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  ****

  By nine the group disbanded, a few risked the weather while most walked around with drinks in hands, chatting sports, politics, and the weather. James sat at the bar talking to the bartender about his first month on the job when the lights flickered off, and remained off. A loud electronic buzzing issued from outside followed by a large concussive blast, James knew a transformer explosion when he heard one. CPS wouldn’t brave this storm so they would be powerless for a while.

  The bartender brought a small battery operated Coleman lamp from underneath the bar illumination much of it but causing the surrounding shadows to grow darker, a pitch black only broken by the strobe of lightning and a few people on their cell phones. James checked his own phone, he wasn't getting any service, the tower couldn’t be reached and the power outage cut off the wireless internet, leaving them all blind.

  Outside the wind howled as rain pelted the club’s glassed fronting beyond shuttered blinds, somewhere a car alarm cried for attention. The whole night was turning ugly and serine. Down within the darkness the front doors burst open, allowing a wild current of cool wind to ride up from the hall and blow around the bar until someone forced them shut. From the hallway appeared James’s driver for the evening, a young kid with curly black locks and a long Jewish nose, his dress clothes and vest soaked.

  “I hope you don’t mind if I crash the party, but I don’t think our car is a safe place to wait anymore.”

  James smirked, offering him a drink on the house; the boy chose a pint of Samuel Adams.

  Chapter 2: the Wheels on the Bus

  Alex took two minutes around eight to look up from the ancient Pacman machine and notice it pouring outside. Lightning lit the arcade, darkened for the evening, and he decided it was now or never if he was going to get home in this crap. Playing games wired into the electrical system wasn’t wise in this kind of weather anyway.

  A via bus sloshed to a stop in a puddle in front of the arcade, he picked up his bags to make a run for it, not acknowledging the Farwell from the gray bearded owner behind his ticket window. He splashed out of the door onto the downtown streets just as the bus closed its doors and make off without him, having picked up whoever had been waiting out in this mess.

  Afraid he’d be left behind for the next bus, if it would even come, he ran after it through the rain, yelling, shouting, waving, splashing through water and wetting the length of his legs. Just as the bus seemed out of reach and he slowed to a stop, about to give up, it pulled over again, set on its flashers, and opened its doors. He made a mad dash for it, coming to the open door where a gust of wind pushed him inside.

  “Boy you crazy” said the overweight black woman in a blue uniform driving the bus who eyed the young, soaked kid dripping onto her metal floor.

  “Maybe, but I'd be crazier to try to get home in worse than this.” He handed her rain soaked coins he pulled out of his back pocket and started towards the back, his favorite seat, where he could be nobody until he arrived at his destination and ignore his freezing wet clothes in the bus's A/C.

  ****

  The digital clock above the driver shined eight thirty, the VIA bus’s movements had slowed through flooded crossings and traffic choked up by wrecks. One thing you could rely on in San Antonio is that everyone’s IQ dropped a few points every time it rained, people who drove well drove bad, those who drove bad drove worse

  Outside the fierce storm rocked the bus with strong gusts of wind, but only so it was noticeable when they stopped. The driver had darkened the overhead lights so she could try to see, leaving them the passengers in a gloom which set a tense mood.

  At nine she called it, pulling over on a street just outside the main downtown area, not far from highway thirty five in a place Alex was unfamiliar with, and announced that they would have to wait out the storm.

  As she switched lights back on someone asked about the chance of flooding, but even Alex knew about the intricate drainage and sewer system under downtown that kept flooding from being a big problem.

  He opened his bag, thanking whatever god might be that his books where unstained. He opened the first page of his new Batman comic and found himself lost once again, only this time to a world of stories and heroes.

  ****

  The bus clock read ten when he drifted to sleep and awoke with a start from the sensation of falling. He once read that the sensation came from your body warning your brain that it might be dying, so the brain would awake you in shock and fear.

  Many of the other passengers had also drifted off, the lights dimmed enough so the ones still awake could read. Blinking the sleep out of his eyes he focused on her while she held the mic to her radio close to her lips.

