“Holy crap.” Two drops of rain spatter the lenses of Mags’s glasses. “That hit close.”
We’re leaving the field when we hear shouting. A couple people run down the hill toward us, yelling and gesturing back at the cabins. Flames lick over the rise.
Mr. Wardwell curses. He and Duke get into his pickup and tear up the road. There’s confusion, shouting, people following them to help—but a lot of people not moving, too, milling and muttering or hanging around their cars to see what everybody else is going to do. Somebody whistles, and I see Jesse dropping his tailgate for us, waving us in. Mason’s standing in the bed, and he gives Mags a hand up.
The cabins sit in a clearing at the peak of the hill where the barrens border on the neighboring property; you can see them when you drive down Back Ridge Road, five little buildings with rusty tin roofs and matchstick porches. Jesse pulls into the driveway and we pile out.
Smoke and flames boil out of the roof of the second cabin from the road. Some migrants throw water from gallon pails, and Mr. Wardwell hauls ass around the first cabin with a garden hose unwinding behind him. Mrs. Wardwell drove up in the flatbed, and I see her grab a crying little girl and swing her up into the truck like she weighs as much as a sack of flour.
Everyone starts dousing the flames, using anything that will hold water. Somebody hands me a plastic bowl, and Jesse gets an old caulk bucket. I run to the hand pump everybody’s drawing from, and then back to the cabin, passing Mags and Nell as they run for refills.
The water I throw disappears into the smoke; I can’t even tell if it hit the roof, if I’m making any difference at all, and I can’t stop coughing. Mr. Wardwell’s soaking down the walls and porch with the hose, his face ruddy, white hair kicking up in front with sweat. “They on their way?” he yells at Duke, but Duke’s still on the phone with 911.
The grass catches a little, and some migrants stomp it out, only to have another piece of burning insulation drift down and light up a few feet away. Migrants run out of the cabins on either side with their arms full of stuff: backpacks and bedrolls and plastic bags of food and dishes. One guy carries a Jack Russell terrier, squirming and barking like she’s ready to take on the fire herself.
I don’t know how long we throw water before I notice that I’m wiping rain from my eyes. It’s finally coming down. The cabin’s still burning, but soon it’s more smoke than flame, and the other cabins are drenched, so they won’t catch. We keep the water coming anyway until the fire trucks show up.
As we all stand back so they can turn the hose on it, Mags, Nell, and I lean on each other, exhausted. Nell rests her head on my shoulder while I put my arm around Mags, catching my breath and checking out the migrants’ turf.
It’s not much more than a scrubby patch up here, really, with two Porta-Johns by the tree line and a little fire pit in a ring of stones. The cabins have been tagged all over by Sasanoa wannabe gangstas. The Wardwells have covered it with big patches of gray paint, but I can still read the word spic, and more f-bombs than I care to count.
Little kids have started appearing on the porches of the cabins at the far end. I can’t believe how many families are crammed into these five little houses. There’s a skinny, freckled, hard-faced lady standing with a man and a little boy, watching what’s left of the cabin roof collapse. Whatever they had inside, something tells me they couldn’t afford to lose it.
“We got to talk,” Jesse says.
I don’t want to hear this. I want to hear you were awesome up there, Darcy, or you look hot with your hair wet or anything other than the breakup words. Mags and Nell are waiting for me in the car, the engine running, the wipers going. I sit with one leg out of the pickup, one hand gripping the door.
He says it fast, like somebody on the verge of wussing out, and he doesn’t look away from the dash. Mason’s waiting in the rain for me to let him slide into the seat, and I tell myself that Jesse wouldn’t do this to me in front of one of his buddies. He wouldn’t be that cruel.
When he finally looks back at me, his expression doesn’t give much away. “Drive-in tonight? It’s supposed to clear up.”
I sag like a popped balloon. The drive-in isn’t a breakup place. You can’t make a quick escape after ripping somebody’s heart out at the drive-in. I scribble my number down on a take-out napkin and let in Mason, who makes a point of not looking at me at all.
“You should see how crappy those cabins are.” I towel off my hair as Mom, Libby, and the girls set the table for supper.
“I’ve seen them,” Mom says. We were late getting home; as soon as we came through the door, Libby went off on Nell about not calling before Mags could shout over her about the fire. Now Libby’s tight-lipped, banging dishes down.
“They don’t even have power or running water or anything.” I hang the towel over the back of my chair. “And there’s, like, fifteen people to a cabin, at least.”
“Not that many,” Mags says.
“Close enough.”
Mom shrugs, refusing to get bent out of shape like I want her to. “I’m sure they’re glad to have roofs over their heads. Better than sleeping in tents or their cars. Growing up, I remember a potato farmer up the road had a bunch of junked buses for the migrants to stay in during harvest time.”
The screen door opens and Hunt leans in, soaked to the bone from rushing around collecting his tools. He lifts a hand to Mom. “Taking off.” He starts to duck out again.
“No, stay,” I say. “We’re having fried chicken.”
“Can’t. Thanks.”
“At least take some with you.” Mom goes to the cupboard and pulls out Tupperware. “We got enough pasta salad to feed an army.”
Hunt steps in and waits by the counter, his gaze resting mildly on Libby for a second before checking out the kitchen, the chipped cupboards and the shuddery old Frigidaire covered in alphabet magnets and clippings from the plays Nell’s been in over the years. The photo of sophomore year’s one-act play The Tempest has yellowed and curled at the corners. You can see Nell in the far corner, playing the part of Ceres, a spirit with one line. “Hunt, you ever seen those migrant cabins?” I say. “I mean, up close?”
“Private property up there, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, but there was a fire today, and we went up to help. It sucks. People got their kids stacked in there like cordwood.”
“Darcy exaggerates.” Mags looks at him over the top of her glasses. “A lot.”
Nell shakes her head. “I dunno, I wouldn’t want to use those outhouses. I wouldn’t want to pee over that hole in the middle of the night with daddy longlegs and—”