If he went on to holler a warning I didn’t hear it; the rush of blood to my head was booming. All at once my legs were pounding like pistons, accelerating my feet into a blur across the asphalt. Arms working the air. Teeth barred as muscles fizzed. All I could think about was getting to the last house on the left and to . . . Rae! Hers was the house ablaze. I could see luminous orange serpents writhing against its timber walls. Hear wood splintering. Plastic popping. Paint sizzling. I could see flaming Medusa heads poking out of broken window panes, hear their tortured screams as they raged at the night air. Heard hot glass shatter. Support beams creaking like the last dying moans of a shipwrecked galleon. I could see burning tumbleweeds of fire cartwheeling along the roof tiles. Thick acrid smoke belching skywards. I shot between a pair of patrol cars. Several startled cops were slow to react. No one was expecting some nut, fresh from the nuthouse, making a direct dash to the fire. All I could thinking about was .
