The Man in the Rain-Soaked Coat

I was twelve when the rains came and didn’t stop for nine days. Our town, Millbrook, was nestled in a valley that turned into a muddy swamp, and the creek behind our house swelled to a raging river. The power flickered, and the radio warned of flooding. But the real terror began on the third night.

I was in bed, listening to the drumming on the roof, when I saw a figure standing at the foot of my bed. He was tall, wearing a long, dark coat that dripped water onto the floor, and his face was obscured by a wide-brimmed hat pulled low. He didn’t move; he just stood there, a silhouette against the faint light from the hallway. I tried to scream for my mother, but my throat was paralyzed. Then, as suddenly as he appeared, he took a step back and vanished into the shadows.

I bolted upright, gasping, and called for my mom. She rushed in, flipped on the light, and found me shaking. ‘What’s wrong, Leo?’ she asked. I told her about the man in the raincoat. She checked the closet, under the bed, and the window, then sat beside me. ‘It’s just the storm playing tricks on your mind,’ she said. ‘Try to sleep.’

But I couldn’t shake the image. The next night, I stayed awake, watching the door. Around midnight, I heard a faint squelching sound, like wet footsteps on carpet. The bedroom door creaked open, and there he was again: same coat, same hat, but now he was closer, just a few feet from my bedside. I managed to whisper, ‘Who are you?’ The figure tilted its head, and I saw a trickle of water run down the coat and pool on the floor. Then it raised a hand, and I noticed the skin was pale and wrinkled, like someone who’d been in water too long. It pointed at me, then at the window, where the rain was lashing against the glass. I scrambled to the wall, and it vanished again.

I didn’t sleep the rest of the night. The next morning, my mother looked worried. ‘You’ve got dark circles, Leo. Did you sleep at all?’ I told her about the second visit, and she grew pale. ‘What does it want?’ she whispered, more to herself than to me. That afternoon, our neighbor, Mrs. Albright, came by. She was an old woman who’d lived in Millbrook all her life. She saw my face and asked what was wrong. When I told her about the figure, her eyes widened. ‘That sounds like the Drowned Man,’ she said. ‘He appears before a death in the family. He’s a harbinger.’

My mother scoffed, but Mrs. Albright insisted. ‘I’ve seen him twice. Once before my husband died, and once before my sister passed. He always appears during heavy rains, as if he’s risen from the river.’ I felt cold despite the warmth of the house. That night, I lay in bed, staring at the door, and I saw him again. This time, he was at the foot of my bed, closer than before. I could see that his coat was a dark, sodden green, and his hat dripped a steady stream. He didn’t point this time; he simply reached out a hand, palm up, as if asking for something. I screamed, and my parents burst in. He was gone, but there was a wet patch on the carpet, a perfect set of footprints leading from the door to the bed.

My father searched the house and found nothing. My mother called the sheriff, but he found no one outside. They were at a loss. The rain continued, and I felt his presence everywhere—in the dripping of a faucet, in the patter on the roof, in the gurgle of the creek outside. On the fifth night, I woke to find him standing beside my bed, so close I could smell the river mud and rotting leaves. He reached out and touched my forehead with a cold, wet finger. And then I heard a voice, not in my ears but in my mind, faint and garbled, like a message from underwater: ‘The other night… they said… the other night…’

The next morning, my mother received a phone call. Her aunt—my great-aunt Clara—had died in a car accident three days prior. She had skidded off a bridge during a downpour and drowned in the river beneath. They had just identified her body. My mother wept, and as she held me, she whispered, ‘She always hated the rain.’

I never saw the Drowned Man again after that. But sometimes, on stormy nights, when the rain beats hard against my window, I feel a cold draft, and I see a dark shape out of the corner of my eye. And I know he’s watching, waiting for his next ‘other night.’ And I wonder if he’ll come for me, or for someone I love.