Chapter 25: Ashes

I was out of the car before it stopped.

The heat hit me at the corner.

A firefighter caught my arm at the tape and held on.

"Nobody past here, ma'am."

"That's my shop."

"Not anymore it isn't."

The front window was gone again.

This time the fire was coming out through it.

Then the roof over the back room fell in, and the light went up into the sky.

Dad came up beside me on his cane, still barefoot.

"Your mother's box," he said.

"I know."

The bride's satin had been on the rack in the back, under a sheet.

The baker came out of her shop in her robe and put her arms around me from behind.

"Her wedding's Friday," I said to nobody.

"I know, honey."

"It's Tuesday."

The firefighters worked until three in the morning.

Damiano stood beside me the whole time with his arm strapped to his chest.

When it was over, he took off his suit jacket with one hand and put it around me.

Something heavy bumped my hip inside my own coat.

The passbook.

The first sketchbook.

Everything else I owned was gone.

Those two were warm against my ribs.

I started to laugh, and Damiano held on to me until it stopped.

We slept at the brick house.

My old room still had the quilt and the brass lock.

I didn't lock it.

At seven the bride called.

"My grandmother says it burned."

"It burned."

"The dress too?"

"The dress too."

She didn't cry. That was worse.

"Okay," she said. "I'll wear my mom's blue suit. It's fine. It's fine."

"Don't you put on that suit," I said. "Be at Pasquale's house at nine."

"What for?"

"A fitting."

Damiano paid for eleven yards of ivory satin from the wholesaler on Roosevelt before I could argue.

"It's for the bride," he said. "Not for you. Be mad at me after Friday."

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