Rain pounded the asphalt, thick heavy drops transforming the night into a shower of diamonds.
She floated over the eddying streams in the street. Her purple shoes dipped into the pool gathering at the payphone's concrete base.
The handset slipped through her hand the first time. She scowled, focusing, and managed to pick it up on the third try, cradling it on one pale shoulder, lavender lips at the mouthpiece.
The phone was silent. The cord had been cut months ago, but the phone remained, an eyesore for the locals, a monument of vague obsolete nostalgia.
She caressed the plastic and chrome body of the payphone, and a dial tone clicked in the handset, buzzing in her ear.
She fought to focus hard enough to press the buttons. The dial tone transformed into a distant, muffled ringing.
Spectra turned, peering through the sparkling night.
About five yards away, half in the gutter, one shoe on the sidewalk, the body of a teenage boy bled out into the night. At this distance, it was impossible to tell the difference between his blood and the puddle in which he lay face down.
She heard a click and sucked in a breath, readying herself.
"Hello?" said the voice of a half-asleep man.
He yawned while she fought to find the right words.
"Who is this?"
She mouthed letters, frantic, unable to speak. What was there to say?
"Gary? Is this you? ... Do you have any idea what time it is?"
"No," she said, her voice a whisper, and then froze, terrified.
"Just come home. I won't tell your mother. But if you break curfew again, you're grounded for a month, you hear me?"
She shivered as the phone clicked in her ear and the dial tone returned.
Spectra replaced the handset, stepping into the rain once more.
She stood staring at the dead boy on the curb until the cold became overwhelming. Shuddering inside her translucent purple coat, she turned westward and floated back to the only home she knew.