Bring the Rain

by JoAnn Franklin

  Hendrix had the need burning inside her, or she wouldn’t have falsified her vita. She’d been smart about it, a little lie here, another there, but the fact remained that she wanted glory and fame, and she’d cheated to get it. Dad always said mud stuck, but I had watched mud dry, turn to dust and blow away. If I worked with Hendrix, she would provide the fire to move TRI to greater heights.

  She lied to get where she is.

  Ideas survived despite people, not because of them. So what if she stood beside me on the podium at Salzburg?

  Do the right thing.

  I couldn’t die without leaving something of myself behind. And that’s what this decision came down to. What was I willing to give up to ensure that The Raindrop Institute survived when I was gone? I spun the chair back to face Lea.

  “Are you still researching frontotemporal dementia?”

  Her eyes lit up. “My most recent study indicated subtle signs of change in humor might be an early sign.”

  “The methodology?”

  “Interviews with forty-eight friends and caregivers of people with FTD. I found changes in humor displayed as a symptom of dementia nine years before actual symptoms. One woman laughed when her husband scalded his hand. Another guy laughed at a barking dog who was scaring children. Both of them went on to display frontotemporal dementia.”

  I frowned, trying to understand. “Laughing at actions that one normally didn’t find funny happened many years before the actual diagnosis?”

  “They theorized that humor puts demands on many aspects of brain function, like emotion, puzzle solving, social awareness. That’s why it could be a canary-in-the-coal-mine warning for people. If this behavioral change displays nine years or more ahead of other mild symptoms, like apathy, then that would allow for planning, saving, marshaling resources, education, participation in research trials, all sorts of things.”

  “Including diet and exercising,” I said. “The researchers think that a Mediterranean diet and daily exercise can help stabilize mild symptoms.”

  “It can. Wicked disease, Dr. Sommers, but by studying FTD, we can find where moral character is located in the brain, and that’s key to your conscientiousness theory about poverty.”

  Ah, more familiar territory for my brain. I caught both of us up in that pattern. “That debate’s been going on for centuries among philosophers and psychologists.” I’d read all of those great arguments and still wasn’t enlightened. “Morals used to be thought of as outside us, like the Ten Commandments. Then ethics research shifted the origin to the individual and virtue theory, then shifted again to thinking of the community as ethics, and now researchers are rejecting all that and speculating that maybe values—doing what’s right—have been hardwired into our minds and generational experiences, and are what make us different from succeeding generations. Which is interesting and helps explain differences in religion, because there are some who think that those differences are memes that have been adopted as heuristics by the brain.”

  “I’d rather lose my memories than my values,” Lea said.

  So would I, but I was beginning to think I might not have a choice. I dragged myself back from the void where no morals existed and collected my thoughts. “I don’t know much about frontotemporal dementia or other dementias. I’m interested in reading your research and learning more.”

  “You found yourself unable to resist touching my hair yesterday, didn’t you, Dr. Sommers?”

  I hadn’t fooled her, but she wasn’t running from me. My gaze went again to the single braid and that strand of gray. This morning it didn’t interest me in the slightest, but Lea was right, yesterday the chemical compulsion in my brain made it impossible for me to resist. I’d been compelled to touch her hair and feel its silkiness.

  “It fits, Dr. Sommers, with your other strange behavior. Once I saw, once I recalled all of the episodes, the incidents where you’ve acted out of the ordinary. I saw the pattern. I hope I’m wrong, I really do.”

  I almost didn’t share with her, but she deserved to know. She worked more intimately with me than anyone else. “I went to see Dr. McCloud. He said I didn’t have Alzheimer’s and my odd behavior is a manifestation of stress and overwork. But he didn’t test for other types of dementias.”

  “There’s no cure for any of them, Dart.”

  I dropped my eyes from the pity in hers.

  “Dr. Hendrix isn’t making it easy, is she?”

  I nodded because that was all I could manage to do.

