Fire Birds (38 page)

“See?” she said and kissed my cheek. “We ain’t forgot how to be normal.”

“Cold beer, huh?” I said and took a drink. “Really cold.”

“We’ve got a cooler full of cold ones, hon. Drink all you want, just don’t fall off the roof.”

We joined the others. They greeted me with a wave then I endured a few bad jokes about my new suit and about how pretty I smelled. Everyone was there, including Nicholas and Grant. Dan took me to a table where there was chips and salsa. Next to that was a small grill on which sat a steaming pot of pork-n-beans.

“I wish we had burgers and hotdogs,” he said. “It ain’t The Fourth without burgers. Help yourself. We’ve been eatin’ already.”

I looked around. There were two short telescopes set up on tripods facing north and west. There were blankets spread, flashlights and handheld spotlights, lawn chairs, the grill, the table, two coolers–

“How the hell did you get all this stuff up here?” I said. “Did you carry it up all those stairs?”

Dan laughed, “Yeah. We packed it up here. We ain’t packin’ it down though. This shit stays. If we need a cooler, I’ll just go get a new one. I swear it wore me out.”

“Danny and Nicholas lugged most of it,” Cheryl said. “They bitched and moaned the whole time.”

“I’m going to go talk to Grant,” I said.

“He’s having a tough time,” she said.

Grant was alone, sitting on the short wall on the east edge of the building.

“How’s the hand healing up?” I asked.

He shrugged and looked down at the bandage, “It’s not growing any more fingers.”

“Can I get you a beer?”

He shook his head. I sat next to him and drank my beer for a while.

“Do you want to talk about what happened?” I said.

He shook his head again, “I’m sorry, bro. I couldn’t protect her. I couldn’t.”

“I know.”

“I miss her.”

“I know,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

I felt his eyes on me. I made eye contact, so he would know I was serious. He sniffed, then looked at his hand.

“It would be hard enough to forget her, but now I have to look at this everyday and be reminded that I let her die.”

“No,” I said. “It shows me that you were willing to sacrifice yourself for her. That’s the real thing. I respect that. You’re a good man.”

He grinned for the first time. “I never know about you, dude. We should have stayed in Biloxi, I guess.”

I looked out at the sunset and thought about it a moment. Things would have been very different had they stayed in Mississippi. “Sara dragged Hell to Clayfield on a leash, but, shit, we can’t do shoulda coulda woulda. It is what it is. I missed her, and I was happy to see her. For what it’s worth, I’m glad I met you too.”

“I’m going back to Biloxi tomorrow with Dan and the old man,” Grant said. “His wife is a nice lady. I met her down there.”

“Are you coming back to Clayfield with them?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “It depends on what everybody else down there does. I don’t want to be by myself.”

Cheryl walked up with a plate. “You should eat before it gets dark, we don’t plan to use the lights too much.”

After a plate of beans, chips and salsa, I leaned on the wall with the others in the dark waiting for it to rain fire.

“Those sirens have been going for more than a full day,” Dan said. “I’ll bet nearly every goon in Grace County is around them.”

“When did you activate the transponders?” I asked.

“A couple of hours ago,” he said. “It might be tomorrow before it happens. I hope you’re good for an all-nighter.”

“Hell,” Somerville said. “If it ain’t happened by midnight, you can forget about me. I’ll be in bed.”

“Where’s bed?” I asked. “Here on the roof?”

“We have a room with some cots downstairs if we need it,” Gail replied. “It’s an interior room, so it wasn’t damaged by the bombs last week.”

“Do you expect the missiles to kill a lot?” I asked. “The one we saw the other day was intense, but it didn’t have much spread. I kind of expected more.”

“That’s why I set off four different transponders,” Tim said. “We spaced them out enough that the drones won’t cancel them out as redundant. They should fire ordnance at each individual target. They won’t get all the goons, but they’ll get a lot.”

“I hope they don’t burn all of western Kentucky down in the process,” I said. “I still want to live here.”

“Who’s up for another cold one?” Dan said.

“What’s that over there?” Laney said.

“Where?” Cheryl asked.

Laney turned on her flashlight and used it to point. “Over that way,” she said. “In the parking lot by the bank.”

“I don’t see nothin’,” Dan said.

“I do,” Gail said. “It’s a red light. It ain’t bright, but I see it.”

“Cheryl, put a spot out that way,” Dan said.

“I see it now,” Somerville said. “What do you reckon it is? Have y’all been in town after dark?”

“Oh shit,” Tim said. “Did any of you mess with the transponders? Did you drop one?”

“No,” Dan said, sounding offended. “You wouldn’t let us touch ‘em, remember?”

“Is that what it is?” Gail said. “What does that mean?”

“Get a damn spotlight on it!” Tim yelled. It was so out-of-character for Tim that everyone got uncomfortably quiet.

The spotlight came on. It moved out onto the bank building. It moved down the wall to the ground then over then up. Then it stopped.

“Motherfucker,” Gail said.

Bruce Lee stared up into the spotlight from the parking lot across the street–one arm, black trench coat, dark cavity where his belly had been. There, through the fabric of his coat pocket was a blinking red light. He gazed up at us then came our way.

“Motherfucker!” Gail said again.

“Is that a transponder?” Dan said. “Tim?”

To the north, the horizon lit up white then orange.

“Party’s over,” Tim said. His flashlight came on, and he grabbed Laney’s hand. “Go now!”

A sound like thunder rumbled followed by the scuffling of eight sets of feet. Beer bottles clinked and rolled, being kicked around. Flashlight beams came on and moved on the rooftop. I was the fifth person through the door to the stairs. There was a flash of light and a glow from the west. The play of light and frightened voices turned the narrow stairwell into something like a haunted funhouse disco.

