New York City, June 10, 2013

★ Outside the doors, the pavement was filmed with rain, too little of it to run off yet. East of the Park, the view down Fifth Avenue was ashy and indistinct in the distance. A man was up on a cherry picker, working on a surveillance camera. Rain flecked the cab windows. A traffic cop in safety-green rain gear knocked on the glass and ordered the driver to swing left, wide of the buses. In the right lane, a long, black Mercedes sedan was slewed over at the curb, the front of its hood burned away. The wipers came on. By the time the cab reached the party store, the rain outside was a downpour — much like the downpour through which the helium tank, now riding depleted but heavy in the back seat, had been toted three days earlier. Surrendering the tank did nothing to make the rain abate. Back outside, scaffolding caged off access to any getaway cabs; the only way to hail one was to be out in the street, out in the rain. The taxi that stopped had upholstery spotted with water on the opposite side, where the previous passenger must have gotten out, and a damp LGA cab-stand flier on the seat. Its windows were steaming over. More rain pelted down outside the office windows in the afternoon. At leaving time, it was down to a few drops. A little girl walked by wearing a translucent yellow poncho over a wide-striped dress, an apparently accidental bee costume. Tens of yards from the station entrance, the drops became real rain again. No sooner had the umbrella gone up than the rain became another sluicing assault. Back home, the kindergartener was angrily changing his pants, having been splashed down by a passing cab. At lights-out, the night city out the window showed itself flattened and shortened, distance and height blurred away.