“Hadda make sure,” Mr. Sammy said. “Once the back porch goin’ good I toss more gas in through the winder.”
I laced my hands down on my lap. “Oh, Mr. Sammy,” I said with genuine sadness. “What you did is very bad.”
“How that be?”
He poses the same question at this afternoon’s trial. I do not have to testify.
Mr. Sammy relates the whole episode, word for word as he told it to me, with civic pride. He clutches his blue spiral notebook and defense counsel has Mr. Sammy read out loud every time he called the police, and every time they ignored his appeals. Mr. Sammy served in a war, he has no police record, he works the line in his church’s soup kitchen.
I have never heard a judge apologize, but this one does. She softly explains to Mr. Sammy about mandatory sentencing requirements. Then she hands the old man ten years. Mr. Sammy appears perplexed.
My stomach curdles like rotten milk. My wits stagger under another injustice. I must find my center and grow whole again.
I ask forgiveness of my little soot angel. I ask forgiveness of everyone I ever wronged. I swear their day will come.
But right now I need to leave the city and all its ways. I need to breathe in tart salt air. I need to hammer nails at my cottage.
But mostly I need the company of all my friends at the Wild Wind County Volunteer Fire Department. I need their sly humor. I need their tough cheer. I need their stout spirit.
And I need to plunge headfirst into whatever crude misdeeds and bold transgressions those ever-unrepentant truants are preparing to commit.
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Fire Sign Page 8