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  Arthur shrugged. “A stupid mistake. No way I’d risk my life for a house. Even if it was super-luxe like that one was.”

  The spot where the house had stood was black char now. Burned framework made brief appearances from behind the still-thick veil of black smoke that spread wider along the bluff’s face.

  “Let’s go,” said Gilda. “We need to hit the beach. It’s going to get crowded here in a bit.”

  More people had abandoned their cars in favor of the sand and surf. Danny sucked in a smoky breath and coughed.

  “Let’s go,” he said. “Wherever it is we’re headed.”

  CHAPTER 14

  Friday, October 17, 2025

  Santa Monica, California

  “Are we lost again?” Keri asked.

  Dub checked his cell phone. He had no signal and the battery was low. He wasn’t sure where they were, despite the street signs. He didn’t want to admit it. Saying it aloud made it real.

  “I don’t think so,” he said. “We’re still in Santa Monica.”

  “So we’re lost.”

  They were standing on a residential street, only a hint of smoke in the air. The street was empty aside from the two of them. Dub spun in a circle and surveyed their surroundings.

  “We’re safe. That’s the important thing. No cops telling us where we can or can’t be. No fire. No smoke.”

  Keri sniffed, drawing in a deep breath. “There’s smoke. I can smell it.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Keri smirked. “I know what you mean.” She paused and added, “We’re lost.”

  Dub stepped into her and put his arms around her. She wrapped hers around him. They kissed briefly. Nothing passionate, just an affirmation of their love for one another.

  “So what do we do?” she asked. Her breath smelled like the cherry-flavored Icee she’d slurped at the arcade. “It’s like we’re in the eye of the storm. If we move in any direction, we dive right back into a mess.”

  Dub brushed hair from her eyes. “I agree. We might be better off staying here for a while. Waiting it out.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Waiting it out? I’ve gotta pee. I’m not doing it in the street. The only thing that’s keeping me from wetting myself is moving around. The longer we stay here, not moving, the more my eyes float.”

  The hint of her New Orleans twang seeped through. She’d worked hard to dampen the drawl since arriving on campus. Every once in a while, Dub could hear it. It was adorable.

  “We could walk in circles,” he said. “Up one side of the block and then back. This is a pretty long street. We could keep moving without going anywhere.”

  She appeared to consider it, wrinkling her nose and eyeing the canopy of trees that darkened the street. The block had the appearance of being trapped in an eternal dusk.

  “Or we could knock on a door,” she said. “Some nice person might let me use the bathroom.”

  “Pick one.”

  She pointed at a moderately sized home directly in front of them. Aside from the towering tree at the curb, the front yard was xeriscaped. Instead of grass, there was a series of concrete pads, wispy light green tufts of grass filling the narrow spaces between the pads. Closer to the front door lining the long bed that ran along the front of the low-slung single-story house were various cacti and succulents. The house was gray washed concrete topped with a Spanish tile roof. The windows were large frameless panes that bordered both sides of wide glass double doors.

  The couple walked across the yard, stepping on the concrete squares, and reached an eight-by-eight stoop in front of the door. Next to the door was a camera-adorned doorbell. While Keri stood rocking on her feet, Dub pressed the bell.

  A man’s voice answered almost at once. “May I help you?”

  “Yes, sir,” Keri said. “We’re college students from UCLA. We were at the pier when the fires started. We’re having trouble getting back to campus. And I need to use a restroom.”

  There was a pause.

  “Please?” Keri added. “May I use your toilet? It’s embarrassing to ask, but—”

  “Of course,” he said. “Hang on a moment, please.”

  Keri smiled widely at Dub and gave him a thumbs-up. Her rocking had become more of a dance. Dub suppressed a grin.

  A figure appeared behind the glass doors. There was a series of clicks and the door swung open. A tall, slender, African-American man stood in an untucked Cal T-shirt underneath an unbuttoned long-sleeved linen polo shirt rolled at the cuff, cargo shorts, and brown leather sandals. He extended his hand to Keri and then Dub.

  “I’m Victor,” he said, “and you are?”

