Red Rain

Tepid applause. Mark forced the practiced smile to his face and took two steps toward the podium.

Jo-Ann turned and wrapped her hand around the microphone again. The applause died quickly. She waved Mark back. “Oh, I almost forgot,” she said, “while I have you all here. Such a nice crowd. It’s so wonderful to see people come out on a rainy night to discuss books.”

Mark shoved his hands into his jeans pockets and waited. He studied the crowd. A twentysomething couple in the second row had their heads down, tapping away on their phones. Behind them, a large man in a Yankees cap and blue-and-white Yankees jacket had the Daily News open in front of him.

Rain pattered the skylight window. Mark glimpsed a flicker of lightning high in the green-black sky. He blinked-and saw someone he recognized in the third row. A young woman in a short blue skirt over black tights and a white tube top.

His eyes took in the gleaming white-blond hair. Blue eyes. High cheekbones. Red-lipped smile.

She didn’t register at first. Mainly because she didn’t tell him she’d be there. The improbably named Autumn Holliday, his assistant. She realized he had finally spotted her. She smiled and her eyes went wide. She gave him an excited wave.

Why did she get all dolled up for this?

Autumn always showed up at his office in jeans and oversize rock-band T-shirts, her hair tied carelessly back in a ponytail. Now he couldn’t help but stare. She looked like one of those stunning Nordic ice-queen fashion models.

“Autumn? What are you doing here?” He mouthed the words silently.

“-Thriller Night here at HamptonBooks,” Jo-Ann was saying. “I think you’ll all want to be here. Our guest author will be Harlan Coben, and if you were here last year, I’m sure you will remember how funny and charming Mr. Coben can be. So. . don’t forget next Saturday night.”

Mark forced himself to turn away from Autumn. Jo-Ann was waving him back. This time there was no applause. He could feel the tension in the room.

Lightning flickered in the skylight above. People shifted their weight, sat up straighter, squeezed the books in their laps. The couple in the second row tucked their phones away.

Somewhere in the back, a baby cried. Mark suddenly realized there were several babies on laps, swaddled like tiny mummies.

Mark placed his hands on the sides of the podium. The microphone was a little too low. He leaned into it. “Good evening, everyone. Thanks for coming out on such a lovely night. Instead of a reading tonight, I know you all probably have a lot of questions. And I thought we could begin by discussing-”

Several hands shot up. They were too eager.

Here we go again.

“Are you Dr. Sutter or Mr. Sutter?” From a chubby, coppery-haired man standing behind the seats, wearing an ugly chartreuse turtleneck and gray sweatpants.

“I’m Mr. Sutter. I have a BS degree in child psychology. You can call me Mark.”

“So you’re not a doctor?” Accusing.

Before Mark could answer, a woman in the front row, her arm cradling a swaddled baby. “Why do you think children don’t need parents? Why do you think they should grow up wild and undisciplined and untrained?”

Mark forced his smile to grow wider. He had learned a lot at the other bookstore appearances. The trick was not to get flustered. Remain calm. Be quieter and saner than the audience.

He glimpsed Autumn, her brightly lipsticked lips pursed, eyes narrowed with concern.

“Have you read my book?” he asked the woman in the front row.

She nodded. “Some of it.”

A few people snickered.

“Well, I think you are misrepresenting what I wrote. I believe children need parents,” he said. “My problem is with too much parenting.”

“There can’t be too much!” a man yelled from somewhere in back. The outburst drew some short applause.

Mark ignored it. “Basically, what I have found is that children thrive and grow happier and more creative with less parental supervision. I’m not saying we should ignore our responsibility to teach them the basics of what’s right and wrong. We all must instill a good moral sense. But we all know about helicopter parents these days, who hover over their kids wherever they go. These control-freak parents hinder the natural creative growth-”

“Kids need to be controlled,” the same man shouted.

“Kids want to be controlled,” the woman with the baby contributed. “They don’t want the kind of freedom you are talking about.”

The audience seemed to erupt. Mark kept his smile, waited for them to settle down, tapping his hands on the sides of the podium.

“I appreciate your point of view,” he said finally. “But for my book, I studied my patients and their parents for five years. My observations led me to believe what I wrote here. I believe parents should act like guides-but not like cops. Children need their parents to be warm and loving. But they also need to be independent from them.”

The woman with the baby spoke up again. “You mean parents should act like friends-not like parents?”

“Friends love and support you,” Mark replied. “What’s wrong with that?”

Another eruption of angry voices.

Autumn was shaking her head, her hair shimmering like a silver helmet in the light. She stared at him wide- eyed, concentrating, as if sending him a psychic message of support. His one fan.

She has nice tits. How come I’ve never noticed? Because she’s twenty-three?

“Let me give you an example from the book, the boy named Sammy. Sammy is ten. His parents treat him as an equal. They let him decide what to eat. They let Sammy decide when to go to bed and when to wake up. They let him decide how much time to spend playing video games or watching TV.

“As a result, Sammy is not only happy but well behaved. Mature. He has a confidence that I don’t see in most ten-year-olds. You see, the extra freedom given Sammy by his parents has allowed him to-”

A vibration against his leg stunned him, and he stopped in midsentence. It took him until the second buzzing tingle to realize it was the phone in his jeans pocket.

Probably his sister, Roz, wanting to know when he’d be home.

He ignored it. It buzzed three more times before it shut off.

“A lot of doctors don’t agree with you,” a woman against the wall spoke up in a raspy smoker’s voice. “I read a review by a psychologist in the Times who said your ideas are dangerous.”

The phone buzzed again. The vibration sent a tingle up and down his leg. Roz wouldn’t call back. Someone was being insistent.

“Excuse me,” he said, grabbing the phone from his pocket. He squinted at the screen. Lea?

“I’m really sorry. I have to take this.” He backed away from the podium. “My wife-she’s on an island. . ”

He turned away from the audience. Behind him, mumbled voices and grumbling. He raised the phone to his ear. “Lea? Are you okay?”

A deafening howl made him jerk the phone away. Then he heard her voice, high, shrill. “Mark-the hurricane. .”

He could barely hear her over the static and whistling. “What? What did you say?”

“Ernesto. . It. . It’s horrible, Mark.”

She was screaming over the roar. She sounded frantic.

“The hurricane? Are you okay?”

The howling stopped.

A jarring silence.

He pressed the phone to his ear, so hard it hurt. “Lea? Are you there? Lea?”