Redsand Canyon she told me not to step on the cracks

All he can think of as he's watching the rain is how much it's different, still, from the rain back home. It runs in rivulets down the canyon walls, carrying the dirt with it. He lets it soak through his coat.

The streets are dim and choked by mist, and the water swallows his toes, sloshing around without any storm drains to go down. An outcropping looms just ahead, and under that outcropping is a figure, huddled up against the rock. Waterlogged, he shivers.

Brunette and heavily scarred, he doesn't recognise her face, even in the dark. He walks up to her as if he is knocking, bent over, on a plexiglass pane of a taxi cab.

Hello, he says over the rain. I don't believe I've met you yet.