Under the Rain Tree - By Chamith Hettiarachchi

Written By: Chamith Hettiarachchi

Category: Short Story

Competition: Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026

Discover the captivating short story "Under the Rain Tree" by Chamith Hettiarachchi, a participant in the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. This narrative artfully explores the enduring presence of a rain tree beside a bustling court complex, a silent witness to the unfolding human drama below its branches. Chamith's work elegantly weaves themes of permanence, change, and the unseen roots of strength, inviting readers from around the world to reflect on the quiet, steadfast companions in our lives.

About the Work

"Under the Rain Tree" captures the essence of continuity amidst change, focusing on a majestic rain tree that offers shelter and solace. The story's mood is nostalgic, with vivid imagery of the court's daily life and the tree's symbolic role as a silent observer. Chamith Hettiarachchi's prose invites us to consider the unnoticed anchors in our lives, reminding us of the strength we often take for granted until it is gone.

Under the Rain Tree

Original Submission by Chamith Hettiarachchi

Under the Rain Tree

by Chamith Hettiarachchi

Much has changed since I first walked those streets, but for decades there was one thing that seemed untouched by time. It was a giant rain tree standing beside the court complex. Its branches stretched across the pavement and part of the road, forming a broad roof of leaves above one of the busiest corners in the area. During the hottest hours, its shade offered relief from the sun. When rain arrived without warning, people gathered beneath it and waited for the weather to pass.

Some believed the tree had been planted there deliberately. A court attracted lawyers, clients, witnesses, police officers, clerks, vendors and people who had travelled long distances with nowhere to wait. A tree beside it made perfect sense. Others claimed it had stood there before the court buildings appeared and that the town had simply grown around it. Nobody seemed to know for certain. By the time I first saw it, the tree appeared older and more established than everything surrounding it.

I was a young law student then, following my mentor through the court complex and trying to look as though I understood what was happening. He walked ahead in his black coat, greeting other lawyers and giving instructions without turning around. I followed with his files held carefully against my chest.

There were always more files than I expected. Some were tied with string, while others were thick with documents that threatened to slip out whenever I adjusted my grip. I worried less about the cases inside them than about dropping the whole pile in front of the court. My mentor never seemed concerned. He knew I would manage because carrying his files was part of learning the profession.

Each morning, before entering the court complex, he stopped beneath the rain tree. A small tea cart stood close to the trunk, with a kettle steaming above a kerosene stove. A few glass jars held plain buns, biscuits and other inexpensive snacks. Several wooden stools had been placed around the cart for customers.

My mentor would sit, order a cup of tea and eat a plain bun for breakfast. I usually remained standing because my hands were occupied by his files. The tea seller would pass me a cup, and I would find some way to hold it while keeping the documents safely pressed between one arm and my body.

I once asked my mentor whether I could place the files on an empty stool.

“Clients may forgive a weak argument,” he said. “They will never forgive seeing their files beside someone’s tea.”

I never asked again.

After court, we often returned to the same place. My mentor drank another cup of tea and smoked a cigarette while discussing the morning’s cases with other lawyers. A victory became greater with every retelling. A defeat was always caused by an unreasonable judge, an unreliable witness or a client who had failed to reveal something important. The lawyers spoke as though the results had nothing to do with them, and the tree listened without questioning anyone’s version.

The tea cart occupied only one side of the trunk. On the opposite side sat a man with a typewriter on a small wooden table. He wore black trousers, a white shirt, a black tie and, on most days, a black coat. From a distance, he looked like one of the lawyers moving in and out of the court complex. He was not a lawyer, although people often treated him like one.

He typed letters, statements, petitions and whatever other documents people brought to him. Those who could not afford a lawyer, or did not yet understand whether they needed one, stopped at his table and explained their problems. Some arrived with crumpled papers folded inside envelopes. Others carried notices they could not understand. They told him about property disputes, unpaid loans, broken marriages, difficult employers and relatives who had turned against them. He listened, offered practical advice and translated their confusion into formal sentences for a fraction of what a legal office might charge.

The steady striking of the typewriter keys became part of the sound beneath the tree. It mixed with the tea seller calling out orders, the traffic on the road and the voices of lawyers discussing cases as though they were still addressing the court.

Near another side of the trunk sat a cobbler. His work area was smaller than the others, consisting of a low stool, a wooden box of tools and several pairs of shoes waiting to be repaired. People came to court dressed as well as they could, but broken straps, loose soles and damaged heels did not respect hearing dates.

The cobbler repaired them quickly. He polished the shoes of lawyers before important appearances and fixed the sandals of people who could not afford to replace them. He also punched additional holes into leather belts, a service I would come to appreciate many years later.

Together, the tea seller, the typist and the cobbler formed a small world beneath the rain tree. None had an office, signboard or waiting room, but each provided something needed by those who entered the court complex. Inside the court, justice was argued through procedure, evidence and legal language. Under the tree, people found tea, words and repairs.

It became an unofficial extension of the court. Clients waited there before their cases and returned afterwards to understand what had happened. Witnesses rehearsed their answers. Families discussed settlements, accused one another of lying and sometimes agreed to compromises after months of refusing to speak. Some people emerged from court relieved, while others came out angry, frightened or confused.

The typist occasionally had to explain documents after someone had already signed them. The tea seller heard private matters from customers who forgot he was listening. The cobbler worked silently while cases were discussed above his head. If the tree had repeated everything spoken beneath its branches, half the town might have required legal representation.

