The rain came down in grey curtains, and everyone on Maple Street ran for cover — everyone except Oscar.
Oscar was seven years old, and he had a magnificent red umbrella with a wooden duck's-head handle that his grandmother had given him. He liked rain. He liked the way it smelled and the way it made the world all shiny. So while everyone else was huddling in doorways and pulling their coats over their heads, Oscar walked calmly down the middle of the pavement, perfectly dry.
That's when he saw her.
A small girl was sitting on the steps outside the library, arms wrapped around a stack of books, rain soaking into her hair and her coat and the pages of the top book, which was starting to curl. She wasn't crying. But she looked like she was thinking very hard about not crying.
"Those books will get ruined," Oscar said.
"I know," said the girl. She didn't look up.
Oscar thought about this. His grandmother had always said that an umbrella was a generous sort of thing — it could share itself. He looked at the girl. He looked at his umbrella. He made a calculation.
"I'm Oscar," he said, holding out the umbrella so its red canopy spread over both of them. "You can be under here, if you want."
The girl looked up for the first time. She had a gap where her front tooth used to be and very serious dark eyes. "Won't you get wet?"
"A bit," Oscar admitted. "But I'm waterproof."
She considered this and shuffled over. Her name was Suki. She was eight — one year older than Oscar — and she had borrowed twelve books from the library, which was probably too many, but she'd been unable to choose.
They stood together under the red umbrella while the rain hammered the pavement. It was a bit of a squeeze. Oscar's left shoulder got quite damp. He didn't mind.
"Do you always carry an umbrella?" Suki asked.
"My grandmother says it's the polite thing to do," Oscar said. "In case it rains for someone else."
Suki was quiet for a moment. "That's a good reason," she said finally.
When the rain slowed to a drizzle, Suki's mother appeared at the end of the street, waving anxiously. Suki tucked her books more tightly under her arm and stood up.
"Thank you," she said to Oscar. "For sharing your umbrella."
"Your books are saved," Oscar said. Which seemed like the important thing.
Suki smiled — the kind of smile that makes someone's whole face light up, gap-tooth and all. Then she ran toward her mother through the drizzle.
Oscar walked home, slightly damp on one side, feeling a warmth in his chest that had nothing to do with the temperature.
The next week, at school, a new girl arrived in Oscar's class. She had serious dark eyes and a gap where her front tooth used to be.
"I know you," said Oscar.
"I know you, too," said Suki. She sat down in the empty chair next to him, and that was that. The beginning of a very fine friendship — started by a red umbrella and a stack of library books, on a perfectly good rainy day.
