side orders

it's raining. i haven't owned a car for five years but still whenever it rains i immediately wonder if i've remembered to roll up the windows.

i would like a refreshing drink, something orange maybe. something light and crisp but so cold. it should feel like swimming in a rushing river in the rain. that's refreshment.

once when i was a teenager i left my car parked at a friend's house. we had gone in his car to the mall. there were passing thunderstorms, summer ones that drench the city and then move off to the east as fast as they came. we got back to his house and i'd left my windows down. the car was soaked inside and filled with leaves that had blown free from a nearby oak. my friend's stepfather and step-sister were sitting on the porch watching me curse my poor luck. "yeah," the stepfather said. "we were wondering who the unlucky owner of that car was." thanks for rolling up my windows, you two.

of course i can laugh about it now. the car has long since died, it's axle snapping as i made a hard right turn early one morning on the way to the airport. i got to new york city and my father called and told me the car was no more. and there, in the span of the hour long flight, one chapter of life closes and another begins.

it was raining one evening as we walked home down irving street. i was showing her the city for the first time. she clutched my arm and seemed nervous. we were quite drunk. 'don't be nervous,' i said, and i started pointing out landmarks to calm her down. 'there's where the one armed delivery man works,' i told her, pointing to a shuttered cafe. 'there's where the japanese girl with the very old jack russell terrier lives. she always puts a small pink shawl on the poor old thing.' a car slows down behind us and i worry that despite my trying to allay her fears, we might actually be in a sketchy situation in a minute. the car kills its headlights and keeps cruising slowly behind us. i can hear muffled bass from inside. we are mid block, about 50 yards from the next intersection. the streetlights are mostly obscured by the leafy canopies of the trees. 'caroline,' i begin, about to tell her to dip into the next alleyway, but the car suddenly drives off into the night, blowing past us in a darkened blur. she has been oblivious, her head nestled into my shoulder.

she is gone now too, i can't even remember a defining point when it ended. gradually things fell apart and one day i awoke and she was out of my equation. sometimes i take an old sweater out of the back of the closet and there near the collar a stray long blondish-brown hair, one of hers, a reminder. one afternoon in fall i send all of the clothes in the back of the closet to the dry cleaners.

the rain falls with no direction, no purpose. nothing like the powerful and determined rains of summer. nothing like the cruel and punishing rains of december. just rain, pouring down with no intent, indiscriminate.