The Ancient Rain by Domenic Stansberry Page A

laughing, and her Sandinista boyfriend. He could feel the fear coming off of them.
    What happened to me will happen to them .
    Dominoes in a line … one flick of the finger …
    â€œSo what kind of play are you doing for Columbus Day?”
    â€œJust a little skit,” said Annette. “A tribute.”
    She laughed then, big-throated, full of herself, and Jan Sprague laughed, too. There was a fragility in the laughter, an awkwardness. Her eyes skittered over to his but did not linger. There were things they all remembered, but did not want to think about.
    Owens shook the ice in his glass, ill at ease.
    *   *   *
    It was a typical Berkeley gathering in some ways. Here they were under the eucalyptus, under the oak, with the light filtering through the blue haze, at the moment when the afternoon turned into evening, and the air was suddenly very still, and the kids started to yearn for their electronic devices. There was a smell like marijuana burning, the sound of a motorcycle in the alley, of cars in the distance. Just a backyard barbecue, friends around the table, complaining about the government, growing boisterous, loud, before the talk turned to schools and real estate. Owen wished this were simply that—friends reminiscing together under the cloud of current events before the inevitable ride home. He wished he could turn upstairs after it was all over and lie on his brightly colored bed with its million pillows and his hyperactive kids roaming the Internet, playing with gadgets. He wished he were just some ordinary dad cursing under his breath the foul gloom of the government, distant events, and news-hour commentaries. If only it were that simple for him, and the face he saw on the news was not his own, displayed split screen with Elise Younger, seeking revenge for her mother’s death.
    Now Annette Ricci stood in front of him blocking the way inside.
    â€œCan I get by?”
    â€œEveryone’s out here now. I herded them out.”
    â€œI was going to get a jacket…”
    â€œWe are going to do a toast,” she said.
    â€œTo my innocence?”
    â€œTo the task ahead.”
    She was being rather coquettish, flirtatious. Insistent. A hardness underneath. For Annette, always, everything was a show. He had learned a long time ago that she always had plans of her own, and there was little you could do to interfere. He remembered then a moment at the SLA safe house, Annette and her boyfriend at the time, a Chicano kid, Naz Ramirez. Another name the feds would have been tracing as well, if not for the fact he’d been dead ten years. But Annette, she’d liked the Latinos even then. Doing the Ché thing. All in khaki, dark brown, a blouse with military sleeves. Jan at the window, sober-faced, working up her courage. The cache of weapons on the floor. If only he could go back …
    I am innocent.
    â€œBe quick,” said Annette.
    He got the jacket. When he came back, Annette stood as before, waiting on the stairs. She pulled the door behind them, and he saw her pause at the threshold.
    â€œDid you just lock that?”
    She put a hand on his wrist.
    â€œWe are giving a little performance. For the kids. I don’t want everyone running in and out.”
    They walked down to the table. Dante was there, and Marilyn, and his wife, and all his friends and his kids, and they made their toast.
    â€œTo a free and happy world.”
    â€œTo the end of these dark times.”
    â€œFree Bill Owens.”
    They did one toast, and then another, his old friend Moe Jensen at the head of the table, a big man with a soft voice, gray in his beard, eyes dim. Jan leaned against Walter Sprague as if this occasion had more to do with her philanthropist husband then herself. She looked at Owens, doe-eyed, as if she were not really there, but they both knew the reason for her husband’s involvement: to erase her name from Owens’s past. He would