I love downtown Columbia on rainy April mornings, when most people have disappeared into offices and classrooms. The rain hasn’t let up all week. It’s not a torrential, flooding rain, with thunder and squalls and night skies smacked with lightening. No, this year it’s been nothing but a consistent drizzle, gray hazed with the air as soft as chenille. I’ve loved this kind of weather since I was in third grade, looking for excuses to stay home from softball practice.

The downtown streets are never quite deserted, even when everyone’s in her office. The university keeps it alive, neighboring the business district on the south end. Peace Park, overly lush from all the rain, cuts a velvet path between the campus and downtown, lovingly trampled as people rush between the two worlds on either side.

I’m glad for the absence of sun. Last night’s wine burns my eyes enough without any added brightness. I can feel the dirt underneath my fingernails from the night gardening, and I absently pick it out, sliding my thumbnail under each fingernail, flicking the dirt to the sidewalk as I trudge past collegiate T-shirt shops, bars, coffeehouses, used music stores, and Middle Eastern cafes. The few people rushing past me have backpacks slung over their shoulders, and they walk with purpose, like they’re trying to beat the rain. I’ve never minded getting caught in the rain. Besides, you get wetter if you try to outrun it, or so a physics student once told me.

Ninth Street’s quieter at ten o’clock in the morning than at any other time. Early in the mornings, it hums with people getting their coffee and Lakota. The same business-suited folks crawl out of their caves at lunchtime, bustling and swarming, followed by they languid afternoon procession of students filtering out of the campus. The evening happy hour and dinner crowds melt into the bar crowd, a few of them still lingering when the coffee fiends re-emerge at dawn.

But ten AM is isolated from this. A few stray students, a few homeless folks, and a few displaced disenfranchisees dotting the natural wood benches that line the sidewalks, facing the storefronts, infinite reflections in endless plate glass windows. I go into Lakota, having decided to splurge on a café au lait to undo the wine.

The smell of fresh-roasted coffee envelopes me as I open the door. If I stay longer than thirty minutes, I know the aroma will permeate my T-shirt. It’ll weave through my hair and seep into my skin. I’ll be sniffing my skin and my sleeve for the rest of the day. I sit at a table across from the counter. A blond man about my age sits at the counter. His face reminds me of Kurt Cobain. So does the back of his head, straight blond hair brushing the collar of his gray fleece jacket. Before him, the bottles of flavored syrups sit, aligned by the color spectrum, their silver spigots all pointing to the tract lights. He visits with on of the counter workers, who’s placing silverware in the chrome bin on the counter. The worker’s shoulder blades and clavicles are visible through his eggshell-white jersey cardigan. When he leans forward to reach the dishwasher below the counter, I catch a glimpse of his shadowed chest, and I understand why men get so excited about seeing down a woman’s blouse. It’s not about breasts. It’s about uncharted territory. He has a sinewy, long neck and a cowlick on the crown of his head. This, along with his patchy chestnut stubble and slightly buck, gapped teeth should make him ugly. His ropey neck and shadowed chest make him beautiful. His eyes turn to slants crow’s feet when he smiles.

"You like what you see, don’t you?" The voice resonates from behind me. I whip around in my chair, almost bumping my nose into the stomach of the tallest man I’ve ever seen. My vision is obscured by his black T-shirt. My head falls backwards until I see his looming face, so high above me he looks like a low-shot movie villain. His hair’s a shock of frosty blond, almost silver in the glow of the incandescent lights. His eyes aren’t much darker, heavy-lidded and steely. A perfect dimple dots each of his full, round cheeks. He’s smiling down at me.

I consider shoving my chair backwards, against him, because he could suffocate me from above. Before I can turn around to shove off from the table, he steps aside.

"I’m sorry. I’m not usually this bold, but I just had to comment. My name’s Dru."

I straighten in my chair, trying to regain my height before reaching for his extended hand, which swallows my hand. He doesn’t squeeze tightly, just warmly holds my hand.

"Thalia," I murmur, unblinking. The words are out before I can catch them. "Why don’t you have a seat?"

He moves to the chair opposite me – light, graceful, and at least seven feet tall in his black combat boots, big and lithe.

"So," he leans his elbows on his knees, clapping his hands together, "what’s with you and Coffee Boy?" He’s so matter-of-fact, so personable, that I begin to relax.

"Nothing. Just admiring. Why are you so interested?"

His eyes lock on my face, not staring. He’s examining. I lock my eyes on his, like I do when I have a staring contest with a cat.

"You just seemed intent on your target, and that fascinates me."

"How could you tell I was intent? You were standing behind me." His eyes still haven’t left my face.

"Oh, I could tell." He paused, and I could see his gaze shift gears, intensifying. "Again, I’m not usually this bold, but I have to say something." His eyes closed and he leaned back in his chair. "You’re very pretty." He almost laughed as he said it, like he couldn’t believe the worlds were coming out of his mouth. Blood rushed to my face. I never, ever blush. Ever. But I’m blushing now. I don’t know what else to do.

"Thanks," I say, looking at my hands as they smooth the denim on the tops of my thighs. "What do you want?" I’m trying to bring myself away from this stranger’s compliment, trying to find something that at least resembles reality, which seems to have flown out the door as soon as he came in.

