“Run!” Joe screamed. “Fire!” He kept it up, screaming and hacking, until they burst onto the road. The smoke thinned enough to see. Devin and the boys weren’t where he’d left them, and panic squeezed Joe’s burning lungs. His eyes watered as he scanned the area, searching for his partner. “Devin!”
“Joe!” Devin’s pale hair emerged fifty yards to the northeast.
Joe ran for him, dragging Marcus along behind. He didn’t dare let go. The smoke was getting worse again, and he and Marcus both coughed as they ran. As soon as they were within a few feet, Joe dropped Marcus’s hand and pulled at Devin’s elbow, urging him forward.
Flix jutted his face into Joe’s space. “We’ve got to run at a diagonal, get north of the fire. We run straight east toward the highway, the wind’ll push it on top of us.”
“You have a path?”
In answer, Flix rattled the map in his hand.
“Go. Marcus, Peter, hold hands and stick tight to Flix’s ass.”
“I think he’d rather you did that,” Devin said.
“Be a jerk after we live through this.” Joe took the hand he’d been meant to hold and ran after the others into the night.
THREE
With Devin’s hand in his, Joe fled an orange nightmare at their backs. The fire gorged on the big houses at the lake, running white and hot at their sides, climbing the walls, licking the roofs, before spreading, spider-like and unimpeded, across the dead grass.
In brief glances over his shoulder, Joe watched it all happen. He couldn’t stop looking. The heat pressed against his back, scalding his skin, and still he turned to mark the fire’s progress. He ran through the streets, coughing and yelling, “Fire! Fire!” hoping the town was as deserted as it had seemed; there hadn’t been time to check. No other footsteps joined the frantic drum of his little group’s feet on the pavement. He screamed again and again, all the way to the highway, when his voice cracked and broke.
When they’d climbed up the steep slope and stood fifteen feet off the ground on an overpass, Joe turned again and watched the fire approach. Alive, it stalked through the withered vegetation, undulating low and soft, eating the plants and everything it touched.
Joe startled when Devin’s hand fumbled against his back.
“Keep moving,” Devin said. “I feel it behind us.”
They jogged along the highway, Joe minding the road for potholes and other dangers. It helped, the running. It always had. Freed his mind. The smoke had battered his lungs enough that he had trouble drawing breath, but he kept going, twisting every once in a while to see if anyone had joined them in their escape. The road remained empty.
The fire would spread with the wind, but maybe the highway would provide a barrier, keep it contained. The thought that people might have been living in those houses being devoured by the fire plagued Joe. He reminded himself he’d seen no firebreaks, no solar panels, no evidence of people. These small towns had to have been among the first to wither away. But what if someone had been there? If he’d tried to check, to go door to door, he’d surely be dead. But not just him. Devin. The kids. He’d have gotten them killed, too. He very nearly had as it was. He shook his head and let himself bump into Devin’s shoulder. The slight contact woke him up, got him out of his own head. He focused on the pavement in front of him and on keeping his companions safe.
They needed to find water. He needed a new plan. If they could get to Dallas... but no, that was too far. Joe wracked his brain, trying to remember what else had existed along this highway. He’d been a boy the last time he’d traveled this way, but cities had seemed to connect most of the area between Dallas and Austin. Surely they’d reach one soon. He didn’t want to stop and have Flix look at his maps. That’d only waste time.
After a few miles, Peter gave out. He dropped to all fours, and Joe jerked Devin to the side to keep him from tripping over Peter’s heaving body.
Flix grabbed Peter’s shoulders and tried to pull him to his feet. “Get up. We don’t have time to waste.”
His red face glistening with sweat, Peter glanced behind them, and Joe did, too, staring at the fading glow in the distance, still brighter than the sunrise off to the east. Peter shook his head. “We’re...far enough.” He sucked in a breath. “Need to rest.”
“Flix said get up.” Marcus coughed hard, then joined his brother at Peter’s shoulders and hauled him upright. “We’re not risking the rest of us because you’re weak.”
Peter pushed Flix, sending him back a few steps, and Marcus grabbed Peter by the upper arm and punched him in the stomach.
“Don’t hurt my brother,” he growled.
Peter doubled over, cradling his belly, but he looked up at Marcus and said, “You’re awful people. I bet you started that fire on purpose.”
Marcus glanced at Flix, who sighed and shook his head. “Not worth it, Marc.”
“Sorry, brother,” Marcus said, then he darted toward Peter.
Joe rushed between the boys. He threw up a quick forearm to the chest and knocked Marcus aside. They weren’t going to fall apart on their first day together. “No fighting,” Joe said. Ouch. Every word scraped over his throat. Worse was how he hated admitting that he’d let them all down. “I started the fire on accident.”
“What the fuck, Joe?” Devin said. “How?”
“I shot at a snake, and the brush under it caught fire.” Joe wrapped his arm around Peter and helped him upright. “If we walk, Peter,
