The first bit of something I'm writing.

A person can see both blocks of 1st St, and all three blocks of Main St from the top of the hardware store. It’s mostly a tar spill with a billboard graveyard poking out of it. Once upon a time there was optimism that this town would grow with the arrival of an interstate, but after the giant skeletons went onto the roofs, the highway was diverted with the advertisers, and the disproportionate metal rectangles stayed atop the hardware store for decades attracting nothing but bird shit and lightning. The ladies who were at the coffee shop at the time had heard all about his first encounter with the lightning from his oldest and only local daughter. She had kept with tradition and told the story, as you do, leaving out her darkest suspicions.

The storm announced itself a few hours ahead of the precipitation by darkening the horizon and electrifying the living things. The old man climbed to the roof unnoticed amid the flurry of preparations. Folks made hurried choices. Home or duck into the coffee shop? Pick up the kids or call and tell them to stay in the school? There were a couple of spots to check the forecast in town. Hanley’s bar had cable with an all day weather channel, and the hardware store always had the radio on. A small group gathered in the bank vestibule as the wind started to pick up and the first chilling drops hit hunched over figures under whatever makeshift cover they held overhead. The bank manager had locked up the interior door, but left the outer door for anyone who needed cover, and then made his own dash to the coffee shop.