Hash browns, ‘made properly’, his aunt would say, and french toast cut in thick slices from homemade bread. The bread that wasn’t being used to make french toast was sitting in a basket on the table, with jam and butter sitting nearby. With the production that went into cooking, there was a lot of pressure to eat, to get full. For most, it was necessary, with long days of hard work on the farms.

Not that Rain worked on the farms much.

“Thank you for breakfast,” he said.

The girls didn’t respond.

“You gonna have a shower?” his aunt asked.

“A quick one,” he said.

“Stomp when you’re done,” she said, turning the knob at the base of the sink’s faucet, cutting off the water. The plumbing in the house wasn’t great, and the cold water being turned on meant the shower water would scald.

He gathered his dishes.

“You can leave that for the girls.”

“I already got it,” he said.

He collected a few more things, aware of the looks from the men sitting around the table, and took them to the side of the sink where the dirty pans and dishes were waiting to be washed.

Allie, standing next to him, pulled a knife out of the drying rack. The metal made a sound as it ran against the side of the rack, singing slightly in the wake of it. Between that, the weapon, the hostility he felt from the two girls at the stove, he shivered slightly. He looked out the window.

Those people I saw in my dream want me dead.

He’d paused too long, lost in thought, being as tired as he was. He was very aware of the stares, of the long looks from the men at the table, his uncle excepted. The girls had paused in their work.

“What?” his aunt asked, her voice sharp. She glanced at the girls. Her voice was sharper as she asked, “What, do you need someone to come up and wash you?”

“Gross,” one of the girls at the stove said.

“Hey!” one of the men barked the word. The girl jumped. A rebuke without any elaboration.

“No, auntie, I was just thinking,” Rain said, feeling his face get hot.

“Then save the thinking for school and get going. We need the sink free to finish the dishes.”

He got going.

The shower was hot, even with the cold water cranked all the way around, and he rushed through the process of getting clean. The soap, spooned out of a jar with a wooden spatula to his hands, then applied to the critical areas, was a gooey mess derived from animal fat and ash. He had no idea what the shampoo was, but it was harsh enough to make his scalp hurt, so he only used it every two or three days.