text: The pages scattered across the floor and he dropped to his knees, gathering them up. The woman behind the desk was shouting at him, shouting something he wasn’t really listening to. It was just another rejection. Just something else to weigh on his mind tonight. He stood, clutching the paper to his chest and thanked the woman for her time and stumbled out. Her assistant gave him a pitying look and his face burned with embarrassment. It was bad enough that he was being rejected, he didn’t need to be pitied as well. The bench at the bus stop was cold as he sat, but there was nothing more comfortable around. He just wanted to get home before the rain started. He could see the grey clouds building quickly. Around the corner rumbled the bus, jerking to a stop before him. He paid his fee and found a seat, shuffling the paper in his lap to put it back in order. Some of the pages had been crumpled and he smoothed them out as best he could. She didn’t have to be so mean, he thought to himself. A simple ‘no thank you’ would have been far more than enough for him to leave her office. Throwing the pages at him was nothing more than smug dismissal. The bus creaked to a halt at his stop and he shuffled off. As soon as the door closed behind him, a wet drop hit his shoulder. He glanced at it and then at the sky. Of course it began to rain as soon as he was out of shelter. He would have to run. By the time he reached his door, water had soaked through his clothes. The pages were wet under his shirt where he had tucked them. The ink had run and smeared across his skin. He kicked the door shut behind him and sat, arms wrapped around his knees as he stared at the sodden pages. Another failure. He’d even ruined the pages. Of course, they were too crumpled to take to another meeting. He sighed and pulled himself from the floor. The pages were laid over his bench to dry, a pathetic attempt at saving the paper, though he could already see how it had gone rough and fluffy from wet and friction. He crawled into bed, burying himself in his disappointment. The night passed and morning came, with a hungry belly waking him. Pulling on clothes and muttering to himself, he shuffled into the kitchen. The sheets of paper he had left on the bench were gone. Instead he found a box, filled to the brim with folded paper flowers. He picked up one, reading the text on one of the petals and realised it was a line from one of his rejected poems. “I thought you might need a pick-me-up.” His sister was holding a cake, smiling at him brightly. “I heard you come back yesterday, but you didn’t come in to tell me how it went.” He stumbled to her, setting aside the cake and leaned his head on her shoulder. Her arms went around him, rubbing his back softly and he began to cry. She held him tight, whispering soft words of love and encouragement until he stopped crying.