The sky looked torn open and set on fire.
From the parking lot of Sierra Glen Elementary, you could see the ridge line glowing red, like someone had dragged a blowtorch along the mountains. Ash fell in slow motion, sticking to windshields and kids' backpacks.
"Everyone inside, now!" a teacher shouted, her voice cracking. "Parents, line up by the office!"
ALBERT JONES stood by his beat-up pickup truck, keys digging into his palm. The truck bed was stuffed with what he'd managed to grab in fifteen frantic minutes—toolbox, a couple of two-by-fours, a cooler, a box of old photo albums he'd almost left behind and then couldn't.
His son WILLIAM clutched a navy backpack like a life vest. One zipper pocket bulged with LEGO pieces, another with a thick photo album. On the cover, a picture of the three of them back when "family" had meant something different.
"You okay, buddy?" Albert asked.
William nodded, a little too fast. "Yeah. I mean… the fire's not here yet."
He didn't say what they both knew: Not yet.
On the curb, a little Black girl sat on her suitcase, swinging her legs. MAYA HARRIS held a half-eaten sandwich in one hand and a phone in the other. On the screen, a paused video showed her mother in blue scrubs, hair tucked into a cap, plastic face shield pushed up.
"I'll be home tonight, okay? We'll watch that movie you like."
The bar along the top of the screen read No Service.
The principal moved down the line of parents, a clipboard pressed to her chest. "We need any remaining guardians to sign out their children now. Mandatory evacuation is in effect. If you are not here in person, you must designate another adult."
She stopped in front of Maya.
"Is your mom here yet?" she asked gently.
Maya stared at the dead phone screen. "She's at the hospital. She said she'd—"
Her voice broke off.
Albert watched the exchange from a few feet away. He knew Maya. Everyone in their street knew Maya. She and her mom lived three houses down, on the corner with the hydrangeas that were always somehow blooming.
"Mr. Jones?" The principal turned to him, hope and worry tensed in the same expression. "Do you know Melissa Harris? She put you down as an emergency contact."
Albert blinked. "She—she what?"
The principal held up a clipboard. Emergency contacts. His name, in Melissa's handwriting.
"We can't get through to her. She's probably in the ER. Would you be able to take Maya with you? Just until her mom can reach you?"
A siren wailed somewhere closer than it had sounded ten minutes ago.
Albert looked at the mountain again. The red line had crawled lower.
Behind him, William's fingers tightened around his backpack strap.
"Dad?" William said quietly.
Albert closed his eyes for a heartbeat.
"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I got her."
He walked over and crouched in front of Maya. Up close, he could see the ash in her hair, the way her fingers were shaking just a little around the phone.
"Hey, Maya. Your mom's stuck at work, but she asked me to get you out, okay?"
She stared at him, eyes huge and dark and full of something that wasn't quite trust and wasn't quite doubt.
"Is she… is she coming back tonight?" she whispered.
He wished he could say yes without feeling like a liar.
"She's doing what she does best," he said instead. "Taking care of people. So for now, I'll take care of you."
He opened the passenger door. "Hop in."
William scooted over, making room. The three of them and the backpack and the weight of three lives pressed themselves into that cab.
They were halfway out of town when Maya suddenly gasped.
"The cat!" she cried. "Mr. Whiskers! He's still in my closet!"
Albert's fingers clenched on the wheel.
"Maya—"
"You have to go back!" Her voice shot up into a squeak. "He's going to die!"
William started to say, "Maya, the house is probably—" and stopped when he saw her face.
Smoke rolled across the road ahead, making the air taste like pennies. Cars streamed past them in the opposite direction, trunks banging open, kids crying.
Albert could see the spot ahead where the sheriff's car blocked the way back.
He pulled the truck over.
"Dad?" William said. "Dad, are you—"
Albert stared at the burning ridge. At the line of cars fleeing. At the little girl in his passenger seat, clutching her dead phone like it might bring her mother back if she held it tight enough.
He thought of the box of old photos in the bed of the truck. The ones he'd nearly left behind.
"All right," he said, voice rough. "One last detour."
He turned the wheel.
"Buckle up. Let's go get your cat."
The heat at the edge of their neighborhood hit like opening an oven door. The sky was dark in the wrong direction, glowing at the edges.
Albert parked half on the lawn and half on the sidewalk in front of Maya's house. "Fast," he said. "In and out. William, you stay with me."
They ran.
Inside, the air smelled like smoke and laundry detergent and the ghost of last night's dinner. The hallway was dim, sunlight turned orange through the curtains.
Maya threw open her bedroom closet. A small, terrified ball of fur launched itself at her chest.
"I got you," she whispered, burying her face in Mr. Whiskers' neck.
On the way out, she snagged something else without thinking: a framed photo of her and Melissa, both laughing, both holding ice creams that were melting too fast.
They piled back into the truck. Albert's heart hammered against his ribs so loud he could hear it over the sirens.
He didn't breathe properly until they passed the sheriff's roadblock and merged back into the river of cars leaving town.
In the cab, Maya hugged the cat so tightly it meowed in protest. William clutched his backpack and glanced sideways at her.
"You okay?" he asked.
She nodded, eyes shining in the red light of the sky.
"Thank you," she said. "Um. Dad."
The word slipped out before she could stop it. Her cheeks flushed. She stared straight ahead, mortified.
Albert's hands tightened on the steering wheel.
He didn't correct her.
He just drove.
Hours later, they stood in another line. This time, the heat came from too many bodies in one space, and the smell was gym socks and hand sanitizer instead of burning trees.
The shelter was a converted middle school gym. Cots stretched in rows. Kids cried. Volunteers shouted numbers.
At the check-in table, an exhausted young woman with a high ponytail flipped through forms.
"Next," she said. "Family name?"
Albert opened his mouth, then closed it.
He had never heard silence ring so loudly.
Beside him, William shifted. Maya hugged the cat closer. On Albert's cracked phone screen, a notification blinked: one video message from MELISSA HARRIS, still unsent.
The volunteer looked from his face to William's to Maya's.
"You're all together, right?" she said. "One family? Families get a room." Her finger pointed to a line on the form. "Singles sleep in the hallway."
Maya's hand tightened in his jacket.
William didn't say anything, but his shoulder pressed against Albert's like he was bracing for impact.
Albert swallowed.
"Yes," he heard himself say. "We're a family."
The volunteer smiled for the first time in an hour. "Jones family," she said, and wrote it down. "Right this way."
As they followed her past rows of cots, Albert kept seeing the fire in his rearview mirror.
He had no idea what exactly he'd just agreed to.
Only that saying no had felt much more dangerous.