  “Keri.”

  “Dub.”

  “Dub?” Victor repeated. “That’s your name?”

  The man was soft-spoken, his voice velvety and reassuring. His smile was broad, his face kind and seasoned with wisdom. His question came across as genuine and without sarcasm.

  “It’s short for W,” Dub explained. “William is my first name. My dad was William, so they called me Dub for short.”

  Victor’s smile broadened. “Nice. I like it.” Then his expression shifted. He stepped to the side and motioned past himself into the house. “I’m so sorry, you need the bathroom. It’s to the right and down the hall, second door on the left.”

  Keri thanked him and scooted into the house. She disappeared around the corner, walking faster than Dub had ever seen her move. Victor invited Dub into the foyer and left the front door open.

  “You have a beautiful home,” said Dub.

  “Thank you,” said Victor.

  The home was immaculate, with the distinct flair of a place inhabited by a man alone. The woods were heavy, the fabrics dark, and the dining room, or what might have passed for one, directly across from where Dub stood might have been an electronics repair shop.

  On a large cherry table sat boxes overflowing with various parts, tangles of wire and cables, and circuit boards. On one end there were large various-sized batteries plugged into power strips that snaked from outlets with the help of orange and red extension cords. Their chargers blinked green and red and occasionally beeped.

  On the other end was a bank of radios. Some appeared to be handheld, like walkie-talkies. Others were tabletop sets with separate microphones that plugged into the boxed transceivers.

  Victor must have noticed Dub eyeing the unique setup. He chuckled.

  “That’s my control center,” he said. “I have a thing for amateur radio, electronics in general, really.”

  “Amateur radio?”

  “Ham radio,” Victor said. “You’ve heard of that?”

  Dub nodded. He took a tentative step toward the room as a radio crackled.

  Victor stayed by the door. “We do emergency broadcasting too. We’re useful when cell towers or phone lines go down.”

  “That’s cool,” said Dub. He wasn’t sure what else to say.

  “What’s cool?” asked Keri. She appeared from the hallway and stepped into the foyer, stopping next to Dub.

  Victor smiled. “Dub and I were discussing my mess of a control room here. I was just explaining—”

  He was interrupted by an urgent-sounding transmission from the largest of the boxes at the far end of the table. It was a woman’s voice. She sounded frantic.

  “—emergency. Break emergency.”

  Victor ran from the door, leaving it open, to the end of the table. He pulled back the armchair and stood in front of the console. Deep lines creased the sides of his mouth.

  “Autopatch fail,” the woman said. “I need someone to call 9-1-1. Repeat. Emergency.”

  Victor grabbed a mechanical pencil from the table, fumbled with it for a moment, and then readied himself to take notes, his hand poised above a yellow legal pad.

  Keri took Dub’s hand, sliding her fingers between his. Neither of them moved toward the door. Now wasn’t the time.

  The woman called out an address. She explained her house was on fire. There w
ere two other homes ablaze. She’d gotten out of her home, but there was an elderly couple in the house next to hers. They were trapped. They needed help.

  Victor looked up from the notepad. “That’s four blocks from here,” he said. He reached for a traditional landline phone perched on the edge of the table. He dialed 9-1-1. It was busy. He tried again with the same result.

  “I’ve gotta go,” he said. “They need help.”

  Without waiting for Dub or Keri to react, Victor ripped the paper from the pad, pushed past them, and ran through the open front door. He was halfway across the concrete squares when Dub let go of Keri’s hand.

  “We should go too.”

  “What?” she asked, appearing dumbfounded.

  “He can’t do it alone.”

  Keri steeled her glare. She clenched her jaw and nodded. “You’re right. Let’s go.”

  The two of them bolted from the house, pulling the door shut behind them, and chased Victor into the street. They caught up with him and ran alongside him. Victor glided, almost floated, as he ran. He was incredibly light on his feet and he was fast. Dub struggled to keep pace. Keri, who ran every day, moved gracefully. Within two minutes they rounded two corners and found themselves in front of three burning homes. A fourth and fifth, one on either side of those on fire, were in danger.