  Later that morning in Ash’s office, Hendrix didn’t say hello. When I sat down beside her, she got up and moved to the next empty seat.

  “Sun in your eyes?” I asked.

  “The perfume you’re wearing is giving me a headache.”

  “I don’t wear perfume.”

  She raised one eyebrow and shrugged. Anger at her contempt had me contemplating retaliation, but before I could act, Ash looked up and frowned. He tapped the table top with his index finger for emphasis. “Both of you are professionals, and I expect you to act as such.”

  “There’s no need for me to sit here and be insulted,” I said. “I sent Dr. Wilson an email this morning apologizing for my impulsive behavior.”

  “What happened, Dart?” Ash asked, and his quiet but steady voice calmed my emotions. Some people have that ability to emphasize what’s important.

  “Lea is frustrated with her career path at NCU and someone has told her, swayed her into thinking, that the old professors like Dr. Hendrix and me are standing in her way.” I hoped I had phrased that right to protect Lea. “Perhaps someone promised her something and then didn’t deliver.” I looked down at the table for a moment gathering my courage and my thoughts, then raised my head to again look Ash in the eye. “Emotions escalated. Both of us were angry. We said things we shouldn’t have said. Did things we never would have done had we not been angry, but I was wrong to make my point in the manner I did, by touching a gray hair in her braid, to point out that she herself was getting older.”

  “You put her in her place.”

  Hendrix’s comment squeezed my weak resolve to be professional. I’d always had a hard time admitting that I’d messed up. Hendrix knew that about me. She’d sensed what made me squirm, and she’d poured scorn into the wounds I was trying to heal from so long ago, when my father used to accuse me of mistakes I’d never made.

  “You know,” I said the words as slowly and precisely as I could, “I think I did.”

  The dean sat back in his chair. “That’s a different motive than sexual harassment. It almost makes you human, Dr. Sommers.”

  Was there a faint smile on his face? Must have been my imagination, but I relaxed. Maybe this was going to turn out okay after all.

  “You’re going to let her get away with this blatant display of sexual harassment, arrogance, and jealousy?” Hendrix’s mouth twisted with disgust as she leaned across the table trying to intimidate Ash.

  Her invasion of his professional space didn’t intimidate Ash. “She’s apologized.”

  Hendrix’s face twisted into ugliness.

  “Dr. Sommers’s actions were not professional, I agree with her on that, but we’re all human. If Lea had complained about her treatment, that would be another matter, but she didn’t, Kathleen, and I asked her twice about the incident.”

  Hendrix sat back in her chair. “If you had given Lea the MOOC as was her right, then Dart’s load wouldn’t be so heavy.”

  Wait. What did she mean? Give Lea the MOOC? She wanted me, a full professor, to step aside from the most prestigious course on the campus, the single course we shared with Stanford, and give it to an untried postdoc? That didn’t make sense.

  “Lea is younger,” Hendrix said, her hand gestures more expansive now as she tried to persuade Ash to share her point of view. “She has more energy, more insight, and her research base is more extensive in the area of Southern poverty . . . as is mine.”

  “I suppose you think Lea should take over The
Raindrop Institute as well?”

  “No,” Hendrix turned her hard gaze in my direction, “that belongs to me.”

  Now we were getting to her real agenda. I could feel my eyes widen, my heart stutter with astonishment. I’d misjudged Hendrix. This was more than smugness and confidence. This was the arrogance that motivated humans to overthrow governments, to take no hostages, and to kill off the insurgents.

  “What makes you think The Raindrop Institute belongs to you?”

  “Dean Wright.”

  “Ash?” That betrayal stung. I turned to look him.

  “He promised me when you got tenure five years ago that The Raindrop Institute would be mine if you failed to develop its potential.”

  “Why?” I managed to ask.

  Ash said, “The Raindrop Institute, in my opinion, is a reflection on this university. If you can’t make it work, then we need to put someone into play who can. After the Oprah interview, the Institute should have fast forwarded into fame and status. Instead, you’ve lost two members, and momentum. You’re floundering, Dart.”

