Memories of Rain
The humid, winter air hung like wet wool around the shops and houses lining the littered street. After years of hurricanes and corruption, the streets and sidewalks of New Orleans were a shamble of wheel-and ankle-breaking potholes and undulating sidewalks. The buildings here were a mishmash of vine-draped French Colonials painted with bright pastels and rotting wooden shacks, their yards adorned with rusting, broken-down cars. Flowers fought weeds to rebuild old French dreams. Jude thought that the nicer houses looked like prisons, their wrought iron fences protruding outwards toward the buckling sidewalks like spear tips. Four metal frogs playing jazz danced in a garden to his right. It seemed easy enough. Walk up from the Garden District to the French quarter, a straight shot down Magazine Street.
It was 67 degrees, but the wind felt cold to him. Jude zipped his light jacket tight. Although it was only five o’clock, dusk sat on the shoulders of the disappearing light. Low, gray clouds settled around him, almost fog, and a dark band of rain threatened over the Gulf. A headless pigeon drifted in the gutter, wings spread, the iridescent purple and green of its feathers lifted softly by the swirling air.
His phone said the walk was thirty-one minutes. Nineteen minutes left. Most cars had their lights on now. A jackhammer drummed with the rush hour traffic on the highway as he approached the underpass which divided the Garden District from the Warehouse District. He looked up. Curving ramps, roads and bridges wrapped around each other like veins and arteries pulsing in and out of the heart of the city. Traffic was heavy. He had to jog quickly across a feeder road to get to the lone sidewalk leading through the concrete pillars which supported the tangled highways. Under the highway, the air thrummed with the vibrating noise of a thousand cars. Here, on the left side of the walkway, a homeless camp hugged a concrete wall. Their fences were shopping carts and colored tarps tied to tents or makeshift frames. On the right side was a sprawling, empty parking lot for the New Orleans Convention Center. He noticed some movement there. He stopped. The sun was almost all the way gone.
Two men were moving in the shadows. One straddled a limp body and the other stood by looking down. One of the men looked up and noticed Jude staring at them. He pulled a gun. “Don’t run motherfucker!” The sound of the man’s voice echoed in the empty lot. Rush hour traffic buzzed like static. Jude wanted to run, but his feet would not move.
The gunman wore black boots and a Tulane sweatshirt. He had three tear-drop tattoos dripping from the corner of his left eye. He walked over to Jude and leveled the gun at his forehead. “You should mind your business. Get over there.” He pointed towards the other man.
Jude tried to focus. Just find a way to survive until tomorrow. He looked at the other man. Wife-beater t-shirt, bulging veins, dangling cigarette. A broken-down wrestler type. He stood next to an unconscious woman, lying on her back, now softly lit by the overhead lights flickering on in the deserted lot. She was naked from the waist up and her skirt was pushed up above her hips. A blue sapphire winked from a black chain around her neck.
Jude could feel the gunman behind him. He reached into Jude’s pocket and removed his phone and wallet. He held the phone up to Jude's face, unlocking it. Then, he pocketed the cash and credit cards from the wallet. He held Jude's driver's license up to his face. Jude was frozen with fear. Remember the details, he told himself. Instead, he kept staring at the woman.
“Jude Roberts, you interrupted our fun,” said the gunman. He tossed Jude’s driver’s license to the ground.
“What are you staring at? You think she’s pretty?” the wrestler said with a smoker’s rasp. Jude did not speak.
“Dude, you got some coin.” The gunman brandished Jude’s jet-black credit card. “And such a pretty little wife.” He scrolled through the photos on Jude’s phone. He looked down at the woman. “Take off your pants.”
“What?”
He slapped Jude hard across the face, knocking his glasses to the ground and causing his vision to blur. The two men faded to unfocussed apparitions. The unconscious woman remained in sharp focus. The wrestler smiled. “Your fun is just starting,” he said.
I just need to survive the night, thought Jude. He unbuckled his belt and pulled down his pants. He tried to pull the leg over his shoes but ended up losing his balance and hopping awkwardly. The two men laughed.
“Everyone knows the shoes come off first, idiot,” the wrestler said. Jude slipped out of his shoes and stood in front of the men in his jacket, shirt, socks, and underwear.
“Fancy undies too.” The gunman pointed at Jude’s crotch. Jude stepped out of his underwear and stood in front of the men naked from the waist down. “Now spread her legs and kneel.” Jude stood unmoving until he felt the pistol press against his temple. He knelt and gently lifted the woman’s legs apart. The air smelled like car exhaust. A piece of broken glass pressed into his right knee. “Put your hands on her tits.” Jude felt the woman’s warm breasts move under his shaking hands.
