Day 360 –

Around here, you have two options for coffee, donut shop or gas station.  I opt for donut.

I’m a bit of a coffee snob.  I like it strong with a tiny bit of cream.  I’ve learned to speak the language.  “Dark roast, half cream.”  It’s as close as I’m going to get.  Confidence is not high.

Back in the car, I take a sip.  I look at it.  It’s a coffee milkshake.  Half cream must have meant half the cow.

I look back at the donut shop, contemplating going back for something stronger.

————–

“A little boy and little girl died in the fire.”

I look at the woman behind the counter at the drug store.  “What fire?”

She points across the street.  “Over there.  Happened this morning.”  I can just make out a house with a burned roof.  I’ve seen a lot of those – caved in roofs, aftermaths of fires – but usually not in a city.  Mostly out in the fields.  Barns, sheds, and sometimes houses.

She says something about the door banging when customers leave the store.  It makes her jump.  My mind is already outside.  I follow it and can see a little more.  The smell is faint, but it’s there.

Around the block, the smell is stronger.  Not like a campfire, more sickly, sweeter, worse.  Furniture and dry wall, wood and plastic, everything a house holds.  It will stick around this neighborhood for quite a while.  People will catch a whiff and remember.  There is still charred wood in the street.  The drizzle and rain makes everything worse.

The woman at the drug store was wrong.  One child, a seven-year-old girl, died.  Four injured.

A neighbor walks their dog in the back yard next door.

————–

The coffee.  I take another sip.  It’s hot.  Too milky.  Weak.  Awful.

It’s perfect.  I’m lucky to have it.

————–

News report about the fire here.