The only telephone in our house sat atop on old forgotten bureau in the hallway along the stairs. The phone had been installed sometime in the early forties. It was heavy and awkward and rang so infrequently that when it did, Viviane hardly recognized the noise at all. It was out of sheer wonder at the sound that she stopped to answer it.
She was greeted by an old familiar voice — funny how, after all this time, he still sounded exactly the same — telling her he’d found her son walking along the side of the road.
“He must have walked nearly two miles in this rain. I’ve got him down here at the house. The dog, too. Tried to dry the boy off, but he’d have none of that.”
Viviane nodded at the phone. “Is he okay? Henry, I mean.”
“Ahh, well, you might wanna hurry over here. He’s acting a bit odd.”
“I’ll be right there,” she assured him, and hung up. She hadn’t the courage to tell him right then that his son was probably acting perfectly normally. For Henry at least.
Viviane threw open the hall closet and grabbed the first thing she saw — a red wool jacket from what seemed like a lifetime ago. Viviane fastened it with shaking hands, grateful it was long enough to cover the dress she was still wearing inside out for luck. By the time she reached the truck, the rain had already soaked right through the wool. Who doesn’t have a rain jacket? she thought.
The truck sputtered and began its slow ascent to life. As she waited, Viviane reached into her purse and pulled out her compact and a tube of lipstick. Holding the mirror close to her face, she slowly slid the red gloss across her lips. It was too dark to see about her hair.
Viviane attempted to back the truck down the hill but stopped when she felt the tires slip in the mud. Instead, she shifted the sliding truck into first gear and veered around the back of the house, driving right through the flower bed that once held the most glorious dahlias in the neighborhood.
As the truck slammed onto the road, Viviane pushed the clutch to the floor, threw it into second gear, and soared into the deluge.
When we left the solstice celebration, Cardigan, Rowe, and I noticed a change in the air. All three of us tipped our faces to the sky, puzzled.
“I think it might r-rain,” Rowe said.
By the time we got as far as the bakery, it was pouring and most people had escaped to their warm houses and cars, leaving the streets empty.
We ducked underneath the awning in front of the drugstore. Cardigan reached her hand behind her back and made a face. “I’ve ruined my shirt. It’s all gooey.” Cardigan’s wings had dissolved into a wet, sticky mess of feathers and glue. We all had puddles in our shoes.
The wind picked up considerably. It peeled the bark from the three birches in front of the store. The strips hung from the branches, whipping and twisting in the angry air. Though Rowe’s navy peacoat was wrapped around my shoulders, I shivered at the sight of the naked trees.
“It’s getting worse. You should probably get going.” Rowe squeezed my hand before letting it go. Rowe had to drive his mother home from work that night, and we all agreed it was too risky for me to hide in the back of the delivery truck. The chance of getting caught was too high, although I did find the thought of it a bit thrilling.
“Are you sure you’re okay to make it home by yourself?” Even standing right next to me, Rowe had to yell over the pounding beat of the torrent.
I put my hands on my hips and feigned annoyance. “Listen. I may be a bit strange, but that doesn’t mean I’m afraid of the dark.”
He grinned. “Just trying to be p-polite.”
Cardigan smiled knowingly and ran into the rain. She disappeared into the cascade of falling water. I turned to follow.
“Hey. Where do you think you’re going?” Rowe teased. I smiled as he put his hands on my hips and pulled me to him. He tenderly brushed the hair behind my ears and ran his fingertips over my face, as if trying to memorize every detail. I closed my eyes, and he kissed me again.
Then, with my lips still tingling, I ran into the rain after Cardigan.
Throughout the city, the rain was proving to be a disaster. Large puddles formed at blocked storm drains and took over yards, street corners, parking lots, playgrounds, empty flowerpots, and raised garden beds. Tree limbs broke and fell to the ground with sharp snaps. Cardigan and I raced toward Pinnacle Lane. Water coursed down my arms and legs, fused my newly cut bangs to my forehead. Cardigan’s makeup ran down her face. As we passed below the worn sneakers hanging from the overhead power line, we both watched with open mouths as the shoes twisted free and flew away into the night.
At the end of the Coopers’ driveway, Cardigan grabbed me and gave me a tight squeeze. “We’re going to be sisters-in-law!” she yelled over the rain, then ran to her house.
If not for a dim glow in the first-floor windows, my house would have looked like just another dark part of the sky. I glanced up at the black second-story windows. I smiled at the thought of sleeping Henry, his fingers curled around the edge of his quilt. I checked my pocket for the chocolate I’d gotten him, making sure it hadn’t melted. The woman at the booth had told me that chocolate came from the Mayans, an ancient people who believed that drinking hot chocolate could bring them wisdom and power. They considered it the food of their gods. I had laughed at the thought of the Mayan gods ripping open little bags of powdered cocoa to stir into warm mugs of milk, but the woman had said the Mayans made their hot chocolate from cacao beans and that they called it xocoatl. I didn’t know if Henry would actually like the sweet, but I knew he would appreciate the new word I’d learned.
The sound of a car door made me jump. At the side of the house, I saw the taillights of Gabe’s truck lit up, glowing red in the dark and the rain. Gabe hadn’t been home for a few days. I tried not to think about where he might be. Whom he might be with.
The truck disappeared around the back of the house. I ran to hide as it careened down the hill and into the road. I stayed hidden until it had driven away.
“Your mother seems frantic to find you.”
I whirled around.
Nathaniel Sorrows stood behind me, holding a black umbrella over his head.
“It can’t be my mother,” I shouted through the rain. My mother hadn’t left the house in fifteen years. She didn’t even know how to drive, did she?
“She’d probably say the same thing about you if she saw you out here right now.”
I blushed. He had a point.
“It is her, nonetheless,” he said. “I saw her leave the house and get into the truck.”
“But what makes you think she’s gone out looking for me?” I asked quietly.
Nathaniel shrugged. “Why else would she leave?”
As I thought of the few things that could motivate my mother to venture out from the security of the house on the hill, like discovering that her daughter had snuck out without permission, dread slashed through my chest like a knife. I wasn’t sure what to do. Should I go home and wait for her to come back? Go to Cardigan’s? But then I thought about how angry my mother would be, the injured look on her face when she realized what I’d done. I wanted to avoid seeing that look for as long as possible.
As if reading my mind, Nathaniel said, “Why don’t you come inside? I have a fire going. You can dry off here while you wait for her to get back.” He smiled.