An old, stooping man of ninety-three carries a black umbrella through the rain.
Jacques.
Late afternoon. Gray sky. A coldness saturates the wet air. Jacques smells the thick scent of rain, letting it fill his nostrils with its melancholic tranquility. He looks at his watch. The frail hands slide slowly and the tiny gears shift around beneath the thin casing. Jacques carefully hobbles along the sidewalk, gazing contentedly upon the cobblestone street and listening to the putter of the old motorcars. He hears the squeaking of a bicycle and moves aside to let the rider pass. It is a tall man dressed in a black suit and tie, hair slicked back, smoking a long black pipe as he rides his thin, spindly, stretching bicycle along the walk. Jacques observes the trees to his right. They sway with the wind, wet from the rain. He feels the tiny splatters of droplets on his face. He is not in a hurry, but he holds in his mind an eventual destination. Something catches his eye: a church sits beyond in a field. He walks slowly through the wet grass and up the large, wooden steps. Once on the porch, he closes the soaked umbrella. Paint peels off the walls of the building, and a few people sit on the porch in ancient rocking chairs, watching the streams and drops and puddles, keeping dry. The church was built in the 1890s, when little old ladies would dress up and walk to church with their families. It is a small church, and only 40 or so people are actually members, most of whom are old people who remember going to church there when they were young children.
Jacques enters the old structure and removes his black top hat, feeling the rough doorframe and stepping up over the wood plank। The church is empty. Wooden pews sit on wooden floorboards, and stained glass windows let the dim light leak in. The walls seem to lean toward the center. Jacques sits down in a pew and listens. There is only silence, except the light sound of rain on the roof. After a while, he hears the thin crackle of an old phonograph playing quietly in the distance. The slow violin and piano duet creeps lightly through the small room, gracing the pews with its ethereal and dampened presence. Jacques closes his eyes and lets out his last satisfied sigh as his body fully relaxes into the pew. The light from the windows seems to grow, occupying more space in the air. The music flows forever, its somber melody crinkling along the wall panels.