“Look up Judey,” said the wrestler. Jude looked at the man, a blur crouching in the dark. He was taking pictures.
“Now pick up her legs and move like you want it,” said the gunman. He pulled the woman’s skirt so it covered Jude’s flaccid penis. “Come on now. Move like you mean it!” He punched Jude hard in the kidneys. Jude felt the muscles of his lower back spasm and cramp in sharp pain as the man’s fist slammed into him. The muscles of his face contracted upward. His mouth fell open in a grimace. His head rocked back as tears squeezed from his squinted, closed eyes. His hips thrust forward as his hands pressed hard into her breasts. Fingers of sweat slid down his back. The broken glass ground into his knee.
When he looked down, she stared back at him with vacant eyes. Eyes blue as the blue sapphire on her neck. The iris of her left eye was flecked with black. It seemed to Jude that she wanted to cry, blue ice melting in the florescent night. The sound of traffic became a taunting chant. Sucking in the acrid air, he moved his fingers through her hair.
“Shit, she’s awake,” said the wrestler. “We got to get.”
The gunman grabbed Jude’s hair and pulled his head back. “We dropped some photos to your phone Judey. If your credit cards stop working, they all go to your wife.” He threw Jude’s phone like a skipped stone into the parking lot.
“Have fun pal,” said the wrestler. Both men ran off toward the French Quarter. The young woman was moving now but still unable to get up. Jude took off his jacket and made a pillow for her head. He covered her bare chest with her torn blouse.
“I’ll get you some help,” he said. She seemed to be regaining consciousness but did not speak. Jude found his glasses, put on his pants, and wandered into the parking lot in search of his phone. Blood from his cut knee soaked through his pants. He found his phone and walked back to check on the woman. He knelt next to her just as two police cars emerged from the darkness. Their overhead lights sprayed a surreal carnival of colors against the parking lot pillars.
‘Show me your hands!” said one of the officers with his gun drawn. Jude slowly raised his hands. Two guns pointed at him in one day. Two guns in one lifetime. An ambulance arrived.
“Walk backward to the sound of my voice!”
“It wasn’t me. I was trying to help,” said Jude as he carefully walked backwards. It seemed like the cop did not hear him speak.
“Put your hands behind your back in a praying position.”
Jude felt the cuffs bite into his wrists. He winced and almost fell, but the officer jerked him up, searched him for weapons, then roughly shoved him into the back seat of one of the police cruisers. The paramedics were attending to the woman.
“Is the girl okay?”
“Sit tight asshole”
Jude watched as the paramedics lifted the woman onto a wheeled stretcher and pushed her to the ambulance. You survived the night, Jude thought. Four police officers stood in a huddle talking. The lights from their cruisers pulsed across their faces. As the ambulance rolled away, the passenger door was jerked open.
“Are you hurt?”
“My leg is bleeding.” Jude closed his eyes.
“I’ll take him to the ER and then bring him to the station,” the cop said to his colleague. He slammed the door in Jude’s face.
***
Jude felt like a zoo animal. Every head turned to stare at him as he walked with his hands cuffed behind his back and a police officer at his elbow. The cop sat him up on an examination table in a curtained treatment alcove. A doctor, a young woman, walked into the alcove. She moved briskly, with an air of competence that put Jude at ease. Her blond hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail.
“Can you tell me your name?”
“Jude Roberts.”
Her green eyes, the shade of brushed jade, locked with his. She smiled at him neutrally. “Mr. Roberts my name is Dr. Hannah. Are you under in the influence of alcohol, drugs or other substances that I should know about?”
“No.”
“Mr. Roberts, please follow this light with your eyes.” She watched him carefully as he tracked the penlight. She wrote some notes on his chart. “Where are you hurt, Mr. Roberts?”
“My leg is bleeding. I have sharp pain when I breathe, and my head is throbbing.”
She looked down at his blood-stained pants. “Okay Mr. Roberts, let’s get you fixed up.” She looked over at the officer. “Take the cuffs off him please.” The officer took off the handcuffs. “Please slip out of your pants and shirt. I’ll step out and get some scrubs for you to wear.”
Jude’s hands started shaking and he began to sweat again.
“Don’t be nervous stud,” said the cop.
Jude undressed and sat back down on the exam table. Dr Hannah came back with some blue surgical scrubs under one arm and smiled at Jude.
