Comet" ~ she gestured toward the ginger cat, who was now attempting to juggle dinner rolls while floating ~ "has been wanting to visit ever since he heard about the library from traveling sparrows."

"Traveling sparrows?" Esme echoed.

"Tuesday birds," Luna explained. "They carry news between magical places. Comet loves stories, you see. He's particularly fond of adventure tales and romance novels. He can't read, obviously, but he likes to sit on my lap while I read aloud, and he makes the most interesting comments."

As if to demonstrate, Comet descended from his bread-juggling performance and approached the group. He floated gently downward like a furry balloon. He landed next to Cosmo and immediately began what could only be described as a conversation. It consisted entirely of various purrs, chirps, and the occasional "purr-snip."

"They're discussing the weather," Luna translated helpfully. "Comet says the rain tastes like adventure stories, and your cat, Cosmo, is explaining about the library and books that sing."

"You speak cat?" Tom asked, still chasing floating bread with his borrowed butterfly net.

"Only on Tuesdays," Luna said. "And only when the rain falls upward. It's one of those temporary magical abilities, like how some people can see music as colors or hear the conversations of trees. I suspect by Wednesday I'll be back to just understanding the occasional meow."

The upward rain was becoming more intense, and the cats were becoming correspondingly more delighted. They had discovered that by working together, they could create spiraling towers of raindrops that rose like liquid tornadoes. The floating bread had joined the dance, bobbing and weaving through the ascending precipitation like an aerial ballet.

"We should go inside," Bibliotheca suggested. "The library has a wonderful view of the rain from the reading rooms, and I'd love to show Luna our collection of stories about weather magic."

"Is there really a book about rain that falls sideways?" Esme asked as they began walking toward the great sequoia.

"Oh, that's one of my favorites," Luna said. "I read it during a particularly memorable Tuesday in the mountains. The rain was falling horizontally, and the local cats had learned to use it as a sort of moving walkway. They would leap into the rain streams and ride them across the valleys like furry express trains."

"Tuesday's magic," Revilo said, holding the library door open for the group. "It makes everything possible, if only for a day."

As they entered the library, the sound of the upward rain became a gentle percussion against the windows. A soft, musical pattern. The cats remained outside, creating increasingly elaborate aerial displays with the floating bread and ascending precipitation.

"The meteorology section is this way," Bibliotheca said, leading them toward one of the library's spiraling staircases. "Fair warning—some of the books become quite animated. A volume about hurricane formations created a small tornado in the reading room this morning. It rearranged all the furniture."

The books hummed with energy. As they climbed the stairs, Esme could hear the faint sound of singing coming from various sections. The books themselves, harmonized in mathematical languages of weather patterns or the poetry of storm systems.

"Here we are," Bibliotheca announced, "The complete meteorological collection, including several volumes that exist only on Tuesdays."

Luna moved immediately toward a book whose cover appeared to be made of actual rainfall, somehow contained within the binding. "Oh, this one!" she exclaimed. "I've been looking for this everywhere. 'The Secret Language of Storm Systems' by Professor Nimbus Weatherby. It's supposed to contain the actual words that hurricanes use to communicate with each other."

"Be careful," Bibliotheca warned gently. "That one tends to create its own weather patterns when opened. Last time someone read it, we had a small blizzard in the fiction section."

Luna opened the book and the pages rustled with the sound of wind through leaves. She began to read aloud, her voice carried the distant rumble of thunder. “'Chapter One: The Vocabulary of Velocity,'" she read, and the words themselves danced on the air. "'Every storm has its own dialect, its own way of speaking to the sky. Hurricanes speak in long, spiraling sentences that can take days to complete. Tornadoes prefer sharp, sudden exclamations that twist meaning into new shapes. And gentle rain showers whisper in run-on sentences that never quite seem to end...'"

"They're dancing to the story," Henrik observed, looking out one of the library's windows at the aerial ballet taking place in the square.

Esme closed her eyes and listened to the symphony of Tuesday. Rain falling upward, cats discussing philosophy, books singing weather songs, and friends discovering new wonders in a library that existed because a goddess had decided their village needed more magic. When she opened her eyes again, Luna was smiling at her over the storm-language book.

"Every Tuesday is different," Luna said. “Just remember to look up.”

"And to always keep a butterfly net handy," Tom added from the window as he where he caught his floating bread. "Just in case."