He rang the bell, rocking on his heels. He watched his breath escape him like cigarette smoke. The thermometer had plummeted overnight, calling for a high of only forty- two. It felt like winter, but it was only late September. Weird for East Texas.
He again rang the bell.
He wondered if he ought to let it slip that he'd been an Ail-American at Tyler High in Tyler, Texas, and would've gone on to play for the University of Texas if not for an injury that sidelined him from the game for life. He wondered if he played it just right, if she wouldn't find that special spot of sympathy in her heart that inevitably led to necking. I can take it from there, he told himself.
Still no answer at the damn door.
An odd faint odor reached his nostrils, but Mike couldn't quite place it. Still no answer. Had she gone back to…where was it? Someplace in California, San Bernardino someplace, she'd said, by way of Phoenix.
She said she'd come in to surprise the folks, so where the hell was she? Maybe she's in the shower. Maybe she can't hear the bell.
He rapped his knuckles loudly against the door and slammed down the brass knocker several times for good measure. Enough to wake the dead, he thought. But still no one came to the door.
He was getting antsy…downright edgy.
Mike yanked at his sagging gun belt and tucked his shirt in better. He took in a deep breath and went to the window to peer into the interior through the sheer drapes. He squinted hard, trying to make out any movement inside. Seeing no one and no movement, but catching his reflection in the glass, he fixed his hair and admired his wide shoulders and thick neck bursting at the collar. Again came the odor he couldn't quite place. He'd been doing battle with a ragweed allergy, and lately could smell nothing, but this pungent on-off odor ran ahead of him. Still admiring his reflection in the window, he now noticed something odd about the complete stillness within. Something looked wrong, and even though he couldn't quite put his finger on it, he felt compelled to stare through at the living room until it hit him, and it did. Through the gauzy haze of the sheer cloth drape, he saw that the big fish tank along the living room wall was as devoid of life and movement as the surrounding room.
Squinting harder, he studied the tank, realizing some kind of strange layer of scum floated across the surface. Staring harder, he realized it was not scum but the residents of the tank-all the fish were lying belly-up at the top of the tank.
"Weird. Something's wrong inside. Lauralie could be in trouble inside." He imagined saving the damsel in distress and being lauded a hero in the papers-a not-uncommon fantasy since childhood.
He got a whiff of the strange odor again. The cold air seemed to heighten the odor one moment, mask it the next, but there it came again, teasing his nostrils. Then it came to him. Gas! Natural gas!
"There's a gas leak inside!"
He snatched his key chain and his radio off his hip, calling it in. As he hailed help, he found the key he needed, a master for every house in the Colony for emergency use only. This qualified.
Jake Everly came on the radio as he inserted the key.
"Jake! That you?"
"Mikeeee! Wha's up, kid? Wha's your lo-"
"I'm at 1638 Willow…I mean, Will-o'-the-Wisp, and we've got a-a-a gas leak here, Jake."
"Possible leak?"
"A leak, Jake-the real thing!"
"A gas leak? In the Colony? No way!"
"I'm telling you, I can smell it through the g'damn door! I'm going in!"
"No, Mike! If you can smell it through the fuckin' door, then it's too dangerous to go burstin' in 'cause if you do-"
Jake, at command headquarters for Colony Security, heard the massive explosion occurring at Mike's end. "Stupid kid! Stupid, stupid damned kid! Oh, fuckin' jeeze! Man-oh-freakin'-man!"
Jake could not hold back his tears. He stopped the tape that had recorded the conversation, and immediately got on the phone with 911, giving the address and the nature of the emergency.
Jake next called his boss to inform him of the explosion. "Christ," said his boss, "someone's got to get over there to rep us, Jake. You do it, Jake. Get your deputies in to cover the phones and the radio, and get yourself over there. I'm on my way! How the hell'd this happen? How the hell'd a gas explosion occur in the Colony in the Glade, Jake? Whose fuckin' house blew up?"
"The Sangers', a Mr. and Mrs. with a daughter visiting. Mike met the girl, sir, and-"
"They called Mike to the location?"
"Mike Wdson's dead, sir. That's all I know."
"Was he answering a call?"
"Awful, just awful!"
"What'd he go to the location for, Jake?"
"He was screwin' around, Dave!"
"Screwin' around?"
"Flirting with the girl there, the daughter. He went over to ask her out, and next thing I know he's shouting something about a gas leak, that he could smell it through the door, and he disregarded my orders and burst in, and-and- and-"
"Get hold of yourself, Jake! Don't have a coronary on me. Do we know if the family was inside? Do you know if the blast affected any surrounding structures?"
"No…don't know, but I felt the vibrations from here."
"Mike rushed in to help people inside. He died trying to save life, doing his duty, Jake, you got that? Get over to the site and be a rep for Colony Security. I'm on my way!"
When Jake arrived at the Sanger home, fire trucks were battling the blaze, and a Houston Natural Gas truck pulled up, followed by a taxicab from which emerged Mr. and Mrs. Paul Sanger, the look of shock and horror unmistakable.
Jake, knowing the couple by sight, stepped up to them and told them what he knew of how Mike Wilson tried to save their daughter, dying in the effort.
"Meredyth! Oh, my God! Meredyth's in there!" screamed Caroline Sanger.
"Mike said her name was Lauralie," Jake said to Paul Sanger, who was busy now holding onto his wife, pinning her to the cab to keep her from running into the inferno.
The cab driver leaned across his hood, staring at the activity of the firemen and watching the blaze. Scar-faced, scratching a three-day-old beard, the cabbie snatched his unlit cigar from his lips and said, "Looks like a g'damn Texas tornado went through here."
"Who the hell is Lauralie?" Paul Sanger asked Jake Everly.
"The girl staying at your place… said she was your daughter! Mike opened the… Maybe I ought not to say any more."
Paul Sanger got on his cell phone and dialed for Meredyth. When she picked up, he breathed again. "Thank God, Mere, it's you! I've got your mother here. She needs to hear your voice, Mere. Talk to her… ask about her trip." Paul pushed the phone on his wife, Caroline. "It's Mere! She's safe, honey! She's all right."
Caroline took the phone, relief the size of a tidal wave washing over her, yet she could not control her tears as she repeatedly called out Meredyth's name and said, "Sweet-heart, we love you so much, Mere. How much you'll never know."
"You're safely home from Paris," Meredyth replied from Lucas Stonecoat's bedside in the hospital. "I've got one hell of a story to tell you guys, Mother."
"And we've got one hell of a story to tell you. It's the house…all gone." She continued to cry.
"Mom, are you all right? What's happened? Are those sirens I hear?"
Her father got back on. "We'll be staying out at the ranch house, sweetheart. Your can reach us there. Think you could come out tonight, Mere? We really need to see you in the flesh and catch up. And by the way, do you know anyone by the name of-"
"Why aren't you going to the Colony home? What's happened there, Dad?"
"It's been reduced to rubble, apparently an explosion….Don't tell her I told you so, but"-he whispered now-"Mom appears to have left the gas on the entire time we were gone, and some poor schlep with Colony Security did a piss-poor job of checking it out. Opened the door and died of the blast. Whole damn house is in flames, pieces of it on our neighbor's roof.”