Wet

Nic awoke to the sound of pouring rain. She had spent the previous day exploring the neighborhood. She discovered that this part of town had a stripclub, a vietnamese restaurant, an old movie theater, and ironically, an abortion clinic right next to a catholic soup kitchen. Behind the kitchen and the clinic there was a lake, and a grassy area next to an abandoned boxcar on a track. This grassy area was where the bums seemed to be. Nic had decided to sleep inside the abandoned boxcar in order to observe the other bums in town. By the time she awoke, they had all vanished due to the rain. She sat up and rubbed her neck which was throbbing in pain from sleeping on the hard floor of the boxcar. A little stream of light was coming in through the space between the edge of the door and the doorway of the boxcar. She reached over and forced the door open a few more inches. She watched the raindrops ripple the surface of the lake, and smack against the tar of the street. After a few minutes she decided  that she would not waste a entire day in sitting around in the boxcar, so she decided to go outside and get wet. She was instantly drenched as soon as she stepped outside. She was also not so pleased to discover that the ground was littered with bird crap. Just then, she heard the screeching of tires and a loud human scream coming from down the street. She rushed down the street, being careful not to slip on the bird poop passing a diner, and turning the corner to pass a record store and a liquor store.  She approached the tall apartment building and looked up into one of the windows. She saw the face of a man with his nose pressed against the glass, and she saw that people were frantically pouring out of the lobby onto the wet, crappy street. And then she saw why. A man was lying on the wet street in front of a bus. There was blood all over the street. Nic stood there among the crowd with her hand covering her open mouth, waiting for the paramedics to clean up the scene.