  “We're stuck here boss, I can’t drive in this weather without throwing us off the road, not only is the storm bad, it’s now dark outside. It's safest to wait it out, after all it’s a Texas storm and can’t take but another hour right?” She sounded unsure, Alex noted her accent, thicker than grew in San Antonio, yet not quite a Dallas drawl, likely a Houston accent.

  The radio squeaked and a deep voice came over the intercom, “How are the passengers holding up?”

  “They're fine, no complaints, a few have dozed off and I’ll wake them once where moving again.”

  The radio squealed again after a pause, even the bus driver winced at the noise, “Fine,” The man said, “look, I’m keeping an eye on this thing and they're saying it looks bad, not a tornado watch, but it’s a big damn cell. Be careful of hail, and if you need to, get to a," another squeal cut him off and after there was nothing but static.

  “Sir?” crackling silence poured from the radio, “Home this is bus six oh two, do you copy?” The bus was silent save for the sound of the downpour battering the windows and turning them into waterfalls, which would have been peaceful had it not been for the howling wind that rocked them.

  His clothes still damp and cold Alex rose, treading softly as not to wake the few sleeping, up to the front red line he no one was supposed to cross, “Everything ok?”

  She shrugged, “Windy, maybe the storm took out our crappy old tower at the depot.” She seemed to think before hitting a few buttons on her CV, “This is bus six oh two, does anyone copy.”

  After a long silence there was the crackle of movement through the white, “Bus three eleven here, is this a mayday call?” a husky male voice came back, to Alex he sounded like a trucker.

  “Negative, I’ve lost contact with home.”

  “Me too, I’ve hunkered down at a gas station, since I can hear you not that far from where you’re stuck. I’m empty though, so it’s no hurry, how’s your load?”

  She looked over her shoulder past Alex, “Not what I’d call a load, but heavier than light?”

  The man was chuckling when he came back over, “Whatever that means. If it’s all right with you I’m going to take a nap until the storm passes, good luck out there.”

  She nodded her thanks, adding “Thanks,” when she seemed to remember the other driver couldn't see her. Mic hung the driver hit her wipers, but the swish slid through the waterfall and left another one in its wake. Switching off her useless attempt she stood to take a look at the door which shook with the fierceness of the wind, then she turned to look over her passengers before returning to a sit. “I hate doing nothing.”

  Alex smiled, “Then take a nap, I don’t think I’ll be going back under with that wind, I’ll wake you when it gets better, or your radio goes off.”

  She nodded a smile towards him, “Thanks kid.”

  Chapter 3: Bones

  Travis tossed aside his sterile white sheets with a curse, at nine too early to call it quits as far as sleeping went, but his bones had woke him. They didn’t ache, they screamed, he knew he needed pain medicine, but couldn’t remember what kind or where he’d get it, plus, despite his inability to sleep, his bed remained just too comfortable to get up.

  ****

  He woke to the howling wind and a heavier d
ownpour twenty minutes later, sounding like a river running down the roof of their one story building. Soft footsteps made their way up to his door pausing before his visitor rapped their knuckles on it. “Come in!” he shouted, his voice hoarse, wincing at how loud he had done so.

  A young looker of a nurse, with long straight hair and one curly blond bang, walked in holding a tiny blue flash light, which she sat on his nightstand. “Just in case,” she said with a voice as sweet as cherries, “anything else I can get you sir?”

  He winced, this time at the effort it took to think, he knew there was something but there no memory of what he had needed before having dozed off swam to focus. Smacking his toothless lips he shook his head no. As the pretty nurse, with her short thigh high skirt, shook her shapely ass out of his room, he smiled and leaned to use the nightstand to help him swing out of bed.

  Now standing his face wrinkled in pain, he realized his knees and spine where on fire, they would be with one hell of a storm raging outside. When had that come upon them? He hobbled to the bathroom, now knowing he needed a piss and a pill.

