Everyone Dies Famous in a Small Town by Bonnie-Sue Hitchcock (general ebook reader .TXT) 📗

“You girls could make yourselves useful helping with the younger kids,” their mother had said. “Go read them books or something.”

Jenny and her sister had exchanged a look, and Jade shook her head emphatically, mouthing head lice behind her mother’s back, which made Jenny laugh and feel for two seconds like they were conspirators. But then Jade’s friends Shelby and Carly bounced over, each threading an arm through one of Jade’s, announcing that they were heading over to the fire update briefing.

How Jade could have such mindless friends was another mystery that Jenny spent too much time pondering. She watched the threesome giggle and weave drunkenly through all the cots at the shelter, which was really their high school gym. The briefing was still an hour away. As if nobody knew the girls were trying to position themselves front and center so the incident command officer who led the updates would notice them. He was almost thirty! What would an old guy like that see in a bunch of teenagers who smelled like pomegranate shampoo? This was a disaster, not a prom.

Their family was in danger of losing their home, and still Jade and her friends were acting as if it were merely a chance for them to attract attention. But why would they stop being themselves just because of a fire? Good riddance, Jenny thought as they pranced out of the gym.

There’d been an announcement that residents could go back home during a one-hour window to get things they’d left behind. Jenny wanted to go. She remembered the firefighter’s grip on her arm.

“Can I come with you and look for Colonel Mustard, Dad?”

“Oh, honey, I don’t know if it’s safe,” said her mom.

“Well, if they’re letting residents in, it can’t be too dangerous,” said her dad. “There must have been a change in the wind or something.”

“So I can come?”

Her mother’s right eye twitched, a sign that she was anxious. “Why don’t we wait for them to go back to level two. Then at least we’ll know it’s safe.”

Jenny thought the Forest Service’s system for letting people know when to leave was kind of bogus anyway. They had gone from level one (ready) to level three (go!) in less than two hours, thanks to the wind.

When she and Jade were little, the word “stranger” was their mother’s label for everyone she did not trust. But as they got older, they learned there were categories and subcategories to the strangers their mother held at arm’s length. At the moment, she was very distrustful of the Bureau of Land Management. She wanted to wait until Coyote Jones said it was safe, because he was a local and she had more faith in him than she did in “some bureaucratic arm of the government.” Coyote Jones had been telling people for days to be ready: “Don’t forget the three P’s, everyone: people, pets, papers.”

“Honestly, hon,” her father said, “if it wasn’t safe, they wouldn’t let any of us go back in. The cat must be scared out of its wits by now too.” Jenny nodded vehemently.

“Animals are really good at finding safe places to hide,” said her mother. “I doubt he’ll come out until this is all over.”

But Jenny jumped up before her father could be swayed by her mother’s eye twitch, which was ramping up.

“We’re at level one, Mr. Scaife,” she said in what she hoped was her best impression of the fire service spokesperson. She grabbed his arm. “Level two, Mr. Scaife. Get set.

“See you in an hour, Mom. Mr. Scaife, we are at level three. Go, go, go!”

That was about as silly as Jenny would get, especially once they were near their neighborhood. It felt like driving into the apocalypse. Miles of hoses crisscrossed the empty streets, and there were huge holding tanks around the perimeter of every structure. Water trucks were going in and out, filling the tanks, which looked like gigantic blow-up swimming pools. Before they could actually drive down their street, they had to stop at a security checkpoint.

“Yikes, this looks serious,” said her father.

“I just need to see some ID,” said the man at the checkpoint. “You’d be surprised how much looting there is in a disaster.”

“Really?” said Jenny’s father, genuinely surprised. He had a hard time thinking the worst of people, unlike her mother, and in spite of everything they had been through. Jenny often felt like a Ping-Pong ball bouncing between her parents. They had such different outlooks.

“Yeah, but we also need to know when people come in and out so we don’t lose anybody.” The man winked at Jenny.

There was tobacco juice in his beard and a wad of chew in his cheek.

She waited for her father to say something like “Winking’s not really appropriate, don’t you think?” Her mother would have. But she knew he was overwhelmed with the idea of looters, and from dealing with the fire, the threat of losing their home. In his mind, if the guy had helped save their home, well, let him wink at Jenny if he wanted to. It was harmless. She bit her cheek and said nothing.

The checkpoint man taped a pass on the windshield with the date and time, and they drove slowly through the war zone that had once been their neighborhood. So far, none of the houses had been lost—although two sheds and a chicken coop had burnt to the ground and were still smoldering.

There was a big orange X painted on the front door of their house, meaning it had been checked and all residents had evacuated. All except poor Colonel Mustard, thought Jenny, turning the knob, which was warm to the touch. Inside, the house smelled like its contents had been broiled with a blow torch. Jenny covered her nose, taking shallow breaths while making the clucking noise that Colonel Mustard liked.

“Here, boy. Who’s the precious kitty? C’mon, boy.”

Nothing.

She rummaged under all the beds and in all the closets, although the only closet he