By the time Akiko got home, wet from the rain and mortified at what the people she passed must have thought of her, her good mood had been completely swept away. The image of the snake kept coming back to her, even though she had managed to get away from the shrine without incident. She slammed the door behind her more violently than was necessary, and struggled out of her boots, dropping her jacket in the entrance hall. In the main room she pulled the curtains closed and then took her top off, draping it over the table. She pulled a bra out of the closet and put it on, her mood settling a little immediately.

Fully dressed, she was a lot calmer, and could feel the colour draining from her cheeks as her embarrassment faded. She swore to herself that she would never do that again, as she opened the curtains. It didn’t let a lot of light in; the clouds had darkened, and rain was falling heavily. Akiko sighed and sat down on the floor. She’d been hoping to go out shopping to take her mind off the shrine, but she wasn’t about to go out in that sort of weather. She looked around for something to read as she reached up to turn the light on, and settled on a magazine.

The rain continued to pound on the window as she read, the noise fading into the background. After a while, the light seemed to fade a little, and she glanced up. The light was still on, but outside it was almost completely dark, even though it was still afternoon. She pulled the curtains shut again, blocking out the driving rain, and sat down to read again.

After a few minutes she decided it was definitely getting darker, and looked up at the light again. It seemed to be shining through mist, its light scattered into a sort of halo around the bulb. Frowning, Akiko stood up to get a better look. The mist around the light thickened as she did so, and she realised that it covered the whole ceiling. The mist became a layer of white clouds, like an overcast sky, and thickened further to grey, then black, the underside starting to boil as if agitated by a strong wind. Akiko reached up, her hands vanishing into the clouds, and felt their cold wetness on her hands.

Her stomach lurched as panic began to build. She stretched, standing on tip-toe, until her fingers brushed the ceiling, and she was reassured to find that it was still there.

A drop of water fell on her arm, and then on her face, and looking around she realised that it had started raining. Stung into action, she gathered everything she could find, covering them with her coats and jackets as the rain strengthened.

With a flash and bang, the light fused and went out, plunging the room into darkness. The rain got heavier, and the room was lit once more by a flash of lightning, followed after a couple of seconds by a rumble of thunder. Akiko crouched on the floor in the darkness, breathing heavily. <em>I fell asleep reading. This is a dream. This is a dream.</em> The rain got heavier, and she could feel the tatami mats getting wet under foot as the water soaked into her clothes.

Lightning flashed again, revealing a bank of mist around the edges of the room, a thick white fog that hid the walls from sight. The thunder crashed a bare second later, but Akiko was already dashing for for the door. She was there in two steps, and could feel the mist cold against her body. The wall and door were still there beyond, sensible to her groping hands, and she searched wildly for the handle.

The metal was cold and wet under her hand, and she twisted and pushed. The door did not respond. The fog around her was illuminated by another flash of lightning, the deafening thunder occurring at the same moment, and Akiko staggered back from the bright whiteness.

In the blackness she felt herself begin to sob, panic overwhelming her at last. She drew a deep breath and screamed, desperate for someone, anyone, to come and help. Her scream was drowned out by thunder, as the lightning showed her cocooned within black clouds, none of the surfaces of the room visible. Her table still reared up out of the roiling fog, but there was no other sign of her room, and even the feeling under foot had changed, from wet tatami to something soft and shifting, almost but not quite like water.

Light began to filter in from behind her, in the direction that ought to be the window. She turned, hoping to see out, and saw a glow within the mist, which seemed to be thinning. Shapes started to resolve themselves, and she took a step back, away from it, as the mist receded to leave a corridor of cloud leading to a shining white torii.

Beyond it she could see the shrine grounds, bathed in sunlight, the green grass sparkling with dew, and beyond it the pale wood of the shrine building supporting the copper roof, which burned orange. The scent of flowers drifted to her, while the rain continued.

Lightning and thunder again, and the doors of the shrine opened to let the snake, Tamao, emerge. He slid gracefully down the steps, scales shining in the sunlight, and raised his head to look at her. Akiko knew he was inviting her to walk down the tunnel to the shrine, and she found herself shifting her weight in preparation.

Shaking her head violently, she forced herself to step backward.

“No!â€ she screamed. “I won’t go! You aren’t real!â€ She took another step back, and another, and the mists closed in on the tunnel as the light faded. Another step and she was within the fog on the opposite wall. One more and she felt her back against the wall.

And the clouds vanished, leaving her in her room. A room thoroughly wet from the rain, with black scorch marks around the useless light. Akiko, still soaking wet, looked around in the faint light that came in from the window, and then reached her hands up to the ceiling.

The ceiling was dry. Not a burst pipe then. Rain in the room.

She sank to her knees on the sodden floor, struggling to come to terms with a new reality.