A storm was coming.

David Henson had known it the moment he'd opened his eyes that morning. He always knew when there was a storm drifting up from the south, just sort of sensed it brooding in the distance like an ugly black secret. His grandmother had been able to do the same thing; predict the weather, sometimes days in advance. She'd been a spooky old lady, his grandma. Eighty-nine years old with a mouth full of venom and a voice that could crack a mirror from sixty yards. The kind of woman who kidnapped little boys and cooked them into ginger bread. All the same, she was always dead accurate when it came to predictions (pretty scary in itself when he thought about it). Dave had secretly rejoiced when they'd finally packed her off to the nursing home last year, cackling like some geriatric hyena, but it later occurred to him that precognition might not be the only thing that ran in the family.

Be that as it may, Dave figured that dementia was still a long way off, and he had more pressing concerns for the time being. Despite the warmth of the day, he wanted to wear his waterproof parker; a dark blue rain slicker with an adjustable hood. It was about three sizes too big and weighed like eighty pounds, but Dave knew it would keep him warm through an avalanche if need be.

Dave's Mom had shaken a skeptical head when he'd told her; the skies were crystal clear aside from a couple fleece-backs skimming the horizon. Wasn't enough there to fill a tea-cup from what she could see. But Dave had been adamant: there was a storm brewing to the south, a big one judging by the ringing in his ears, and he wasn't about to get caught in a gosh-darn tornado without a slicker. His mother finally capitulated, not so much because his arguments had swayed her judgment, but because he sounded cute when he said things like "gosh-darn."

Dave had headed stoically into school, trudging along the pavement while the sun beat down from an endless blue sky. Upon arrival, he'd endured the sneering ridicule of his classmates with almost superhuman patience, sweating bullets beneath half a ton of blue gortex. The morning lengthened to midday without a single cloud crossing the yardarm, but Dave stubbornly refused to remove his parker. Doubts were cast over his sanity by fans and critics alike (even young Janey Watson was puzzled by his behavior, although she made no comment RE his mental state). Back in the classroom, he sat gnawing the end of his pencil, watching the window the way others watched the clock.

And there it was, just as he'd expected.

A massive gray build-up along the southern horizon; obliterating the landscape as it crept imperceptibly along the Blaxland Ranges. Hardly seemed to be moving in their direction, would probably miss them by four zillion miles, but Dave knew better. This was going to be much worse than he'd anticipated. For a moment, he could almost hear his Grandma's shrieking laughter in the back of his head, high and shrill and razor sharp. For the first time that day, he started to feel scared.

The thunderheads circled Ridgewick most of the afternoon, driving cold autumn winds through the center of town. Doors and windows began to rattle, the classroom's corkboard walls began to 'breath' back and forth. Dave looked around in growing agitation, wondering why nobody else noticed the sudden change in the air. A static charge seemed to be crackling through his veins, a hundred times worse than the continual buzzing in his ears.

The skies were rumbling with purple anger when school let out around three o'clock. Most of the younger children scampered straight home trailing their backpacks, far too sensible to get caught in the rising gale. The older ones made a bee-line for Memorial Park, led by the malevolent Katie Prescott and her Minions of Darkness (that was how Dave actually thought of them: he'd discovered A.K. Rowland last year and tended to think in terms of Potterisms). Crumpled brown leaves chased them down the empty streets, streaking through fence pikes and power lines.

And still the thunderheads cycled overhead, bending the trees along Memorial Drive in their fury.

Dave tagged along in the rear guard, mainly because his friend Janey Watson had been roped into the exodus and he pretty much went wherever she did. He'd also been getting an odd vibe all afternoon, as if something black and ominous was approaching with the storm. Several times, he thought he heard dogs baying in the distance, but decided it had to be the keening of the wind. Unfortunately, this explanation did little to sooth his rising anxieties. When the short hairs on the back of his hands started to prickle, he knew the storm was almost upon them.

"We ought to go home," he told Janey, but knew she wouldn't want to leave until the game was finished. Katie Prescott had decreed an interclass tag marathon and when Katie Prescott called tag, no one left until the Final Game Was Played, not unless their parents had a comprehensive dental plan. So Dave stood inconspicuously off to one side while half the sixth grade stampeded round and round the Fountain in lunatic abandon. Sheet lightning seared the clouds several times and dogs wailed like ghosts in the background, raising the hackles at the base of his neck.

Something bad was coming.

The storm finally broke around three-thirty, blackening the skies as the rain lashed down in a literal torrent. Curbs were flooded, drains overflowed and lawns receded before the backwash. Long dead branches fell from denuded maples and were carried off to parts unknown. The One Last Game ended with a booming thunder-burst that scattered the children to every point of the compass. They emptied the playground in a swarming mass, screaming to the indigo clouds. Some of them lived close by and vanished within a matter of seconds, others bolted through the Wilderlands, emerging five minutes later into Westside Estates. A few spilled down Memorial Drive, heading towards the center of town.

Further out in the boondocks, traditional protective measures were taken by stern-faced adults. Curtains were drawn over a hundred picture windows; doors were locked and double bolted, as if this could somehow ward off the storm's howling ferocity. As a final precaution, mirrors were covered with white linen – an old superstition meant to ward off ball lightning, which was common this time of year.

Perhaps they should have painted ha'ants on the eves as well.
Who knows, it might have proven just as effective.

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