The search for the end of the perfect rainbow was on.
Gena was once again caught up in wonder. Her heart felt as light as the after-rain sky above and every shadow, storm, and cloud that had previously been holding her captive had cleared. These were the effects of the fascination that took control of her senses every time a long rain finally ended. But unlike other gloomy showers, this one had put a flawless, perfect rainbow in the sky above her small town of Chestnut, California and Gena was intent on finding the end.
It wasn’t that she expected to find a pot of gold or even a leprechaun. In fact, Gena had actually developed a fear of the little green Irishmen during her fourth grade year when her best friend, Mara had dressed up as a leprechaun for Halloween; Gena was sure that the costume wasn’t meant to instill a fear of all things Irish in small, impressionable children, but unfortunately that’s what had happened. Since then, Gena had always secretly questioned the exact intentions of leprechauns.
No, it definitely wasn’t a leprechaun that Gena wanted to find at the end of this rainbow.
An old pink bicycle was accompanying her on her quest. Together, they traveled up Potter’s Grove Street and down an unnamed side street, where Gena said out loud to herself (altogether a very charming and annoying habit), “I wonder why this street doesn’t have a name” and continued down the redwood-lined road. Her eyes were stuck on the brilliant rainbow as all other thoughts were pushed out of her preoccupied mind.
It was an obsession, really; Gena felt she couldn’t focus on anything else until she reached the end of that all-consuming rainbow and witnessed for herself the magic she was convinced was waiting, just waiting for someone curious enough to snatch it. And she had to be that curious someone. Her desire to reach the magic flowed out of her heart and into her fingertips. All over, her body tingled with the anticipation of discovering something new and a silent, joyous song began to hum its way down, down to her toes.
Looking ahead, Gena could see where the rainbow dipped into a tightly huddled grove of trees halfway up Pistachio Mountain. The only problem was that she had run straight into a roadblock: Mr. Duskin, the owner of the sliver of the mountain where the rainbow-glowing grove of trees resided, happened to be the most overbearing, overprotective, overparanoid man Gena knew. He was always complaining to the town mayor, Gena’s grandfather that yet another group of “teeny boppers” had trampled the neon-red “WARNING” signs that littered Mr. Duskin’s property fence from one side to the other.
As she had been throughout her life, Gena was completely aware of the trouble she was getting herself into as she pushed her slight body through the one hole in the fence that hadn’t yet been secured with twelve planks of wood. “At least I have a good reason for trespassing,” she said out loud to herself, again in that offhanded manner of hers. Any anxiety she might have had about intruding on Mr. Duskin’s property was dissipated by the thought of reaching that perfect rainbow and Gena began to run up the side of the mountain, so consumed by the thought of finally reaching the magic that wonder and enthrallment took control of her footsteps and propelled her towards the as-yet unseen trunk of the rainbow.
