RAINBOW MAN, Chapter 16

A serialized novel from best-selling author David W. Berner

Welcome to Rainbow Man, a serialized novel about a grieving widower who travels to Spain to find solace and restart a life only to find himself entangled in the counterculture past of a younger woman.

Summary of Chapter 15: Chloe begins to come to terms with the hard truths of her past, what she must do, and how Robert can help her.

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Debbie had been a young girl when it happened. It was not until college that she learned all of it, what her father had done years ago in a time of weakness and uncertainty. The woman, some ten years younger than Robert, had worked with him at the grocery, one of the cashiers and an occasional assistant in the bakery. He had befriended her after learning of her son’s death, a car accident, a horrible crash on a snowy night. They shared coffee and talked. He held her hand when she cried. The money he gave her had come from the family savings account, a hundred dollars at first, then two hundred, again and again, offered to her in cash to help with funeral expenses, to buy flowers and a small headstone. She was alone, this woman, the boy’s father gone years before. When Emma had wondered aloud about the money, Robert had lied. Maybe it was for the tires the car needed, he had said. Maybe it was paying off the Christmas debt, he had said. You know me, he had said, I’m not so good with this kind of stuff. And each time he told another lie, he saw that woman’s eyes, heard her voice, the way she thanked Robert for his help, his generosity. He felt the hugs she had given him, the kiss on the cheek. He had offered money to a friend in need. It was nothing more than that, he insisted. But Robert knew it was more, knew it was different, and in time, Emma knew, too.