Kendra sat on the back edge of the trunk of Mommy’s car, sniffling, with tears trickling down her cheeks.
Dexter and Conan were taking turns chasing each other back and forth along the edge of the road, yapping at each other, nipping at each other’s tails.
Kendra felt horrible inside, like she was collapsing. She did not even notice the harsh smell that sometimes passed her by on the rushing, whipping wind. Branches creaked overhead as they swayed in the strong wind. Her long hair flew all around her head.
She was horrified that Mommy had seen her naked with Marc. Now she knew what was going on between them, which was supposed to be just their secret. Kendra wondered what she would do to her – what would her punishment be?
Why had she come home so
Kendra was on the verge of a sob when she was momentarily deafened by a loud explosion that lit up the night a bright orange on the other side of the road, through the trees that grew between the two narrow lanes.
She lifted her head and her eyes widened, then narrowed, as she watched a trailer – the trailer in unit seventeen – explode in flames that rose up to the trees. The trailer became momentarily airborne, then crashed to the ground with a terrible clamber.
Kendra’s breath was sucked from her lungs for a moment.
The flames rose up along with debris.
The flames licked at the whipping branches and caught almost immediately.
Kendra shot to her feet and called the dogs to her. They hurried to her, and she picked them up, holding one in each arm.
Flames crawled like great orange spiders through the branches overhead, spreading a fiery web.
“Oh, no,” Kendra said, her voice high and shrill. “Oh, no, oh, Jesus, please, no.”
Somehow, Anna twisted her wrist around and stabbed the blade into Reznick’s wrist. He blurted, “Ah!” and let go of her as blood began to flow.
With her lips peeled back over her teeth, she came forward, thrusting the knife at him. She got his left arm, his right arm again. Then his chest.
Reznick backed up against the refrigerator.
He slapped her face once, a backhanded swipe, hard.
Anna stumbled backward a couple steps.
He moved forward and reached for her wrist again.
Anna slashed the knife and caught the palm of his right hand. The blade sliced diagonally from the web of flesh between his thumb and forefinger, across his palm, and down to the heel of his hand. It was a deep cut, and blood came from it in a sheet that ran from his palm down his wrist and over his arm.
“You fucking men,” she growled. “You all want the same fucking thing.
She darted forward and thrust with the knife. She got the inner elbow of his left arm.
She thrust again and again.
Reznick could not seem to stop her, so he tried to stop the
He grabbed it with his right hand and tried to twist it out of her hand, grinding his teeth until they crunched in his head.
She threw herself forward, putting her full weight behind the knife while the blade was in his right hand, and he could not hold it.
The blade entered him just below his sternum and slammed him back against the refrigerator. It entered him all the way to the wooden handle.
Mouth open, he slowly bowed his head and looked at the knife sticking out of him.
“Mommy!” Kendra screamed outside, screamed at the top of her lungs. “Mommy! The sky’s on fire! Mommy, come quick! The sky’s on fire!”
Reznick’s back slid down the refrigerator and he landed on his ass with his legs splayed out before him, the knife sticking out of his middle.
“Oh, my God!” Anna said when she got outside.
Hell had been unleashed overhead. The wind blowing through the trees had turned into flames. Burning branches were starting to fall as the flames roiled and whirled through the trees above. It spread rapidly in all directions, blown by the wind, until it covered the entire trailer park in a fiery sheet.
Anna hurried back to the trailer door. She went halfway up the steps, pulled the screen open, pushed the door open, and grabbed her purse off the floor. She reached into the purse for her keys as she went around the car.
“Kendra, get in the car!” she cried.
Holding the dogs, Kendra hurried to the passenger side of the car and got in.
Anna started the car and backed out of the carport.
It was like the end of the world. Fire rained down from the sky.
Other people were running for the trailer park’s entrance on foot, and some were getting in their cars to drive out.
As Anna neared the exit, driving the wrong way on the right side of the road, she saw a police car with its lights flashing parked just outside the trailer park.
A BMW came out right behind her.
“What’s happening, Mommy, what’s
“I don’t know, sweetheart, but we’re gonna be okay.”
“What about Marc? Where’s Marc?”
“Marc’s on his own.”
Reznick crawled on hands and knees to the door, the steak knife still jutting from his middle.
He heard screaming outside, a lot of cars.
He grabbed the doorknob and pulled himself to his feet.
Blood dribbled from his cut arms and hands and neck. It ran down his belly under his T-shirt and gathered at the waistband of his shorts. He made a grunting sound again and again as he pushed the screen door open and went out on the porch. He stumbled down the steps.
The night was a shimmering orange outside. Reznick wondered if he was hallucinating. As he stumbled along the carport toward the road, he saw that it was raining fire, and he was certain he was dying and having some kind of near-death religious experience.
He staggered out into the road and looked up.
The sky was in flames. They danced and swirled and swelled overhead. They rained down on the ground.
People were running and screaming, and cars were rushing out of the trailer park.
Reznick waved at a passing car and cried out for it to stop, to help him. It drove by. Another came along and he tried to step out in front of it to get it to stop. The car simply swerved around him.
There was an explosion to Reznick’s right, another to his left, and a rush of flame shot into the air from each one.
Reznick fell forward on the broken pavement and landed flat, driving the knife deeper into him.