  I hadn’t told him about the defections of Mary Beth and Classy, about the pleas for help I couldn’t answer. How did he know?

  “Kathleen is more than willing to help you out.”

  “Not help. I never said I would help. You know the ideas I have for the Institute will make it a household name, Dean Wright. That’s what this university needs to make NCUW the shining academic star of the East Coast.”

  “Aren’t the two of you forgetting something?” Both of them saw me as insignificant; I could see that in their expressions, as they stared at me. “TRI doesn’t belong to the university.”

  “Of course, it does,” Ash said. “You dreamt it up while you were working for the university. We’ve given you the leave time you needed to make it happen, and we’ve funded it.”

  “No, you haven’t. You turned down my request for funding.”

  “An oversight on my part. I’m willing to put significant resources toward the effort so Kathleen can make it what it should be.”

  He’d give the money to Kathleen, but not to me.

  “It’s already what it should be,” I said.

  “What?” Hendrix almost spit the word out. “Give it up, Dart. You can’t take it any further. I can.”

  I pushed my chair away from the table. “TRI belongs to me. It’s not a university initiative. The university has no claim on that work.”

  “Don’t be so sure of that,” said Hendrix. “We can make it very difficult for you.”

  I ignored her and looked at Ash. “I thought you cared about me.” I knew the minute I said the words that I shouldn’t have. But at least I hadn’t reached out and patted his hair. Nor did I feel any compulsion to do so. “TRI belongs to me, and I have the documentation to prove it. I have not received any funding from the university or the college, nor have I used materials, support staff, or university public relations material to promote TRI.” Except for Lea; she was working with me on the website and the MOOC, but the research I was doing for the institute informed the class, so that didn’t count.

  “Wrong again, Dart. Bless your heart.” Hendrix smiled, and I hated her for thinking of me as less than. “Hadn’t noticed before how that rhymes. Rather sweet, don’t you think?”

  “No, your words aren’t sweet. They’re condescending. And I’m not wrong.”

  “The dean has given you release time for TRI.”

  “In exchange for promoting the university.”

  “But that also establishes TRI as a university initiative.”

  “Free advertising doesn’t indicate ownership.” I pushed the chair against the table. “Dean Wright has no authority to take TRI from me or to involve you, Dr. Hendrix, in the day-to-day running of the initiative. He knows that, and if either of you try to take this away from me, I will find a way to stop you. TRI belongs to me.”

  “Dart, think twice before you alienate NCU. We can help you move TRI to an international scale,” Ash said.

  Be careful. You can’t be sure that he knows, and if you mention Salzburg, then he will find a way to take TRI from you. Ash would give his entire career to share my moment at Salzburg. No that’s wrong thinking. But I’d seen the pattern I wanted to see and the logic didn’t matter. It would be best to play these two along until I had Salzburg wrapped up and done.

  “I’ll think about it,” I said.

  “That’s all I can ask for at this moment.”

  Again, that quiet, steady voice comforted me even when I suspected he’d used me to get what he wanted. But was that the disease talking or reality? Ash wouldn’t use me to get what he wanted, would he?

  Hendrix grew restive, but Ash quelled her with a glance. “You can afford to give Dr. Sommers a little more time to get used to this idea, can’t you, Kathleen?”

  Now I really was confused. Whose side was he on?

  ELEVEN

  “LYNN, I’M A SCHOLAR, not an artist.”

  I should never have let her talk me into this. She’d been at the dining room table painting, and I’d sat down while I waited for Ash. Then he’d texted he’d be an hour late picking me up, and I’d made the mistake of telling Lynn. The next thing I knew, she’d had an apron over my good clothes, an easel propped in front of me, and a brush in my hand.

  “Honey, this is art therapy.”

