A.E. Janes

BMMBMMBMM I woke up to the balcony lights still on and the smell of something burning outside my door. I think about Pearle and Beth, her mom. I remember sitting outside after the Station Fire hearing about how Pearle’s house almost burned down. Fire looks weird to someone who’s five. And even though there is new fire clearly coming to consume everything about me I still go out on the balcony and watch for about an hour, like Beth, looking in the wrong direction. Next time I’ll bring a book and a blanket. I will invite over my neighbor and her kid and tell them about how scary watching for fire is. In a few dozen years I will tell this story again on a date that’s going badly because I like to think about comfortable things while I am being bored out of my mind. In a fire who knows what to save? Tonight I run for Donaldo and New York Bear and Ricky, my electric guitar, Murakami covered in a paper bag, Turkey the snail, my crunched up orange water bottle. I leave behind photo albums, money, life, because that is what a fire demands of the human spirit. It is a task to run downstairs with everything I am holding onto, the fire is outside the door anyway, so I will curl up into a ball in the middle of my living room floor waiting for a call before my night is totally over.