It was cold in this place, wherever it was. Dark too, but not quiet. A persistent banging, strident and annoying, sounded a harsh rapport over the sound of violent wind. The sound of wind swelled and thinned from howls to whistles, and the accompanying banging led to a cacophony of riotous music that did nothing to please the ears of the listener. He was comfortable, balled up in his covers the way a burrowing animal would be, and it took Everett a moment to realize he was awake, and the deafening symphony he heard was coming from outside his window. He lurched up crookedly, arms restricted by his bed coverings. As he moved, the blankets fell away from his protruding collar bones, and he shivered. It was not supposed to be this cold in spring, he thought uselessly and tiredly, not fully awake. He realized the cause of his awakening, the raucous clatter of his flower box against his window frame. He shrugged out of his cocoon without much difficulty - a life spent as a violent sleeper left him used to the battle of limbs and sheets - and swung his legs over the side of his bed. The floor was cold against his bare feet. 

Everett ran a hand through his tousled hair, it's lavender color accentuated by the dreary light that filtered past his plain blue curtains. As much as he was disturbed by the weather, he reminded himself that they did reside in the valley of a large mountain, and such areas are prone to sudden and violent weather patterns. He didn't think much of it at that moment. He yawned deeply, looking to his clock and seeing the time, decided he might as well get up anyway. He probably wouldn't have much luck falling back asleep. He stood after the decision was made, and groaned as he disentangled himself completely from the sheets and his bare torso was exposed to the cold. He swept up his robe as he strode lazily to the window, pulled it on with another yawn.

At the window, he looked out. The sky was a terrifying shade of dark gray, swirled and intermingled with tendrils or both lighter and darker clouds, giving the sky a truly ominous appearance. The whole town shook in its wake, trembling and rattling in the powerful gusts. His building was no exception; the wooden frame before him convulsed under the pressure. He waited until a particularly harsh gust subsided, and then quickly cracked his window and quickly dashed his slender hands out, bring in the flower box easily. He closed it again, and the action was followed immediately by another forceful gale. His flesh was raised in goose-flesh from the exposure, and he stuffed his hands under his arms and shivered. The air had felt damp, and smelled of salt. He peered into his garden-box, relieved there seemed to be little irreparable damage; it would grow back. He straightened the box against the sill, and stepped back. 

He made it to his bed before he heard the crack of thunder. It was easily one of the loudest, most jarring sound he had heard in a long while, if not ever. The resounding echo off the mountain was even still something to be heard over the wind, and he wasn’t surprised, but yet not prepared, for the following lightning strike. Almost his entire apartment, which consisted of just two rooms, a main room with an elevated and screen off bed area and a bathroom, lit up in an ethereal white light, making insidious shadows out of the furniture and Everett himself. He stopped cold, shocked for a brief second, and then slackened. The only thing strange about this lightning was its magnitude; it was nothing he wasn’t used to. Still, he felt the hair on the back of his neck rise. He returned to the window. 

As he stood there, gazing at the sky with a look of contemplation, he was most enraptured by the sight of the clouds turning in on themselves. The entire mass circled around a reverse whirlpool. He stood, transfixed, as the entire undulating storm slowly disappeared from sight; collapsing from an all-encompassing sheet, to a large obstruction, to small dark cloud, and then, lastly, nothing. 

Everett had never seen something so magnificent in its mystery. An intellectual by nature, this strange events had his mind racing at the possibilities and meanings of the phenomenon he had just witnessed. He blew a long breath out of his nose after he stood in silence, eyes lifted to the sky just outside his thin window. He opened the window, slowly at first, half expected the winds to blow, the sight of the vortex having been an illusion, but the air was calm, and when he repositioned his planter’s box, it sat against his window without protest. He shook his head and closed the window once more. 

Looking to his clock, he saw that it was not lit up. He knew it was around five or six in the morning, and sighed. This was an interesting morning, indeed, he thought as he dressed.