flash

There were fire trucks at our house. The flames had jumped the highway, the smoke was rolling in. I was 14. It was dry as a bone, needles crackling under my feet. The pines offered the only shade for miles around. The pumice turned to powder. I was choking on 100 year old smoldering pine. We were evacuated.

That summer we had one good downpour. Long after the earth had turned to dust, the plants had withered and curled, and the surrounding land went up in flames. That storm was a welcome stranger.

The sky grew dark as the clouds pulled all the moisture from the ground. They covered the sun, casting a shadow across my desert home. The air cooled and the drops began to fall: fat, heavy drops of life. My sister and I bolted out of the house, thrilled to be soaked with sky. You could hear the ground drinking, gulping, desperate. Scent of sage and soil.

Then the lightning cracked, the sky flashed. And the fires started once more.