Raincheck

Rodney
opened one eye and glanced up at the sky when the first drop of rain hit his nose. He sighed. Well, after all this unrelenting heat, a little rain was probably a good thing. Still, it made for an unpleasant night, particularly if the storm blew over quickly and left nothing but a steamy, sauna-like atmosphere behind.

As was his usual habit, he scanned his surroundings as best he could without actually moving just yet. The last rays of light were fading from the sky, the cars below beginning to turn on their headlights. Across the street, the skyscrapers began to light up from within. He could make out the movement of people inside some of the windows, like ants behind a wall of glass. Not that he’d ever seen an ant farm, but he’d read about them.

It should be safe enough. People seldom came up to the rooftop these days, especially now in the summer’s furnace of heat. Cautiously, he turned his head. Yep. Empty. The rain began to fall in a steady patter, slicking his skin and darkening the tarpaper on the roof below him. A small gust of wind stirred up the remains of some dead leaves and sent them skittering against the balustrade.

He glanced down at the supporting stone structure at his feet. The cement beneath his toes clearly showed a wide crack. Was it his imagination, or was it bigger tonight than it had been the night before? He didn’t know. All he knew was unless someone patched his base, at some point soon he’d go tumbling down thirty floors to the street below. Never mind the pedestrians and traffic; it wouldn’t be so good for him either.

Carefully, he eased himself off the damaged pedestal and, gripping the balustrade, swung lightly over the low rail to land on the rooftop. Ah, well. There was nothing he could do about it. It wasn’t as if he could head into the nearest hardware store and buy the necessary supplies needed to fix his own perch. The idea amused him, however, and he pictured himself walking into a supply store, his claws ticking on the tiled floor as he made his way to the information desk and asked for assistance. In his mind’s eye, salesgirls screamed and fainted, dropping inelegantly to the floor, while customers turned, white-faced and horrified, to shrink against the walls. And he, Rodney, walked out of the store with a basket under one arm, everything he needed to repair his base and get on with the next hundred and fifty years or so of his life.

Unless, of course, his building was torn down. Then it wouldn’t matter if his support disintegrated right out from under him. It could happen; he knew that. Older buildings like his were knocked down every day to make way for newer, larger, shinier ones. Was that such a bad thing? He didn’t know. Maybe this was all there was. Maybe he’d lived all the life he could have reasonably expected to live and to want something more was merely crying for the moon.

He stared out across the Hudson River, feeling the cool rain moistening his skin, and he sighed again. It was too soon to stretch his wings. His tail flicked up over one arm and coiled itself around his bicep as he sought the protection of the shadows and waited for darkness to fully descend. It was going to be another long night.

It was
nearly midnight when the door to the roof was violently flung open.

Rodney moved into the deeper shadows beside the large vent for the building’s coolant system and watched curiously as someone stepped out onto the roof. The rain had stopped a few hours earlier, and now the moon decided to break through the clouds, bathing the rooftop in a clear silver light. It wouldn’t be good if a human spotted him.

The man who stepped out onto the roof was the most beautiful person Rodney had ever seen. He was dressed in one of those black-and-white outfits—it took Rodney a moment to supply the word
tuxedo
—and walked with determination over to the edge of the roof, placing a foot on top of the low railing and resting his forearms upon his knee. A bottle of whisky dangled from one hand. As the moonlight gleamed down from above, Rodney saw that his collar was open and his tie askew. He could make out the glint of silver from a chain around the man’s neck

Rodney couldn’t determine the color of his eyes at this distance, but his hair was dark and short, standing up in startled spikes as he stared broodingly out at the city lights below. The sounds of the street wafted upward: the rumble of traffic, the honking of horns and the occasional siren. The man at the rail stood for a long moment looking down at the city before straightening and placing both feet on the rooftop. He raised the bottle to his lips and took a swig from it.

With a swift, angry movement, he lifted the bottle as though to dash it to the ground.

“Pity to waste that,” Rodney said, thinking aloud.

The man flinched and spun around to peer into the shadows of the rooftop. “Who’s there?” His voice was sharp.

Rodney was taken aback. He flattened himself against the air-circulation duct, grateful for the way the brilliant moonlight made the shadows that much darker and deep.

“You
heard
me?” No one had ever heard him speak before. It was one of his greatest amusements, providing a pithy but silent commentary on the actions of others around him.

The man gave a short laugh, full of harsh humor. “Perhaps you shouldn’t have spoken so loud, buddy.”

“Um, sorry about that.”

The man shrugged. He half turned to look back out at the city lights. “Don’t mind me,” he said at last, glancing toward the blackness where Rodney was hiding. “I just came up to clear my head.”

Rodney scarcely knew what to say. For the first time in his memory, someone other than his kind could hear him, and now he was actually carrying on a conversation with a human. This was a momentous occasion, and it surely needed to be marked in some way with a profound statement on his part. “A bit hot for that, don’t you think?”

