Much too early the morning after the art director’s party, the local station that I’d fallen asleep to went back on the air, shocking me as awake as I was ever going to get in this life.

“Good morning, Meridian, and welcome to ‘Early Edition.’ Daybreak Don will be along later with the latest forecast for your Wednesday. In our top story of the hour, police—”

shifted uncomfortably on the couch. So that was where the remote was. Viciously, I pried the thing out of my spine and started punching buttons. No luck at that hour. Infomercial. Evangelism. Daybreak Don. Evangelism. Evangelism.

In no mood to be saved, sold, or slimed, I tried VH-1, which was just breaking for commercials. The first one—an orgy of models in Spandex, flouncing around to Van Halen—made me change channels as fast as I could. But I wasn’t fast enough to miss the “spokesmodel” at the end. “Get it. Flaunt it,” she was saying—unnecessarily, really, if you looked at her where the cameraman had.

Did it matter that nobody would know for sure that the commercial was for a health club? Did it matter that I’d written it?

Well, advertising was a living. Club West wasn’t the worst work on my reel. And sex sells everything anyway. Why feel guilty about it?

I switched off the TV and crawled off the couch—a triumph of will, under the circumstances—to start the coffeemaker and open the deck-door curtains.

The sky was red. Somehow, sky that color seemed right. So did the three crows, black as mortal sin, circling silently over the condos.

I squinted bloodshot up at them. Christ, they were big for crows. Maybe they were really ravens.

Ravens. Why not? The morning after that much wine, this far into thirtysomething, what you want is ravens. Poe knew all about these things. How did it go?

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming . . .

Now why did that line come to mind? Curious.

The ravens dipped and soared in the weird red sky, not making a sound. Watching them made me a little seasick, so I gave it up after a moment and went back to the kitchen to see whether the coffee was ready.

I drank one mug standing over the coffeemaker, poured another—and nearly dropped it on the way back to the greatroom. A shadow was moving slowly across the carpet, the shadow of a woman, long hair blowing lightly in the hot wind.

Someone was out on the deck.

Keeping sharp watch on the shadow, I parked the mug on the counter, felt along the wall for the fireplace tools, and then edged toward the sliding glass door, gripping a poker, too scared to feel stupid. I took a deep breath, grabbed the door handle . . .

And swore, and threw the poker halfway across the room. Now I felt stupid. It was only one of the ravens, sitting on the deck rail, and the shadow that it cast was the shadow of a bird.

That did it—no more art directors’ parties. Bad dreams all night, and now bad birds. I was starting to see things.