“You can put these on in a minute,” she said. Blood was still oozing from the cut on Jude’s leg. The cut needed seven stiches. “Okay, that’s done. I’m going to order some x-rays of your back and head. I’ll be back after they’re done,” she said.
An orderly arrived with a wheelchair. When Jude sat down, the police officer handcuffed him to the chair. “That’s not necessary, officer.”
“This one’s a rapist, doc. He’s cuffed whenever he moves.”
“I’m not…” Jude started to speak but stopped. Dr. Hannah’s lips were drawn in a tight, thin line. Jude hung his head to hide his face as the wheelchair made its slow roll to the x-ray room. The handcuffs rattled on the armrest.
“He has three fractured ribs and a large contusion on the side of his head. He doesn’t need to stay here.” The doctor was talking to the police officer. She had her back to Jude. She would not look at him again.
***
The New Orleans Police Department Headquarters sat squat in the heart of the city. Jude was in an interview room with a man who had introduced himself as Detective Louis. He had just finished telling him his version of events when the detective interrupted him.
“Maybe they caught you and left because they had other problems with the police.”
“Look, I can prove it to you. Just give me my phone.”
Jude’s phone and driver’s license were in a plastic bag on the table in the interview room. The detective handed Jude his phone. He stood over Jude’s shoulder as he unlocked it. There were three missed calls from his wife.
“Look here’s my route.” He showed the detective his GPS mapping program.
“Doesn’t prove anything. In fact, it puts you at the scene.”
“How could I take pictures of myself?” Jude asked.
“Pictures?” the detective replied.
Jude felt something shift in the room. “They forced me to my knees then started taking pictures like the whole thing was a joke. When the girl started to wake up, they said they would send them to my wife if I cancelled my credit cards.”
“Show me.” The detective gestured to the phone. Jude hesitated. “Look Mr. Roberts, you can stop this interview anytime. We have plenty of reason to charge you. I can book you and send you to jail, where rapists don’t fare well. Guilty people stop talking. If you’re innocent, let me help you.” Jude handed the unlocked phone to Detective Louis. “My god,” the detective said.
“I am also a victim here.” Jude could feel the detective’s skepticism.
“You don’t look like it in these shots.” He showed Jude the picture the wrestler took the moment after he was punched. Jude saw his face. It was the face of agony. It was the face of ecstasy. He could see the face of a rapist.
“You’re turning everything upside down. Talk with the woman. She’ll tell you.” Jude desperately hoped that this was true.
“We’ll talk with her when she’s able and follow up on your story. If there’s any semen from the rape exam, you’re toast.”
Jude looked at him evenly. “There won’t be anything like that.” Jude opened the app for one of his credit cards and showed the detective. “Look, they’ve already charged almost three thousand dollars on just one credit card since I’ve been here.”
“Petty thieves taking advantage of the situation.” The detective got up suddenly and left the room. Jude sat slumped in his chair. He could feel them watching him on the cameras monitoring the room.
“You’ll be staying at our hotel tonight Mr. Roberts,” the detective said as he reentered the room. It was almost midnight now. He slid a paper across the table. “Sign this. It gives us permission to image the contents of your phone. You’re going to be held in isolation tonight. You should know that the victim is not seriously injured. We’ll talk again tomorrow.”
***
It was early afternoon, the day after the crime. The detective sat with Jude in his office. Jude was dressed in his own clothes. “We’ve checked out your story, Mr. Roberts. We verified the victim’s location before the assault and determined she traveled from the opposite direction of your route. She remembers the man with the gun you described but doesn’t remember much after she was drugged. We found a couple of witnesses in the homeless camp that corroborated your story. Turns out the 911 call came from there. Even meth-heads have cell phones, I guess. We aren’t charging you at this time.”
“At this time?”
“Mr. Roberts, I believe that you’re innocent, but you know how lawyers are. They never commit.”
“Can I go?”
“I am truly sorry about all this, Mr. Roberts.” The detective gestured toward his office door. Jude left without speaking. He took a cab to his hotel, checked out, and moved his flight home to that afternoon at 5:45. Then he called his wife.
“I’m coming home early.” He didn’t know what to say.
“Everything okay? I tried calling a bunch of times yesterday.”
“I got mugged. They stole my credit cards and roughed me up pretty good, but I’m okay.”
“Oh my god. What happened? Are you sure you’re okay?”
“It’s a long story, but I’m okay. I’m just on the way to the airport and need to call the office. I’ll fill you in when I get home. I love you.”
