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 Posted: Wed Jul 16, 2025 4:38 pm
Quote: Personal Raincloud (11) : It’s a beautiful, sunny day in Destiny City–for everyone but you. There’s not a cloud in the sky–except for yours. No matter where you go, a dark cloud seems to hover, casting shadows wherever you go. It’s been raining since you woke up today, and it’s like bad luck and bad weather just follows you. It’s a constant downpour, always exactly where you are. The raincloud is usually big enough to easily cover a full building, so if you stick around for too long, your misfortune will turn into someone else’s too. The raincloud might follow you for a few hours or for the whole day before slowly fading; there’s no escaping it, or the strange, sombre mood that seems to follow you.
“This is… inconvenient,” Nataniel grumbled, standing at the threshold of the doorway leading from the patio out the back stairs and to the garage. There were errands to run today in preparation for tomorrow, and it was supposed to be sunny and breezy. The weather app on his phone said it would be a nice, peaceful, relaxing day. Not too hot, but perfectly warm and pleasant. If someone were to need to leave their home, this was the time.
-Except it wasn’t what the app said it would be (deceitful app); it was ludicrously dark for the middle of the day, with thick, heavy raindrops splattering the ground in huge puddles and the water coming down in torrents.
Decidedly not the sort of conditions Nataniel wanted to be outside running errands in.
…But it wasn’t like they could push it off another day.
They needed to get food, bug spray, sunscreen, a cooler, ice, floaties- things they would need (or want) for their week at the campsite. And yes, of course it would be possible to leave and drive back into the city and get whatever they had forgotten, but Nataniel had it in his mind that that defeated the whole purpose of going to camp in the first place. Maybe what he had in his mind was wrong (he held no love for the hot, bug-infested outdoor of summer), but he wanted to do it right for Basyl. …To make it close to the sort of family vacations he’d had when he was younger.
A small collection of their friends had agreed to join: Tanwyn, Ivory, Ellian, Gideon, and even Basyl’s little sister and her girlfriend. Nat wanted this to be as smooth and as comfortable as possible for all of them, and there was already bound to be plenty of hardship with all of them in such close proximity for the next week.
The rain pattered on. Nataniel allowed his shoulders to sag, looking almost helplessly over his shoulder at Basyl. “Should we hold off shopping until the morning? I would prefer not to wait until the last minute…” The only reason he’d waited this long was because he feared any food he picked up going bad if they’d bought it any earlier.
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Posted: Thu Jul 17, 2025 5:09 pm
He was already just behind Nat, on the way out so they could Get Moving! He didn’t consider the shopping as much of a chore as Nataniel did, but Basyl would still prefer if it didn’t take hours and hours. They had a list, they had a schedule, they had a plan. And this was step one of an amazing week.
-Soooort of.
Basyl appeared at Nataniel’s shoulder, peering over him toward the gray and murky world beyond. Oh, it would be terribly inconvenient if it was going to look like this for more than just a day- the rain was definitely not part of the plan. And if it encroached upon their camp time, it would make the whole trip less exciting. They couldn’t go hiking through the trees or swimming in the lake in a thunderstorm. Basyl’s eyes narrowed, squinting out at the clouds because, well, it was certainly dark and hazy with a torrential downpour, but…
He could see beyond it. Like, quite easily, even? The rain pelted down on their house and yard, but it did look sunny beyond that. Which was weird, seeing two wildly different weather phenomenon in the same view, with nothing at all to separate them. Weird, sure, but it made him hopeful.
The week would not be ruined. Just this one, small excursion.
“Well, it seems-? It l-looks like we’ll be okay once we make it to the car. Look.” He pointed over Nat’s shoulder, gesturing to where he could see a clear and defined break in the storm. “It should be nice and dry during the shopping. It’s just getting out of the house that’ll be wet.” And because he knew- knew- with every fiber of his being the reluctance Nataniel was currently experiencing, Basyl offered him a sweet smile and a soft touch of lips to his love's shoulder through his tee-shirt. "Come on. Let's get it over with, and I'lllll- I'll make sure you get a treat, afterwards."
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Posted: Thu Jul 17, 2025 5:22 pm
The sound Nataniel made in the back of his throat was a noncommittal grumble. His vision wasn’t quite as good as Basyl’s… but he could still see that his fiancé was correct: the sun wasn’t all that far away. By the time they made it to the grocery store, they’d be out of the rain. The day would be saved. His focus shifted forward, toward the walk down the crumbly driveway to the garage and the car. They were already at the doorstep, about to leave.
He huffed and muttered, “No reason to waste more time than we already have…” And they were out the door, striding at a brisk pace despite the wind’s every insistence that they turn away.
The driveway was only a few yards long, barely something he noticed on most days and only inconvenient because today specifically, the distance was besieged by unhelpful conditions. The wind snatched and tousled at his hair, the water seeped through the thin fabric of his t-shirt, the heat and humidity of the day immediately fogged up his glasses. Most people had garages attached to the house. Not them, though!
The pair of men slipped through the side door, under cover and immediately met by the sound of pounding rain on the tin roof, and only marginally more unkempt than when they exited the house. Nataniel absolutely could not stand the sticky, clingy, damp fabric stuck to him at the shoulders; he would rather tear his skin off than endure it until he was dry. …But that would probably make the rest of the day go just as not-smoothly as the first few minutes of the excursion, and the shopping was for Basyl, so… So he could get over it (for now).
He flicked a hand to the side, beckoning for Basyl to take the passenger seat as Nataniel rounded the front of their car to get in on the driver’s side. He settled in the seat, pulling his starcharm-adorned keys from his pocket.
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Posted: Thu Jul 17, 2025 5:26 pm
Basyl obliged with a hum, scurrying to hop in the car quickly and not hold them up.
Like most times that went differently than expected or didn’t follow the norm or plan, Basyl was not half as bothered as his fiancé was. He brushed droplets of water from the top of his head with the palm of his hand, smoothing down the messy waves that threatened to frizz up under such humid conditions. He flipped the back of his hair, pulling it out from behind him as he leaned back in his seat. He adjusted his shirt, wiped cold little speckles of wet from his bare arms with the bottom edge of his tee.
And that was the extent of what he had to do to make himself comfortable again. It would dry in- well, minutes, probably? And even if it didn’t, it wasn’t really so bad. Of course no one liked being damp, but now they were in the car, and he barely even bothered to think about it again.
Oh- Except- “Here, let me have them,” Basyl offered, reaching over the center console to take Nataniel’s glasses from his face and dutifully wipe the foggy lenses on his tee shirt.
“There! Now you can’t even tell we were rained on, at all. …W-which is only a little of a shame, I think.” He leaned over as much as he could, sliding Nat’s glasses back up the bridge of his nose “My love is very sexy when he’s wet.”
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