Mr. Flood unfreezes the rain around us with a snap of his fingers, and the two of us walk down Market Street to Vine Street. By the time we get to the stairway at the end of Vine Street, I have to pee so bad that I’m about ready to wet my pants...but I know better than to ask if I can pee before a flood.
We walk up the concrete steps to an elevated walkway. As we cross over the expressway that loops around the edge of downtown, I’m just glad that the walkway’s covered, and I’m out of the rain for a moment.
On the other side of the walkway, we cross a bridge over the murky, brown Stonycreek River. At the end of the bridge, we enter a little station, and Mr. Flood buys us tickets for the World’s Steepest Vehicular Inclined Plane.
“The Incline,” as everyone in town calls it, looks like
