She sometimes wondered if thunder was the way clouds talked. The streaks of lightning must be the verbs, she mused, and the rumbles that followed after were merely modifiers to the primary concept. But clouds lived such short lives, from sea to sky and back again, she couldn’t think what they would have to say. Even the yellow-finned fish her father pulled up in the hand-knotted nets seemed to have more sense.

“Melina, stop sky gazing and help your brother,” and with that amused command her father banished thoughts of clouds that talked, and pulled her back to the rocking boat and the boring chores that came with it. She made a face she knew would make him laugh, then moved to help her brother mend the nets. The clouds would have to wait another day…