  This was woo-woo, and the scientist within me was appalled. Therapy wouldn’t help me. I solved my own problems. And then I realized the brush in my hand was trembling. Lynn patted my shoulder. She had a streak of blue paint on her jeans and a blotch of red that had spread into the faint lines around her mouth—or maybe that was red lipstick. It was hard to tell with Lynn because she was a serious painter. And she meant well, I knew she did.

  “Nothing else has reduced the stress in your life, Dart.” Lynn put the canvas she’d prepared on the easel. “I’ve wanted you to try this for the longest time.”

  She’d been pestering me since I’d almost fallen off the ladder painting the trim.

  Lynn held up the picture I’d selected last week when she badgered me to get started. I hadn’t told her I’d picked it because I liked the title, Sliding into the Deep. The artist had painted a simple two-dimensional shed with a pitched roof about to topple into the ocean but still upright, for the moment at least, against a turquoise blue sky. Never mind that skies never went that color nor were oceans black, the image called to me. And it was simple, two sides and a roof. Anyone could paint that.

  “You sure?”

  I nodded, relieved she hadn’t called me out for not trying hard enough.

  Lynn handed me a pencil and a sheet of paper, and proceeded to show me how to transfer the image onto the blank canvas, one dot at a time. Fifteen minutes later, I connected the dots with straight lines, and the shed emerged.

  Perfect, except as Lynn pointed out, the building wasn’t centered. But I’d copied it. Just to be certain I looked away, looked at the picture, looked back at the canvas, and I could see it now.

  Still not centered.

  I erased the dots and the lines and tried again. Lynn encouraged me to keep trying. That’s what I liked about her, she always encouraged me.

  Nothing changed this time either, because although it looked right, the simple structure wasn’t centered when I measured the space around the shed yet again.

  Lynn didn’t say a word, and I loved her for that. She had to see what I was doing, had to wonder why my brain couldn’t process what I’d done wrong, but she was patient, and she let me keep trying until I positioned the shed in the middle of the canvas where it was supposed to be.

  The measurements said I’d gotten it right, and so did Lynn’s smile. That grin erased the worry that had come into her eyes.

  That’s when I knew I would be engaging with Lynn in woo-woo at least once a week. Her art therapy would be my tire gauge against mental deterioration. But that meant I’d know every week I painted if the disease had progressed.<
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  How could I face that?

  How can you not?

  That voice again. Maybe I should listen because that voice was why I was waiting for Ash.

  Cool evening air wafted over the pier. The day had been unseason-ably warm, and the diners took advantage of the warmth to eat outside in the ocean breezes. Ash and I watched the sun set on the water as we finished our meal, the fresh catch of the day for me and a steak for Ash. The conversation hadn’t been as bad as I’d anticipated. We’d talked about his trip, the implications for the university, and nothing about our personal lives. We were back to being friends, Ash and Dart, instead of the deeper relationship that Ash wanted.

  “You’ve been quiet all evening,” he said.

  That’s because I’d tried to pretend I wasn’t scared out of my mind. I didn’t understand why it had taken my brain four attempts to center that shed. I’d tried to put it out of my mind and enjoy the food, the company, and the breezes, but the distress hadn’t gone away. Something wasn’t right, and as I toyed with the stem of my wine glass, I wondered if I should confide in the one man who might make a difference for me.

  “Why don’t you tell me what’s troubling you?”

  If things between us weren’t so complex, maybe I would—but no, that wasn’t a viable excuse for avoiding the truth. Ash had nursed Jennifer through frontotemporal dementia, and he knew what to say, how to reassure me and tell me I was just having a bad day. That made my mouth quirk up in a slight smile, and he caught that.

  “I was just thinking that I could count on you to tell me the truth.” And I could. I could count on the man, but my boss was another matter, which is why neither of us had brought up TRI this evening. Discussions of TRI belonged in the office, not on this perfect evening.

  He covered my hand with his. “You can,” he said, and his own small smile delighted me so much I relaxed for the first time all evening. “You can count on me, Dart. That’s what I’ve wanted you to know for the longest time. I want you to count on me.”