“I’m not certain how we accomplished it, but roughly three and a quarter hours later, as the moon dipped to its lowest point in the night sky, we’d stopped the fire from consuming a sixth building. Men were still pouring buckets on the smoldering heap, and a few embers still glowed red-orange, but there wasn’t a dancing flame to be seen.”

“She stood there, half lit by the street lamp, her diamond choker sparkling. A knot formed in my stomach, and I knew it wasn’t from the appetizers I’d eaten earlier that night. Then, in a haunting tone I still remember to this day, she whispered, ‘My dear, dear friend....Quo vadis?”

“It’s amazing how much a frail old woman will confide in a visiting nurse.’ She laughed and shook her head. ‘Imagine pouring out your soul to someone stooped over a bedpan.’ She took another puff, and once more blew smoke at me. I took hold of her wrist.”

“Alicia, enough!’ We all froze. My dad had only invoked his Code Red Warning: You’ve Done It Now voice twice in my lifetime. The first was when Val was trying to feed me ‘magical pills’ from the medicine cabinet when I was four, and other was when my mom thought he was being too flirty with my aunt. ‘He’s twenty-fucking-two years old! If he doesn’t want to go, he doesn’t want to go, okay?”

“Somehow I can live in that awful building‟s shadows,” she said, “but I don‟t think I have the strength left to ever set foot in there again.”

“On the heels of his words, the front window exploded. As if time slowed down, he watched the shards of glass scatter across the floor, luminous crystals dancing about the wooden slats of the floor like insects scurrying in choreographed retreat.”

“I stood for a few moments, looking for the Little Dipper. ‘Howdy, Breandan,’ I whispered. ‘Look at me now. Can you believe my predicament?”