May 2
“Come outside! Quickly, come outside!”
“Hush up… Hush up.” I put a bookmark at page 15. Stephen Elliott’s article Surviving a Month Without Internet…this May and June’s copy of Poets & Writers. I get up and go to the front door weaving through the erratic dances of sixteen legs…
“Look at the smoke… It’s another one.” And we move to the end of the driveway…
“Another one? Arson? Any one home?”
“I can’t believe there is that much smoke.”
“And I had just put the oil in the pan on the stove. Part of tonight’s supper. Fried okra… the family’s favorite. And I just went to the computer room to check on my emails.”
“Would you believe it? This is the third oil-in-the-fry-pan-on-the-stove-fire in the past 20 years, in just this circle of 19 houses.”
“Watch out… here comes fire truck number two… and three.” And music is blaring from the party house across the street…
“And there’s number four, and number five…”
“Glad they built that new station down round the corner.”
“Didn’t make no difference though, the house still’s gonna be a mess…Just look… the flames are coming out of the roof…”
“And I’m so stupid… I had to answer that email… It was so important. And then I checked my blogs… And then the alarm started to ring… loud… Real loud. I ran to the kitchen… Too, too much smoke… I had to get out… Find the dog, and get out…”
And the neighbors are now coming from both streets… The
“What happened? A grill blows up? Did everyone get out?”
“Think so… The rest of the family is still playing golf.”
“They couldn’t find the two cats… but the dog’s okay…” The elderly couple makes their way across the street.
“This one’s not as hot as the one down the street a year-and-a-bit ago… But the house’s a gonner. And there’s so much smoke. It smells like Sonny’s Bar-B-Q!”
The Hero and The Angel stand holding hands in the shadow of the yellow fire truck… standing on the sidewalk… The Angel nods to the
The fire-people have the hoses going… Steam’s now rising… and the orange flames are blackening the new roof tiles… Children come running… A number of youths ride in on their bikes… Neighbors are making their ways to the confusion.
“Has anyone seen my cats? I don’t know if they got out.”
“Here, why don’t you sit down? You can use this chair.” The Angel helps the old dear to have a seat… The Angel smiles reassuringly.
“Has your family been contacted?”
“Not yet… and I feel so, so stupid… I really did not have to answer that email. Puppy, stay here. And the children just moved out on Friday. What station are the fire-people from?”
“Number 47… The new one nearby… and around the corner… Try not to worry, too much. What’s done is done…” The Angel pats the old dear’s shoulder.
“But we didn’t take out any insurance on the house, when we moved in six months ago.”
The Angel walks back to the Hero, who’s listening to the next door neighbor chatter nervously… They watch the two fire-persons walking between the two houses, swatting at errant sparks… A third fire-person is hosing the outside wall of the neighboring house…
“You’d think they’d bloody well turn off that music… out of respect.” It was the royal homeowners’ association president and vice-president… They now had made their appearance…
“I’m going over to demand that they turn it off…”
“Don’t bother… That’s them there standing by the one in the front row seat…”
The Angel is now holding the Hero’s right hand… They cross the street… and walk away from the smoke and the noise…
“What’s de numbur of dis house?” the
“I think it’s 247.”
The house continues to smoke… The flames have hidden below the roof top. The Red Cross volunteer runs over to the fire-person who has fallen down, still holding the hose that had been dosing the neighbors’ wall… Two other fire-persons rush over… The hose is turned off. A child points to the Hero and the Angel in the distance… A cat is following them…
An ambulance blares its way up the crowded street.
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