“I love you too.”
Jude was already asleep when the jet’s wheels lifted from the runway. Fifteen minutes later the tease for the local 6 o’clock news flashed across the TV screens in the airport bars and across the city: “College student assaulted on Magazine Street: Is New Orleans the most dangerous city in America?” The police technician who copied the contents of Jude’s phone had sold the pictures to Channel 8.
The news anchor opened with a description of the assault and then flashed to Jude’s mug shot: “This man, Jude Roberts, a business executive from Chicago, was arrested in connection with this heinous assault.” The somber-faced anchor then applied the coup-de-grace to hook the viewers: “Please note that the following graphic images may be offensive to some viewers.” Photos from Jude’s phone followed. The image of the woman was blurred. Jude’s face and body were shown in clear detail. Agony or ecstasy? It did not matter. Sex and violence always sell. The story was picked up by the national networks. The photos were leaked from the station and rocketed through the internet. When Jude jolted awake as the plane’s wheels bounced on the runway in Chicago, the story had been picked up by most major networks and the photos had been viewed online four million times.
***
Jude had always loved the rolling neon lights on the ceiling of the underground walkway at O’Hare airport. Tonight, he closed his eyes and leaned on the black railing of the moving sidewalk. In his mind, the lights only flashed red and blue and red and blue. His usual driver waited for him as he stepped off the escalator into the main terminal.
“Good evening, Mr. Roberts. Welcome home.”
“Thanks Randal, it’s so good be home.” Jude watched the crystalline skyline of Chicago recede as the car powered north towards Lake Forest. Randal’s eyes shifted in the rearview mirror to study Jude’s face. Jude let out a long sigh. This nightmare was over.
The tree-lined avenues and stately homes of Lake Forest seemed to breathe life back into Jude as the car rolled into his neighborhood. He had worked his entire professional life to get here. This was where people who have made it lived. The sound of tires on pea gravel made him smile as the car pulled into the semi-circular driveway in front of his house. Yellow light splashed across perfectly trimmed junipers. The walk was shoveled clean. Soon he would be sitting by a fire with a glass of Irish whiskey. He had built his life like the bricks of this house. Everything was solid. Everything was secure. Everything would be fine. He was only 52, and a star at the firm. When the New Orleans deal closed, he would take a long vacation with Allison. Maybe the beach. He opened the front door and set his bag in the tiled entryway.
“Allison, I’m home!” he called. Silence.
Jude found her sitting at their kitchen table. Her hands gripped its edge like it might run off at any moment. The table was distressed barnwood. They had bought it together years ago, for their tenth anniversary. She seemed intently focused on one knot in its surface.
“I thought you said you were mugged,” she said.
“I was. What’s going on?”
“Check the news.” Allison’s eyes were puffy and red.
Jude opened his phone. His email and texts were blown up with messages of condemnation, hatred, and other vitriol. Some messages congratulated him: “The bitch should die.” He scrolled through the major news sites. He felt bricks crumbling around him.
“Allison.” He sat down next to her and put his hand on hers. “Allison, it’s not what it seems.” Jude tried to explain what had happened. Allison sat mute and unmoving. “Allison, do you honestly think I am capable of this?”
“I didn’t think you were capable of cheating, but there you sit.” The memory settled on the table like dust. Some betrayals are never really forgiven.
“Oh please, Allison. That was six years ago. I am so sorry.”
“Sorry for that or for this?”
“I am sorry for it all.” Jude did not have much fight left. Exhaustion, anger, and shame boiled the air between them. His fractured ribs made every breath cause searing pain. The antique clock on the kitchen wall ticked loudly. Seconds were hours. “The police cleared me. I am innocent!” Jude slammed his flat palm on the table. Allison looked up.
“You’re not so innocent,” she said. She got up and left the room.
***
When Jude arrived at the office the next morning there was a crowd of protesters in front of the office waving signs and yelling. His administrative assistant greeted him with caution. “Mr. Calbert wants to see you.” Lane Calbert was the managing partner at Jude’s private equity firm.
“Christ Jude, this is a clusterfuck. What the hell is going on?”
Jude explained the story yet again and gave Lane the contact number for Detective Louis.
“No need, Jude. I believe you. The cops wouldn’t have let you go if they thought you were guilty.”
“Thank you.”
“We’ll sort this out-- but take a few days.”
“What about the New Orleans deal?” Jude felt Lane’s scrutiny.
“Don’t worry about it right now. Just lay low for a bit. I have a car in the parking garage that can take you home.”