After I qualified as a lawyer, I continued the same routine. At first, I told myself that stopping at the tea cart was a matter of convenience. In time, I admitted that it was habit. The tea seller learned how I liked my tea, and I no longer needed to order.

The typist became useful when I had a routine document to prepare and was too busy, or too lazy, to do it myself. I would explain what was required, leave the details with him and collect the finished pages later. His ageing typewriter continued producing documents with the same uneven letters and occasional dark marks where the ribbon struck too heavily.

The cobbler rarely received work from me until my waistline began expanding. Every few years, I handed him my belt and asked him to add another hole. He would examine it seriously before looking at my stomach.

“The belt is not the problem, sir,” he once said.

“Just make the hole.”

He smiled and did as he was told.

Years passed almost without announcing themselves. The court complex expanded, new buildings appeared and the road beside the tree was widened. Buses changed, cars became more common, and motorcycles filled every space left between them. Public telephone booths arrived and disappeared. Mobile phones entered the hands of lawyers, clients and eventually the vendors themselves.

The way people dressed changed too. Younger lawyers came in sharper suits and carried fewer files as documents moved onto screens. Clients arrived wearing fashions that would have attracted disapproving looks when I first began. Minor accidents occurred at the nearby junction, arguments broke out over parking spaces, and people continued running towards court because their cases had already been called.

Through it all, the rain tree remained. Its branches continued spreading above the pavement, and its trunk seemed to grow broader with every passing year. The streets became louder, faster and more crowded, but the same human worries returned beneath its shade in slightly different forms.

The tea seller’s hair turned grey, the typist’s fingers moved more slowly, and the cobbler began wearing thick glasses when threading his needle. I was changing with them, although I noticed their ageing before I noticed my own.

They looked after the space beneath the tree as though it belonged to them. Each evening, they swept away paper cups, cigarette ends, fallen leaves and scraps left behind by customers. The place was often cleaner than areas maintained by the street cleaners. They did not do it out of civic duty alone. The tree was part of their livelihood. Its shade was their roof, its trunk marked their address, and the people drawn beneath its branches became their customers.

As the years passed, my mentor came to court less often. Age slowed his walk and gradually reduced the number of cases he accepted, until illness kept him away altogether. By then, I had established my own practice and occupied the place in court that had once seemed to belong permanently to him.

Whenever I stopped beneath the tree, I could still picture him on one of the wooden stools, breaking a plain bun in half and lifting his tea before it had cooled. The tea cart, the typewriter and the cobbler’s box remained in their familiar places, making the distance between those early days and the present seem smaller than it was.

Then, one morning, I turned onto the familiar street and found the road blocked. A violent storm had passed over the town during the night. It had torn roofing sheets from buildings, broken signboards and brought down electrical lines. I had spent part of the night listening to the wind and rain against my windows, but I had not imagined what I would see the next morning.

The rain tree had fallen. Its enormous trunk lay across part of the road, with branches covering the pavement and reaching towards the court wall. Leaves, broken twigs and pieces of bark were scattered everywhere. Workers with saws were cutting through the outer branches while police officers redirected traffic around them.

The roots had been pulled from the earth, leaving a wide hollow beside the road. For a tree that had towered over us for so long, what remained beneath the ground seemed surprisingly shallow.

People had gathered to watch. Some took photographs while others stood quietly, looking at the fallen trunk with the disbelief usually reserved for the death of someone who had always appeared strong. The tea seller stood beside his cart, which had been moved farther along the pavement. The typist held his covered typewriter against his chest. The cobbler remained near his box of tools. Without the tree above them, the three men looked strangely exposed.

An older man near me shook his head.

“Rain trees grow very large,” he said. “They can stand for many years, but their roots do not always go deep. One strong storm is enough.”

I looked at the torn earth and thought about all the years we had trusted that tree to remain where it was. It had sheltered thousands without asking who they were or why they had come. Because it had endured heat, rain, road construction and decades of change, we had begun to think it would endure everything.

We often made the same mistake with people. Some had guided us, protected us and carried our burdens without complaint. Their strength became so familiar that we stopped seeing it as effort. We assumed they would always be available because they always had been. We rarely wondered what supported them or what weaknesses remained hidden beneath the surface.

My mentor had once seemed permanent too. So had the tea seller, the typist and the cobbler. In time, perhaps, others would think the same of me. We mistook endurance for immortality.

One of the workers cut through a large branch. It fell heavily onto the road, scattering leaves across the wet surface. Soon, the tree would be divided into sections and carried away. Traffic would return, people would find other places to wait, and the court would continue without the witness that had stood outside it for decades.

I remained there for another moment, looking at the open sky where the branches had been. Then I remembered the case waiting for me and crossed the road towards the court complex.

Behind me, my intern adjusted the pile of files in her arms and followed.

About the Competition

The Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026 by Hashtag Kalakar is a prestigious platform celebrating literary talents from around the world. This event showcases diverse voices, offering writers an opportunity to share their unique stories and perspectives. Participants engage in a vibrant community of creatives, contributing to the rich tapestry of global literature.

We extend our heartfelt gratitude to Chamith Hettiarachchi for sharing the evocative short story "Under the Rain Tree" with us. As a participant in the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026, Chamith's work enriches our understanding of the enduring qualities of seemingly ordinary elements in our lives. Thank you, Chamith, for your thoughtful contribution to this international celebration of creative writing.

About Hashtag Kalakar

Hashtag Kalakar is a creative platform dedicated to providing artists, writers, singers and other creative talents with opportunities to showcase their work and reach wider audiences through competitions, features and creative initiatives.