The sound of the bombs rumbled in.

“As close as he is,” Tim said, “it’ll be an almost direct hit!”

“Do we try to get out of the building or go down to the basement?” Dan said.

“We can’t go outside,” Tim said. “There’s no time! We’re better off in the basement!”

“We’re not going to make it!” Laney shouted.

At the third floor landing, I opened the door. “Forget the basement!” I yelled. “We need to put walls between us and him!”

They followed me in. I ran down a hallway toward the west side of the building. When I got to the window looking out toward West Broadway, I could see the fires burning miles away. The door on my right said: TERRENCE BAKER, ATTORNEY AT LAW.

“In here!”

I ran to the far corner and got down prone, covering my head. Others came in behind me. It got quiet. Then there was the whine of the incoming aircraft. It became brighter than a sunny day. The building shook and groaned. Then it shook harder, and I covered my ears for the noise.

Then, other than the occasional pop and crash, it was quiet. I stood and looked out the window. To the west, the fire still burned. I could tell by the shadow of the hotel being thrown out onto West Broadway that a fire burned on 7th Street as well. However, the firebomb that hit Bruce Lee’s transponder didn’t have anything to burn other than the fuel it provided. Everything flammable had been burned up the week before. It was dwindling and would burn itself out soon.

“Is everybody okay?” Cheryl said.

I pushed past the others and opened the office door. The end of the hallway was gone, open to the outside. I walked out as far as I could and peered down the thirty or so feet to the burning street and rubble below. The entire east face of the building had collapsed. Tim came up beside me.

“Is that all of the transponders?” he asked. “Are there more?”

“Everyone out on the fire escape!” Somerville yelled from the office.

I looked back toward the office then at Tim.

“He told me he had twenty-two,” I said. “I had three that I gave to Dan and Gail. There was one in his pocket. I used one in the Firebird. The rest were in the tote.”

He nodded, “Okay. We should be okay. I left the rest of them with the sirens along with the C-4,” he said.

“Does that mean the drones won’t come back?” I asked.

“No.”

The next day we stood on the runway and watched Dan pack a few supplies in the plane for their flight to Biloxi. Each had a gallon of water, a bottle of liquor, and enough food for one day. In addition to their sidearms and machetes, the plane was equipped with one 12 gauge pump shotgun, and one .30-30 rifle.

“I’d feel better if you took more supplies,” Gail said to Dan. “What if you have trouble?”

“It’s a short trip,” Dan said over his shoulder. “You and Cheryl shouldn’t fret so much. We’ll be there by this evenin’. We’ll be back by this time next week. We can always scavenge extra supplies if we need to. Y’all act like I’m going to be gone for years or somethin’.”

Once the supplies were stowed, he kissed his sister on the cheek, then gave Gail a long one on the mouth. Then he left them and pulled me off to the side.

“Do me a favor, wouldya, hoss?”

“What’s that?” I said.

“I know we got us some tough women here, but would you mind stickin’ around ‘til I get back? Ain’t no man here except Tim. I think he’s capable and all, but it would make me feel better if you was here too to back him up.”

I looked over at Cheryl then back at Dan. “Sure,” I said. “I’ll stay until you get back.”

“You can stay longer,” he said. “We’d be glad to have you, but I know you gotta do what you gotta do. I won’t fight you on that.”

I nodded again and looked at Cheryl. She gave me a small smile, but I could tell she was worried.

“Cheryl could do a whole lot worse than you,” he said. “And has.”

“Huh?”

“Look after ‘em,” he said and turned to get into the plane.

Nicholas Somerville came up to me. “I’ll see you in a few days,” he said. “Hopefully we’ll bring a whole caravan up here. Grant told me about the others there in that group. Can you imagine what we could do here with a peaceful group that size?”

“It’ll be good,” I said, but I didn’t feel it.

He gave me a slap on the shoulder and walked away. I looked at Grant, and he lifted the bandaged hand in a wave then climbed in to the plane. The doors were shut. The engine started.

Tim, Laney, Gail, Cheryl, and I moved off to the side. We all waved as the plane sped down the runway and lifted into the air.

“Stay in bed a little longer,” Cheryl said. “It’s cold.”

“What time is it?” I asked. “I should probably check the fire.”

She snuggled in closer to me. “Tim can check it. It’s his turn.”

I picked up the watch from the nightstand.

“It’s after six,” I said.

“Stay in bed,” she said. “I’ll make it worth your while.”

“Will you now? Oh…in that case, Tim can check the fire.” I rolled over and kissed her.

There was a knock on the door.

“Ugh,” Cheryl whispered. “We should get our own place.”

“What?” I called out.

Through the door, Laney said, “We lost another chicken last night. Tim thinks it might be a possum getting them.”

I sighed, “Okay.”

Cheryl’s warm hand moved down into my pants.

“I can’t get the fire going,” Laney said. “Tim’s outside trying to figure out where the possum is getting in.”

“Stay,” Cheryl whispered. “Let her do it.”

“Turn on a space heater to knock the chill out of the air,” I said to Laney. “I’ll be out in a while.”

“Gail says the space heaters use too much juice, and we still need to cook breakfast.”

“Okay. I’ll be right there,” I said.

I sat up on the side of the bed and scratched my beard.

“That girl needs to learn how to take care of herself,” Cheryl said.

“She knows how,” I said. “She just doesn’t want anyone to sleep in unless it’s her.”

“We weren’t sleeping,” Cheryl said.

“Yeah, I’m going to want a rain check on that.”

I got up, got dressed, and pulled on my boots.

“You should probably get up too,” I said, peeking out the window. “It looks like we got a hard frost last night. We’ll need to go over to the Lassiter place and dig the sweet potatoes. Persimmons will be ready too.”