Chapter 7
The air changed before I understood I'd moved.
One foot was still on the wet concrete inside the shed and the other was on the rough slab outside, and the smoke that had been everywhere inside became something I could see coming out. It poured low and gray over the door frame and curled around my pink sock. My bare foot found dirt and a cold pebble at the edge of the slab. I didn't run. The red hose was still in my right hand, its brass nozzle heavy and slick, and it pulled back toward the dark inside like a leash. My rabbit stayed tucked in my left arm, its long ears pressed flat against my chest where I'd been holding it, and the soot on my cheek felt tight when I blinked.
I had thought outside would be quiet. It wasn't. The fire made a soft roaring sound behind me, and the shed wall ticked and popped. I turned my body but not my feet, and I could see him through the smoke. He was still bound, rope coiled thick around his torn shirt, his chest rising fast. He tipped his head toward the opening and I heard him shout again, that one word I'd already heard raw in his throat. "Run!" It wasn't angry. It was thin from the smoke. I shook my head without meaning to and held the hose tighter.
The yard was empty in the way it gets empty on a summer afternoon when everyone is somewhere else. The grass beyond the slab looked too bright. Our gravel drive stretched toward the house and the county road and I couldn't see Mommy anywhere along it, no car, no figure on the porch. The house looked far even though it was only maybe thirty yards off. I wanted to call for her but the smoke caught in my throat and made me cough, and the cough pressed the rabbit into my face. I didn't let go of the hose. Fire needs water. That was the only sentence that made sense, even if I didn't say it out loud just then.
I followed the hose with my eyes. It ran from my hand down across the threshold, over the lip where the wood had started to char, and along the outside wall of the shed toward the back corner. I had never really looked at where it came from before. It wasn't just a thing you held. It went somewhere. It went to the spigot. I'd seen Dad use it against that same shed wall, his hand turning the green handle while water hammered into a bucket. I took two small steps sideways, dragging the hose over the dirt, keeping my shoulder almost touching the door frame so I wouldn't be too far from the smoke and from him.
The spigot was right there where the shed siding met the concrete footer, low and bright. A brass hose bib with a green oval handle, screwed into a board that was already warm from the fire on the other side. The red hose was connected to it, clamped tight, but the hose itself was flat and soft under my fingers when I squeezed. No pressure. I remembered how it felt when Dad had it on, how the hose jumped and went hard as a snake when the water came. This one was limp. It had water inside, somewhere, but not moving. I knelt without letting go of my rabbit, and the dirt stuck to my bare knee.
I tried to turn it. I put the brass nozzle down for a second on the slab and used both hands on the green handle. It didn't want to move. My palms were small and sweaty and the metal was stiff from not being used or from heat, I didn't know. I pushed with my thumbs the way I'd seen Dad do, leaning my whole weight in. The handle gave a little squeak and then stuck again. I repositioned, wiped my hand on my pink dress, tried again. My rabbit slipped and I had to catch it with my forearm and pin it against my side, and the soot from my cheek came off on its beige ear. The fire behind me cracked louder and a puff of hotter smoke rolled out the door and over my head, making the daylight go hazy.
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From inside I could hear him breathing hard and shifting against the rope, trying to get closer to the door without being able to. He said my name again the way he had before. "Macy, go find Mommy." Same words, same order. I didn't answer because I was still working the handle and because I knew if I ran down that driveway toward the house I would have to drop the hose, and if I dropped the hose there would be nothing to put on the fire. I stayed right there on my knees at the wall, half outside and half still tethered to that dark doorway, my one sock now gray with dirt and my bare foot dusty, and I set my teeth and tried the handle a third time.
It moved a quarter inch. I felt a shiver run down the hose under my other hand. Something tightened in it, just a little, like it was starting to wake up. The yard was still quiet except for the fire and my breathing. Mommy was still not in sight. The spigot was right in front of me, the door was three feet behind me with smoke pouring out of it, and the brass nozzle was cold where I'd left it on the concrete waiting to be picked up again.