  ****

  Travis woke, on the toilet the little bathroom clock said ten. Flushing the acrid smelling urine, cursing his aching bones and his ability to just doze off, he turned to his medicine cabinet to eye the pill bottle sat on the sink which caused him to pause. Despite his efforts he couldn’t remember having taken any though he rarely left the bottle out after he finished.

  With a shrug he took three pills and put it back in the medicine cabinet, lightning hit somewhere close, the crash of thunder felt better than heard. He flushed the toilet and headed back for his bed, ready to just bury his head under his pillow and ignore the rest of the night.

  ****

  His bedside clock said eleven when the storm hit harder, it sounded as if something solid pounded against the building. His TV awarded him with nothing but static, with a curse he thought about what to do. He wasn't getting back to sleep without the television but he didn't want some techie in his room bothering him this late at night. Travis wondered if anyone else might be awake in the rec room during this monster of a storm. But first, his bones hurt.

  Chapter 4: LGBT

  The two lovers, four friends, sat at a booth in the darkened IHOP, their meals having come before the power failed, but without power the restaurant could only operate the most basic of machinery. Anything else they hoped to munch on would have to wait for CPS, who Gil hoped weren't crazy enough to be climbing electrical poles in this kind of weather.

  The last half hour Gil had spent sleeping in his lovers lap, and while Ben had an obvious hard on for him, he sought comfort, his need for physical pleasure having flown away, replaced by a primitive fear of the weather.

  Wind rattled the thick window they sat by, driving sheets of rain against it, and Claudia brought her knees to her shoulders, leaving her wet sandals on the ground to let her bare feet play against the blue cushioned bench, pressing on it, making an indent, and watching it disappear. Leon had made his boredom apparent for the past hour, but for now there was little anyone could do about it.

  Gil glanced at his digital watch, the numbers turned to ten.

  ****

  At eleven Leon scooted closer to the window to watch the rain slide down it after Claudia wandered to the bathroom. The two lovers where falling asleep on each other, which was fine with the usual loner. The waiter kept bringing them juice and fruits, things that wouldn’t need heating but would go bad without refrigeration, on the house. He listened to the wind howl, studying the windows as they rattled. Sipping his cranberry lemonade the he palmed the glass, cool in the heavy rain after such a warm day, glad he and his friends found a safe place to sit out this crap.

  ****

  Her watch let out a little chime to let Claudia know it had hit the half hour after eleven, and she rose from the toilet. She hadn’t needed to go, just to get away, the constant flash, flash, flash of lightning made her edgy. The thoughts of no TV, no radio, no phones, even her cell, which she kept trying to thumb onto the internet with, without technology she was going mad. Flushing the unused toilet she stepped out of the stall to rejoin her friends when a loud rip sounded across the sky, rattling the metal fixtures, and she realized she needed to use the restroom after all.

  ****

  Just before twelve she rejoined the group, the two lovebirds asleep, her other gay boy so interested in the window she wondered if he was testing fate on whether lightning might strike him. “You ok?”

  He nodded, “Bored off my ass, but ok,” looking across the table his lips dressed in black pulled into a frown, “got no one to copulate with like those two.”

  She smirked, “We could, you know, go pick a random patron to fill our needs.”

  He shook his head smirking right back at her.

  Chapter 5: Home Plot.

  Harry had been home for hours before the storm hit. It wasn’t the first storm he would ride out and living in Texas it wouldn't be his last. Still, at an hour before midnight, having heard nothing from his parents in this hell of a storm he became worried, and his phone was without service.

  He had power, but the T.V. connection failed around ten thirty as well as his internet, which didn’t surprise him, being owned by the same useless phone company. He only hoped his parents might ride out the storm somewhere safe.

  Gathering a couple of flashlights, he sat in the living room with his chocolate lab, turning on his blue-ray player in hopes to tune out the rest of the night with the colorful carnival movie about birds, Rio.