***
The next protest started in New Orleans. The pillar where the assault occurred became a shrine. Votive candles adorned with the Virgin Mary flickered against cracked concrete. Flowers, stuffed animals, and chalked slogans encircled the pillar like a wreath.
The protests began to spread nationally. Outrage that Jude was released fueled more outrage. Celebrities got involved. A well-known black pastor crafted a meme of the picture of Jude on top of the woman with the caption: “WHITE MEN FLY WHILE BLACK MEN DIE.” The pastor flew to New Orleans and led a march on the police headquarters demanding justice for black suspects. Jude, the victim, and the attackers were all white. Lane Calbert called Jude and asked him to come back to the office.
When he arrived, he was ushered into a conference room. Three partners and someone from human resources sat on one side of a glass-topped conference table. Jude saw a large envelope sitting on the table in front of Lane. Jude himself had delivered the same envelope hundreds of times after deals had closed. He was used to being the architect of these moments. Moments when lives were abruptly derailed in the name of synergy or efficiency. Last month, he sat on the other side of this same table. A senior manager from a company his firm had just purchased sat staring at him, anticipating the blow. The manager’s wife sat with him. Her hands gripped the edge of the conference table.
“We are making some management changes at the company. Unfortunately, your position has been eliminated,” Jude had said. Although he knew what was coming, the manager’s cheeks flushed, and he squinted back tears.
“I’ve been with the company 28 years. I’ve given my whole life to this place.”
“I’m sorry Mr. Hughes, I know this is a difficult time, but you will find another opportunity, a new chapter.”
“I am fifty-eight years old. No one will hire me.”
“In the envelope you will find a severance agreement and release. Under the circumstances, we are offering an enhanced severance package of eighteen months.”
“This isn’t right. I should sue you.”
“You should read the documents, talk to a lawyer, and make whatever decision is best for you and your family.” Jude’s voice was even, without emotion. These moments needed to handled carefully.
“There’s no real choice here and you know it,” the manager said.
Jude slid the envelope across the table. “I will leave you with Janice, from our human resources department. She will answer any further questions you might have.” Jude knew he would sign the agreement. There was no real choice.
“I don’t have any questions.” The man and his wife got up to leave. She walked around the table and leaned down to whisper in Jude’s ear. Her perfume smelled like crushed flowers.
“You think you are so smart, but what you do is evil, and it will haunt you for the rest of your life.”
Jude stared at Lane Calbert and the two other partners. He had worked with them for fifteen years. He made the hard decisions when hard decisions had to be made. “Lane, this isn’t right. I’ve made millions for the firm. I’ve done nothing wrong.”
“The client on the New Orleans deal has asked for a new team,” Lane said. Jude stared out the large windows of the conference room toward Lake Michigan. The water along the shore was frozen and huge blocks of ice were piled on the shore, driven there by the incessant winter wind. “Some of the female analysts have expressed fears about working with you.”
“What! That’s bullshit, Lane. You know that. Who? I’ve never had a complaint. Never even cracked a dirty joke.”
“Hotline complaints are confidential.”
“Hotline complaints? Really Lane? Even if it was more than a disgruntled gossip line, policy requires an investigation, not an execution.”
“And a former analyst has come forward with an allegation that you coerced her into a sexual relationship some years back.”
Jude closed his eyes and rocked back in his chair. He was kneeling again in the parking lot under the highway. There was a gun to his head. The only difference this time was that the trigger would be pulled.
“You don’t deny it then?” Lane looked sheepish.
“Just give me the damn papers Lane.”
“Take your time to review them. You might want to talk with a lawyer,” the human resources representative said.
“Shut up Janice. I know the drill,” Jude said. He signed his severance agreement and release. Lane Calbert sat still and silent in his slate-gray suit. Jude was escorted out of the building by security.
***
“You’re a fifty-two-year-old white man who has been arrested. You’ve been vilified by every media outlet in the country. Our case is a dead loser.”
Jude sat across the desk from the lawyer. He had given this firm millions of dollars in deal fees. The meeting was a favor.
“What about defamation? These stories have cost me everything.”
“Actually, most of the stories were factually accurate. You were arrested. You were a suspect. The pictures they published were actual pictures of you.”
“But the police cleared me!”
“The police only said that they do not have sufficient evidence to charge you. Nuance doesn’t matter to the media. News is entertainment. And facts certainly don’t matter to an angry mob. Moreover, do you have the resources to litigate for years with armies of first amendment lawyers hired by big news organizations?”
