TERRY TRADED the hatchback even for an eleven-year-old Monte I Carlo with tee tops. The engine was eight cylinder, and the paint job something for a bowling ball, shiny and metal green. The roof section was black cloth, and torn in a few places. He pressed the brakes long before he wanted to stop; through a rusted hole in the floorboard he watched the road pass beneath. He didn’t take the windows off to let the roof open, but he thought of it; the idea of a roof with windows he could take out and put in the trunk made him dizzy it felt so unnecessary and glamorous. The windows came with padded storage sleeves, dark green vinyl, like the inside of the car, heavy brass zipper on top to hold them safe.

Terry woke standing, naked in the fore room, except for the red band work socks sagged at his ankles. He was going at a piss; for how long he was not sure; he dreamt of rain, and the sound of his piss against the wood panel sounded like rain pelting the roof, and he thought, still, it was rain, when he looked down at himself, head still half in dream, and he watched the piss for a few moments, thought, at the same time, it is raining, and too, I’m going on the wall.

He held the piss and ran outside, socks damp in the early dewed grass, stood on pine straw bedded thick around an oak, and he went there, back to piss, first on the bark and then at the root-knobbed base of the tree. He kept going when it started to rain. He looked up, heard winter thunder above him, past the branches.