  There was a crowd on the street. As many as a dozen people stood watching the houses burn. It didn’t appear any of them were doing anything other than staring slack-jawed or recording the flames on their cell phones.

  The houses were burning in various degrees. The one in the center was fully involved, with flames on its first and second floors. To the right, another two-story house was burning on the second floor only. Smoke poured from its eaves, billowing in black plumes.

  To the left was a single story, its roof on fire. It was unclear how far the flames had spread.

  Keri and Dub followed Victor to a tear-streaked woman holding a large radio in her hand. She was alternately speaking into it and holding it to her ear.

  “Which one?” Victor asked her.

  The woman’s eyes opened wide, appearing incredibly white against the soot covering much of her face. At first, she didn’t seem to understand the question.

  “I heard your transmission,” Victor said. “People are trapped. Which house?”

  The woman’s chin quivered. Her trembling hand extended the radio toward the single story.

  “It’s filled with smoke,” she said. “I tried. I couldn’t breathe.”

  “Two people?”

  “I think so,” she said. “Stanley and Sonya. Both use walkers. Their bedroom is in the back. I tried the front—”

  “Don’t worry about it,” said Victor. “You coming, Dub?”

  Dub looked at Keri, mouthed, “I love you,” then followed Victor toward the house.

  Keri started to follow. Dub held up his hand. “Stay here. Keep her calm. Talk to the firefighters when they get here.”

  Keri took another step and stopped. She opened her mouth to say something. Dub ran after Victor.

  The closer they got to the house, the thicker the smoke became. Behind them, people were yelling at them, telling them to stop, that they were being idiots. That they were going to die. Dub ignored it. Victor did too. They rounded the corner of the house, racing toward the backyard.

  Victor ran through the smoke, crashing into a wrought-iron gate. Dub heard the clang, and Victor tripped backward into him. He caught him, steadying his new acquaintance, and they fumbled the latch open. Dub swung open the gate and held it for Victor. Both coughed. Dub tried to squeeze out the sting of the particulate. Victor moved past him. He couldn’t see much more than four or five feet in any direction. His throat burned, and he pushed his shirt up above his nose and mouth. It didn’t provide much relief.

  “I found the bedroom,” said Victor. “This way, Dub.”

  Dub followed Victor’s voice to the rear of the home. There was a window that stretched from underneath the eaves of the roof to Dub’s waist. Victor was pushing on the pane from its base. It wasn’t budging.

  “How do you know this is the bedroom?” asked Dub. He was against the house now, where the smoke wasn’t as oppressive.

  “I don’t, really,” said Victor. “I can see a bed through the smoke. The glass isn’t hot. This is as good a place as any to get inside.”

  “Is this a good idea?” asked Dub.

  Glass shattered inside the home somewhere. Wood cracked and popped.

  “It’s a horrible idea,” said Victor.

  Dub hesitated, thinking about Keri, about how much life he had ahead of him, about the bystanders yelling at him. Then, against his better judgment and the little voice in his head telling him to run, he ignored all his misgivings.

  “Okay. Let’s do this.”

  Victor took off his linen shirt and wrapped it around his arm. He told Dub to back away and shield his eyes for a second.

  Dub pinched the fabric at his nose to keep his shirt in place. He heard a crash as Victor jabbed his elbow through the window and then cleared away the shards. He reached up inside the broken pane, unlocking the window lock, shoved it upward, and told Dub he was going first.

  “I need you right behind me,” he said. “I can’t do this alone.”

  “I’m ready to go,” Dub assured him, and Victor heaved himself up onto the window ledge and over into the smoke-filled darkness. Dub followed and was immediately struck by the suffocating heat and the disorientation from the smoky blackness.

  Only the dim light from the open window provided any sort of visibility. Low to the hardwood floor, the smoke wasn’t as bad. Ahead of him he could see the soles of Victor’s leather sandals. Victor was calling out for the homeowners.

  “Stanley!” he yelled. “Sonya! Are you here? Where are you?”