“It’s not justice.”
“There’s no justice. There’s money and there’s power.”
***
“Mr. Roberts, I didn’t expect to see you back in New Orleans any time soon.”
Jude sat in Detective Louis’s office sipping stale coffee in a Styrofoam cup. “You have to put out a statement declaring me innocent. My life has been ruined by this.”
“We’re a police department not a PR firm, Mr. Roberts. Race relations with the police are very tense right now. If we say anything more, the whole city might erupt.”
“How can a white man, a white victim, and white criminals become a symbol of racist America?”
“You’re a rich, white executive who appeared to get special treatment. We know that’s not true, but it doesn’t matter.”
Jude squeezed the coffee cup until it broke. Hot coffee spilled across his hands.
“Shit, here let me get you something.” The detective looked concerned.
“Did you at least catch the guys that did this?”
“No, but it’s not a priority.”
“How can it not be a priority?” Jude wiped his pants and hands with paper towels and stared at the detective.
“Our force is understaffed and overworked. She wasn’t raped. The victim is a Tulane graduate student who wants to remain anonymous.”
Jude stared out of the small window of the detective’s office. It was beginning to rain. “What do you meant she wasn’t raped?”
“There was no penetration. They never even got her fully undressed. You must have got there at about the same time they did. She’s had a rough go but is recovering. You stopped those bastards. You’re an accidental hero, Mr. Roberts.”
Jude put his face in his hands and rubbed his temples with his thumbs. “What I am I supposed to do now?”
“I know this a difficult time, but you will move on to another chapter in your life.” The detective paused. “There is one thing you could do though.”
Jude looked up. “What?”
“The victim, her name is Isabella, called me. She’s followed all this on the news. She knows the actual facts, but seeing those photos caused her PTSD. She said she wants to talk with you. She thinks talking to you might help her recover.”
***
Audubon Park was an expansive sweep of trees and green adjacent to Tulane University. They agreed to meet at a picnic pavilion in the center of the park. A slow drizzle dripped as Jude walked along the serpentine walk towards the pavilion. Spanish moss swung from oak trees. Swans swam along the edge of a cattail-lined pond. She was sitting at a picnic table in a bright green raincoat.
“Isabella?”
She looked up. The same black fleck in the blue. The same blue sapphire.
“Mr. Roberts? Thanks for agreeing to meet.” They sat silently. A mourning dove called three times from the trees behind them. “The detective says you saved me,” she finally said.
Jude looked down. An earthworm struggled in a puddle.
“The truth is, I was a coward,” he said. “I was more focused on saving myself than helping you.”
“The detective said one of them had a gun and threatened to kill you.”
“Yes, that part’s true.” Jude sighed and looked off into the distance. A sharp pain shot across his ribs. A jogger pushed a stroller along the path.
“I can’t remember anything after the bar. When I saw those pictures, I started having flashbacks and nightmares about you.”
“I am so sorry.” Their eyes met for a moment, then they both looked away furtively.
“My therapist says the drugs caused amnesia. So, to fill in the gaps, my unconscious mind invents details that are worse than reality. I thought that, if I met you and talked to you, maybe the nightmares would stop.”
“Kill the demon?” Jude’s hands felt heavy on the table.
“Kill my demons, or at least start to. I’m still angry and afraid. I have a long road to go.”
“I’m so ashamed of the things I’ve done,” said Jude.
“I left my drink on the bar and just turned around for a minute to say goodbye to a friend. I wasn’t drunk.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” said Jude.
Isabella looked away and down. She rubbed her hands on her thighs. After a minute, she pushed her hair away from her face, looked up, and met his eyes.
“It wasn’t your fault either, Mr. Roberts.”
It was raining harder now. They talked for another hour. They talked about books and movies. They talked about friends and families. They talked about past lives and future lives.
“Well, I better get back to class,” she said. “Thanks again for meeting me. Maybe I’ll sleep tonight.” She smiled and flipped up the hood of her raincoat.
Jude watched her walk away. A brighter light moving through the softer greens of the grass and trees. He listened to the rain drumming on the metal roof of the picnic pavilion. The air smelled like damp earth. Jude wondered if it was snowing at their lake house in Traverse City. Allison was staying there now, but they talked every day. Maybe she was sitting in the bay window watching snow blowing in white sheets across the rolling winter waves on Lake Michigan. He stared toward the tangled highways with the underpass leading to the French Quarter. Beyond them, the city gleamed, slick and bright against the coming night.
