Downpour.

The thunder clapped like a sheet drying in prairie wind. Its crispness slowly unfolded, the creases that let go of themselves and turned into cool damp slides. Their only purpose to catch the fat drops that soak into the fabric, until every thread was filled and gushing at the seams. Streams of water raced through dusty front yards, creating tiny rivers and enormous puddles, filling every crevice it could find. The dust slowly becoming muck, the potholes miniature lakes.

For a split second the entire stretch of earth became illuminated, the sky, the grain, the houses spattered anywhere. It all, for a microsecond, was pure white. A calm transcendence, a pinhole in the firmament. The fire lit faces extinguished in a hiss. The comfortable warm scent replaced by sporadic flashbulb bursts.

When they raise their tired heads and open their shadowy eyes everything will be the way it was before. All of the rain, the astounding down pour, will have vanished. Everything feels cleaner, but nothing looks different.