This is Drabbletober, the podcast of tiny fiction.

Hello, and welcome to Drabbletober. This is episode 28, for Monday the 28th of October 2024, and I'm Elizabeth Guilt.

Your one-hundred word story for the day is:

Breaking the Rainbow

I remember him in kindergarten, throwing stones at the sky. Toddlers are all, at heart, destructive. But he asked strange questions when I taught weather systems in first-year science, and again when we covered refraction in GCSE physics.

He was seventeen when I caught him vandalising the gym.

"What is this?" I demanded.

He shrugged, sigils dribbling paint down the wall. "Weather magic."

I raised concerns with the school counsellor.

It rained this morning. I heard his voice, then I saw the sky shatter. His face drifted past my lab's second floor window as he ascended, blissfully, into multicoloured brilliance.

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Rainbows are one of my favourite natural phenomena, and understanding refraction does not make them any less magical or mysterious.

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Take care, everyone, and I'll see you tomorrow for episode 29.

https://www.elizabethguilt.com/drabbletober/episode28