  Victor coughed and stopped advancing along the floor. They were at the foot of the bed, Dub guessed. He reached out, touching the edge of a cheap comforter that draped to the floor. It was thinly stitched polyester, the same kind he’d had on his bunk during freshman year. It was the kind of thing that came in a bag with sheets and pillowcases to match.

  Coughing, Victor called through the fabric of his shirt, “Stanley! Sonya! Can you hear us?”

  Victor inched forward, and Dub followed at his feet. They hadn’t heard any sounds from the homeowners. From beyond the walls of the room, more glass shattered. A loud crash told Dub that either a wall or ceiling had collapsed.

  “We don’t have long, Victor. If they’re not in this room, we’ve gotta get out.”

  Victor didn’t acknowledge him. He scooted forward at a quickened pace, the soles of his sandals becoming more difficult to see as the smoke thickened closer to the floor.

  As they moved closer to the wall that separated the room from the rest of the house, the ambient heat grew more intense. They passed the bedroom door, which was closed, and in the gap between its bottom edge and the floor, an orange glow flickered from beyond despite a feeble attempt at plugging the gap with balled athletic socks.

  Victor repeated his call, and his cough, leading Dub closer to another doorway that was open. They crossed the threshold onto a tile floor. This was a bathroom, the faint outline of the toilet to one side and the white laminate cabinet to the other. It was a narrow space, like a galley, but the smoke was thinner in here, and the air was moderately cooler. The tiles were cold on Dub’s palms. He inched through the narrow space behind Victor, and from the back of the bathroom came the faintest echo of a raspy whisper.

  “Help.”

  At first, he thought it was Victor. He grabbed his sandal and tugged. Victor turned around, wide eyed.

  “You okay?” asked Dub, suppressing another cough. His mouth was dry and scratchy, his nostrils stung, and his eyes burned.

  “It’s not me,” he said and then louder, “Hello? Hello? Stanley? Sonya?”

  “Help.”

  It was coming from inside the bathroom. The men cr
awled quickly toward a bathtub in the back of the space. Victor pulled back the curtain, yanking hard enough that the rod lost its suction on the wall and crashed down on top of them.

  Dub helped yank it free and toss it aside, revealing two figures huddled together in the tub, which was half filled with water. One of them weakly called out for help and reached a hand toward Dub.

  Dub grabbed the hand, its skin wrinkled and soft, like a woman’s hand, a decorative ring on one of her fingers.

  “Sonya?” he asked. “Squeeze my hand if you can hear me.”

  She squeezed.

  “Squeeze again if Stanley is with you.”

  Another squeeze. Weaker.

  “Okay,” he said, still holding her hand, “I’m Dub. Victor is with me, and we’re going to get you out of the house.”

  Victor shifted his weight and moved next to Dub. He reached across the porcelain lip of the tub and spoke calmly. “Hi Sonya,” he said. Everything is going to be okay. Dub and I are here for you. Is Stanley awake? Can he hear me?”

  She shifted her weight, tugging on him for leverage. She sat forward, her body in the corner of the tub, wedged between the tiled wall and the faucet.

  “No,” she said. She coughed and cleared her throat. “He fell. He hit his head.”

  “We can’t get both at once,” said Victor. “He’s unconscious. It’ll take both of us. We have to take one at a time.”

  “Agreed,” said Dub.

  “Okay,” said Victor, turning to Sonya, “we’re going to get you first. I’m going to wait with Stanley and Dub—”

  “No,” said Dub. “You take her. I’ll climb in the tub and wait with Stanley for you to come back.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yes,” said Dub. He guided Sonya’s hand to Victor. The two of them helped lift her from the tub while at the same time making sure Stanley didn’t slip under the water.

  Essentially Dub took Sonya’s place, leaning against the wall with Stanley’s body against his. He coughed and told Victor, “Hurry.”

  Victor managed to drape Sonya’s slight figure over his shoulder and disappeared into the smoke and out of the bathroom. Dub had never felt so alone in his life. Stanley’s lungs expanded and contracted against his chest; with the water seeping into his socks and down the back of his waistband, he regretted his decision.