I have to push her out the door. There are things you'd never know about a fire unless you've had one. Really fast and really hot. So hot that the fact that a house is built of brick or stone is no more defense against it than if the house was made of paper. The damned thing just burns up, just like that, like some kind of alien devouring itself from the inside out.
Fire pours out the windows and doors, onto the porches, curls up around the roof.
The house is engulfed, all but gone by the time I hear the first sirens, by the time I remember about Mick sitting cross-legged in the middle of the lawn like he's watching fireworks on the Fourth of July, like he's Jesus fucking Christ on the fucking Fourth of July. She's over at Hal's. I can see them staring out his big front window. Hal has a house even bigger than ours. A car pulls up to the curb and the door flies open, but Mimi just sits there.