  ****

  Midnight rolled around and the only thing left with power aside from his flashlights was a battery operated wall clock which chimed out a Beatles tune he didn't know the name of, though his mother would have been able to. Harry couldn't believe his luck, having just set popcorn in the microwave a flash of lightning followed by a brighter, longer flash somewhere distant had taken the power.

  His two year old lab hugged her body against his leg as she shook, he hoped she wouldn’t pee herself. If she did he’d have to wait for the lights to clean up the mess, or just plop down a towel and hope for the best.

  With her in tow he made his way to his parents’ room to lie down on the queen sized bed which had a decent view of the storm through a row of plate-glass windows. His dog climbed in bed after him, content to sleep until their parents returned home.

  It wasn’t that at eighteen he a little thunder scared him, he normally liked storms, but his dog was and if he slept in his own bed she might pee it, something he'd rather his parents deal with. His fears came from the possibility they might be caught in this mess and wanted to make sure he knew when they arrived home.

  ****

  Harry awoke, he tried to see what the clock said, but in the strobe of the lightning he remembered the power failure, he should have guessed by how heated the room had become without the AC. Even if with power restored the clock would've been flashing some random number, most likely twelve.

  Instead he fished his phone out of the pocket of clothes he still wore and hit a key, one o’clock, still no call, no service, and no parents. Something felt wrong, and it wasn’t just his parents this time, somewhere deep in his gut something stirred that further instilled fear and worry within him.

  His dog whimpered, she shook the entire bed in her own fear of the storm, and for the first time since his youth young he too became afraid of a storm.

  Chapter 6: Parental Unit

  Michael was in shock, unable to believe what had transpired in the last few seconds, his wife whimpered in the seat next to him while his car spun with fluid motion. The windows around him creaked under pressure, only half the sky visible, half of his view dark, murky water which seeped in through the spaces around the door. He had been stupid, way too stupid, crossing that water, but it seemed like such an insignificant puddle.

  He knew he shouldn’t have done it, he wouldn't have done it before, but whether it was exhaustion or the earlier
rounds of alcohol speaking he had tried and now his stupidity would get them killed.

  “Micheaaaal” his wife cried, a dark spot formed under her crotch that and stained the seat, the car stank of urine but that was the least of the problems the interior of their car would face.

  He unbuckled, helping her do the same, and lied down with his head in her wet lap to put his feet against his own window, but stopped after a second thought. His car was now floating soundly down the rain made river way, his door downstream, if he kicked out the window this side would sink allowing the rushing water easy access to the bottom of the car, to flip it, drowning them without hope.

  Instead he turned and put his feet across his wife onto her window. “Wendy,” he called to her weakly, she whimpered, “Wendy, dear, I need you to listen. I’m going to kick, these windows are meant to break, as soon as I do the water will rush in, but no matter what you make it out that window and I will be right behind. OK?”

  She stared at him wide eyed, but nodded, which was enough for him, it was now or never.

  He shoved with his heels, the electric window popped free of its gears and fell into the door. His wife’s screech turned into a choking cough under the roar of the chilled current that rushed into their car, he had to act fast.

  Michael hoisted his wife, now light under the rising water, and shoved her out the window into the raging storm.

  ****

  She had tumbled through the water unable to move in such a defeating current for what seemed forever after exiting the car she and Michael had bought just two years ago. Now it seemed like she might have been treading for hours, land, their car, and her beloved husband who saved her life as the water swept her downstream lost to the darkness. She slammed into a glorious brick wall, flashes of lightning revealed pocked red clay and a partial of green gang tagging.

  She could also make out a blue ladder folded in half to keep creeps and crooks from accessing the roof, but with the waters risen so drastically she now swam just below it.

  Forgoing her current purchase, she fought against waves and currents, gripping onto a grip-less wall as she pulled herself along to find hope gripping onto the cold, wet, blue ladder. With a grunt and a groan she tried to pull herself onto it, but found herself too exhausted to do so. Her muscles ached with exhaustion and where starved of warmth, she wanted to just let it go, let it be, resume her cruise down the river, but she refused. Her husband was God knows where because he had saved her, and it would not be in vain.