Red Rain

brown hair matted to his red forehead. His T-shirt was torn and stained with brown streaks. His shorts were rags.

His eyes were wild and his mouth was moving rapidly although Lea couldn’t hear his words. His arms were outstretched, his mud-smeared hands open to grab her.

He’s crazy. He’s out of his head.

Move!

But there wasn’t time.

With a menacing groan, he grabbed her by the shoulders. He pulled with surprising force, nearly dragging her off her feet. She inhaled the rank odor of his body and his mud-caked clothes.

He groaned again. She wasn’t strong enough to resist. He was pulling her away from the others, dragging her out of view, grunting and groaning like an animal.

“Let go! Let go of me! Please! What are you going to do? Please-let go!”

11

The radio squealed. Andy Pavano nearly lost his grip on the wheel.

“Vince, turn it down or something. Sounds like you stepped on a cat.”

“Hey, I’m always kind to animals. Can you hear me now?”

“The rain is messing with the radio.” Andy slowed the patrol car around a curve but still sent a tidal wave of rainwater washing over the narrow shoulder.

“It’s these old Motorolas, man. They’re not even digital.” Vince said something else but the signal broke up.

“Vince, what did you say?”

“I said maybe you could talk to your uncle about springing for a new radio system.”

“The chief isn’t my uncle,” Andy snapped. “He went to school with my cousin, that’s all.”

“Okay, okay. You’re both Pavano. So it’s an honest mistake, right?”

Headlights from an oncoming car blazed over the windshield. Andy tried to squint through it, but he couldn’t see a thing. Turn off your brights, bastard.

He opened his mouth in a loud burp. The meatball hero from that Italian place on Main Street. . What was it called? Conca d’Oro?. . it hadn’t gone down yet.

He swerved to avoid a lake of rainwater that glimmered darkly over the right half of the road. He could feel the wind push the car sideways. “Vince, this rain is killing me.”

“There’s a hurricane, Pavano. Down South. A big one. It pushed out into the ocean, but we’re getting the sloppy seconds.”

Andy snickered. “Vince, you’re a poet. Sloppy seconds? That doesn’t even make sense.”

“Hey, what makes sense?”

Andy joined the Sag Harbor Police Force three weeks before, but it was long enough to know that what makes sense? was the height of Vince’s philosophy.

“The wind is trying to blow this fucking Ford off the road.”

The radio squealed again. Then Vince’s distorted voice: “Language, dude. Remember? People listen in. Civilians. Shut-ins. Keep it clean.”

“Okay, Mom.”

“You city guys don’t know how to drive. How long were you a New York City cop?”

“I was a Housing Authority cop.”

“Ooh, I’m wetting myself. I’m so impressed. How long?”

“None of your business, Vince. What’s up with the chitchat? You just lonely?”

“I’ve got a wife, an ex-wife, and four kids, man. How do you get to be lonely? Tell me.”

Andy didn’t have an answer for that. He had an ex-wife, too. The lovely Susannah. One of the reasons he moved to Sag Harbor.

All My Exes Live in Texas.

Someone should write one like it about New York.

All of Andy’s philosophy could be found in country songs.

He thought about Sari. Her dark hair falling over her forehead. Those beautiful eyes, oval and green like cat eyes. He should turn around and maybe drop by her house.

That first visit was awkward. No. Worse than awkward. She was ice. She tried to freeze me. All that talk about how she was in love, how she was going to get married. To a guy who owns the tennis shop in Southampton?

No. That’s crap. No way that was going to happen.

Now she’d had time to think about him, get warmed up to the idea of Andy being around again.

Sure, he blew it the first time with Sari. Maybe this time. .

“Pavano, what’s your ten-twenty?”

“I’m east on Noyac. Am I going in the right direction?”

“Maybe you need a GPS. Like the summer people. You’re still a tourist, Pavano. Why don’t you talk to your uncle about getting a-”

“You’re going to keep calling him my uncle, aren’t you.”

“Yeah, probably. My sense of humor, you know. Riding this desk you need a sense of humor.”

“Riding this desk? You been watching Cops again?”

The car rumbled past the turn at Long Beach. The rain formed a heavy curtain. He couldn’t see the bay. No cars in either direction. Who would be out driving in this?

“So tell me again where this house is, Vince.”

“It’s a left on Brick Kiln, then a left on Jesse Halsey. Go to the end. Take a right on Bluff Point Road.”

Andy sighed and shifted his weight in the seat. “Got it. You know, I didn’t sign on for shit like this. I came out here for peace and quiet. Maybe a domestic or two. A deer down on the road, someone steals a stop sign or takes a leak in a supermarket parking lot.”

“That sounds a lot like whining, Pavano.”

“Left on Brick Kiln, right? Okay. I’m here. I’m not whining, Vince. But, look-you’re riding a desk, as you so colorfully put it. And I’m-”

“Got another call. I’m out. You’re not the only cop out tonight, Sergeant.”

“Just about.”

The Sag Harbor Police wasn’t exactly a big force. Vince on the desk nights, the chief, and how many patrol guys? Four? Andy ran through their names in his head. Three Italian, one Irish. He made the left, then the right.

“Vince? You still there? I can’t do this. It’s making me sick. Really. I’m going to lose my supper.”

“Not in the car, please. If you’re going to blow chunks, stick your head out the window.”

“I have a weak stomach. Really. It’s in my physical report. You can check it.”

“Please don’t make me cry. My mascara will run.”

“I can’t see a thing, Vince. It’s total darkness here, and the rain-”

“You can do it. Just follow the regulations. Go to the house. Show them your ID. Say what you have to say. Then go throw up.”

“Why did I get this, Vince? I don’t even know where I’m going.”

“No one else would do it, Andy. That’s a ten-four.”

The radio made a loud click. Silence.

Bluff Point Road curved around the south side of a part of the bay known as Upper Sag Harbor Cove. The houses were far back from the road, hidden behind trees and tall hedges. Ahead of the clicking wipers and the splashing currents of rain, they rose up in the windshield like dark walls, blacker than the sky.