Head down, watching his feet dance through the deluge, Brooks hummed a vague tune, something about summer showers. The raindrops pelted him like tiny hammers, a thousand points of liquid assault in an Arizona monsoon. A flash of light split the clouds, and the thunder boomed, reverberating through every bone.

Brooks stopped his make-shift jig and looked up. Perhaps, he thought to himself, I shouldn’t be in the middle of the street. Personal safety aside, the scene of the quiet suburban street mesmerized him, black asphalt curving an idle path through rock lawns and squared off houses. The heat of the day still crept up through the black surface, sending the rain back heavenward in weak rivulets of steam.

Natalie’s house stood at the end of the street, where it made a T-junction with Adobe Way. She’d be home by now, he mused, considering a bold, late-afternoon approach upon her sanctum.

“No,” he said aloud to no one in particular, “We’ll wait for the night shift. We’ll wait for true dark.”