Before the radio gives its warning, the sky has already said its piece. You just have to know the language it speaks. Elias Thorne knows it. He sits on his porch, in a chair worn smooth by the shape of his own body over decades, and watches the afternoon.
He is not a man who talks to fill silence. His words are like well water, drawn up only when needed, and they are always cool and clear. His eyes, nested in a web of deep lines, are permanently narrowed from a lifetime of judging the distance to the horizon.
Today, he squints toward the west, where the sky is a clean, sharp line. To an untrained eye, it is a placid blue, flawless. But Elias sees the high, thin wisps of cloud, what he calls wind-devils, brushing the upper atmosphere.
He notes the way the swallows are flying low over the fields, their paths erratic and close to the ground, chasing insects that are also hugging the earth. The air itself feels wrong. It is still and heavy, holding its breath before a great sigh.
A stillness like this in late summer is not a sign of peace. It is a sign of a debt being called due.
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