"I just want to look at you." He’s not defensive, just blunt.

"Why?"

"Because I like to gaze upon beauty."

I bring my eyes back to his face, studying, trying to place it. I’ve seen him before, and that voice has spoken to me at some point. "What do you do, aside from tower over unsuspecting women and extoll their beauty?" My tongue is firmly planted in my cheek. No one seriously pulls this crap. I remember my café au lait and take a sip. It’s already cold.

"I deliver pizzas"

Reality’s back! I snap back in my chair and laugh. "Pizzas? Hell, you don’t look like a pizza-boy."

"Well, what do you do?" He’s a tad defensive now, not that I blame him.

"Hmmmmm…" I take another sip to stall. "I do lots of things." This is the first time in ten years that I haven’t had a quick answer for that question. "I breathe. I took a shower. Right now I’m drinking cold coffee and talking to a rather disconcerting stranger."

"What do you do for a living?"

Good lord, I’m going to have to say it, aren’t I? I really don’t give a shit what Dru thinks about my unemployment. I just don’t want to hear my voice wrapped around Those Words. "I’m between…I quit my job. I’m unemployed." I exhale and take a gulp of the old coffee.

"Then you don’t have much room to talk, do you?"

"I was a chef. Worked for a wedding company." Past tense. "I don’t know what I am now. Do you want to go for a walk? I can’t sit here anymore. I need air." The dimmed lights and coffee smell aren’t comforting anymore. I feel like I’m in some Brazillian cave and a rock’s been placed at the opening.

"Sure."

It’s still drizzling outside as we make our way towards Peace Park, mostly in silence. He talks about his childhood in New Orleans, teen years spent doing Tarot readings in Jackson Square for tourists while his Baptist minister father would stand beside him, reading scriptures to prove that Dru was worshipping demons. He’d bat the scriptures away with other Bible verses that said otherwise. I don’t think I could have gotten a word in if I felt like trying. For once I was enjoying my own silence, not having to figure out what to disclose of myself. I don’t feel like I have to disclose anything. Either Dru doesn’t care, or he’s already got it figured out. I’m not sure which it is, and I don’t really care.

"Do you still do readings?" I ask as we start across the soggy grass at the park. If I was sure I wouldn’t step on broken glass or bees, I’d slip my sandals off, feeling the cool, slick dampness against the calloused souls of my feet.

"I do, but I don’t have my cards with me. Want me to go home and get them?" He skipped around me, literally skipped, graceful and as full of energy as any seven-year-old who might have skipped across this park.

"Nah, that’s okay." We headed towards the footbridge. I always have to go to the bridge and look for crawdads in the creek.

"I can still give you a reading, though. I’m psychic."

I pulled myself onto the bridge’s stone ledge, folding my feet under me. "Okay. What am I thinking?"

"I’m psychic, not a mindreader. I do know that you’re surrendered something you thought you needed, but it’s really something that you’re better off without." He sat across from me, straddling the bridge ledge, his right foot dangling over the shallow water.

"Do you tell that to everyone who’s quit her job?"

"No, no … not at all. Most people give up their jobs out of stupidity, when they don’t know who they are or what they need. You’re not a stupid person. You’re intuitive, a sensualist." He punctuated this with his hand on my left knee, caressing with a firm, languid swoop. I felt quills falling out of my skin, knocked out by the damp wind and the force of his touch.

"You did that on purpose," I said, giggling.

"Of course I did. I do everything on purpose, and so do you. You’ve probably never done anything by mistake in your life. You think you’ve made mistakes, but you never really have."

"Fate. What’s supposed to happen, will."

"Like this?" His eyes locked on mine as he lifted my hand to his mouth. I froze, but was liquid as he slipped my pinkie between his lips, swirling his tongue, gently sucking as if he was extracting the juice from an orange slice. He released it. I closed my mouth, my jaw having dropped, slack and loose. The dew and the rain were starting to warm from cloud-hidden sun, burning a haze that hovered over the tree branches, clinging to the leaves. The thickness of humidity usually feels vice-like and heavy, but now it’s plush in its weight, comforting as flannel sheets and goose-down quilts.

I blinked. Dru smiled, pleased to have stopped me so suddenly. My hand hovered in front of him, suspended where he’d released it. I brought it back to my lap as I chose my words. "So, what’s going to happen to me next?" I hoped the trace of cynacism I felt managed to creep through my voice.

"I don’t know, since I can’t see my own future. And now my future is wound around yours. You tell me what’s going to happen next."

"Well, I know that I’m going to go home now, since this is getting too weird. But I’ll look for you when I’m downtown."

"Okay. If that’s what you want."

"It’s what I want."

"Well, it was wonderful talking to you. Can I hug you?"

I stretched my arms wide, wrapping them around the towering stranger. He released me, smiled, and skipped away without a word.

I head for my car, ready to go home for lunch. There’s a woman sittig on one of the benches in front of Lakota, singing. No guitar, no tip jar, just singing in a solid soprano that lilits with the breeze. Her song is about painted ponies going up and down. She’s thin, her bare arms resting on her drawn knees. When I pass she looks at me, eyes black slicks on her white face. Her voice doesn’t stop as our eyes connect. It continues as easily as breath. I look away and scurry to my car. e’s H