He smacked his forehead silently in the shadows. First contact communication with another species, and he’s talking about the
weather
?

The man didn’t seem to notice. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Don’t know why I thought it would be any different up here. I’m David Marshall, by the way. Apartment 14 C.”

David. That was a nice, strong name. It suited him. In the light of the moon, Rodney could see that David was everything he was not. David wore his tuxedo with a lean, lounging grace. The moon cast the planes of his face into sharp relief: high cheekbones; a long, well-shaped nose; lips full and pouty, as though they’d been designed for another face but had been given to him as a generous afterthought. He was simply gorgeous. Rodney suppressed a sigh.

“I’m Rodney,” he said, deliberately leaving out the rest of the information that David had so easily provided.

“Here’s to you, Rodney.” David lifted the bottle and took a healthy swallow. He blinked at it a second and then held it out in Rodney’s direction. “Here. Help yourself.”

“Ah, no thanks. Some other time perhaps.” He was very tempted to step out into the moonlight and take the bottle. He’d always wondered what whiskey tasted like and whether it would have an effect on him. This conversation was the most interesting thing he’d experienced in years, however. He loathed the thought of it ending with horrified yells and him hiding from the police for the rest of the evening.

David nodded solemnly and dug the toe of one gleaming patent leather shoe into the tarpaper. He made a small, resigned sound and shifted his weight, as though getting ready to head back inside.

Rodney found himself desperately wanting to prolong the conversation. “Clear your head from what?”

“What?” David looked up in his direction, his thoughts apparently somewhere else. His expression lightened. “Oh. Right. Yeah, well.” David scowled, obviously remembering something from earlier in the evening. He made even that look sexy, and the thought startled Rodney. Since when did he think of people as sexy?

David gave a little half shrug, a movement that Rodney envied in its simple elegance. “My father is Patrick Marshall. You know, Marshall Industries?”

“The big property developer?” Rodney did know who he was. Marshall Industries was one of the fast-growing developers in the city, with signs heralding the appearance of a new building almost every day—usually on the site of an older building, such as his.

“Yeah.” David didn’t sound happy about it. “That’s him. Well, I’m the oldest son; he thinks it’s about time I settled down, got married, and took my place in the company.”

“But you don’t want to,” Rodney guessed.

“It’s not the life for me,” David growled. He turned toward the railing and looked out upon the city, waving the bottle toward the lighted buildings as he spoke. “I don’t want to spend my life tearing things down to put up bigger things no one really needs. And I sure as hell don’t want to be married off to some woman chosen by my father for her money and connections or how nice she’ll look on my arm. Or some woman, period.”

Rodney cocked his head as he watched David at the rail. Even his back was gorgeous. Long, crisp lines that spoke of a lean athleticism that Rodney could never hope to duplicate, not with his great, hulking body. “So what
is
the life for you?”

David briefly glanced back in his direction. “I don’t know. If I did, it would be easier.”

“Why not just walk away?” Rodney didn’t understand; this guy could do whatever he wanted.

David made that unpleasant laughing sound again. “Easier said than done. I have no real skills and no money outside the family trust. I’m in my thirties and I have no fucking idea of what I want to be when I grow up.”

“I don’t see the problem.”

David shook his head, turning off the rail to face the sound of Rodney’s voice. “It costs money to live in this town. I can’t just cut all my ties with my family; and let me tell you, that’s what telling my dad ‘no’ would entail. I might live in a cage, but it’s a nicely gilded one and I don’t see any way of leaving it.”

“Bullshit.” Rodney had to control his anger. “I don’t think you know what the definition of a cage really is.”

“Excuse me?” David had the air of someone who was not used to being spoken to in this manner.

“You heard me. Any cage where you have the key, where the goddamn door is
open
, only you’re too chickenshit to walk out of it, is no cage at all.”

David looked taken aback, his mouth hanging open slightly before he closed it in a little half smile. “You know, I was about to get pissed at you, only something tells me you’re speaking from personal experience.”

“Hooray for you. See, there’s one skill I bet you didn’t know you had. Personal observation.”

David laughed and this time, he sounded genuinely amused. “I’ll have to put that on my resume. You’ll be a character witness for me, right?”

“Sure.” Rodney couldn’t help but be a little mollified by his reaction. Even among his own kind, Rodney’s bluntness was legendary.

“Well, Rodney,” David drawled, a warm, inclusive note to his voice. “You’ve given me a lot to think about. I owe you one.”

“Anytime.” Rodney watched David turn and head back toward the door to the roof, bottle swinging loosely in his hand.
I wish I could move like that,
he thought.

David
wasn’t entirely sure why he was heading back up to the roof. It had been several weeks since he’d had that unusual conversation with the voice in the darkness, and he had no reason to think that Rodney would be on the roof this evening. He wasn’t even sure that Rodney lived in his building, though it seemed most likely that he did. Only residents had access to the roof.