The dark street corner is lit by a single dim light in the crosshairs of two crookedly angled streets. At the top of that X-intersection, among tree stumps and a dozen abandoned and ruined panel houses that once formed a temporary work settlement some decades ago, a single surviving dwelling is lonesome looking.
From inside their car, dry from the rain, parked directly across the house, the man in the hat and his ugly scarred companion are watching the shabby two-by-two wooden building. In the top right window, that’s open, a single lightbulb hangin from the ceiling shines over the bedroom of little Jefferson. The hatless shorter man sniffs, coughs, and declares “that’s the only family left, mom and a boy, and they ain’t going to last long, will scat the hellouttahea soon enough,”. The men stare in anticipation and wait for the results of their wicked work.
The rain outside doesn’t obstruct the view inside: Jeff’s mom sits next to him, bed-side, waiting for her young boy to fall asleep. The rain droplets shoot into the dilapidated roof, sip through it and onto the innocent targets inside. Mom’s face glitters every time it’s struck with water and she clutches her precious boy ever so more tightly with every drop to hit her feeble stretched torso. The shifting of her weight, to fully reach and cover Jeff’s far side, to coddle him dry, pushes the bed against the rotten floorboards barely enough for an irritating squeak and Jeff’s eyes wake back open.
Mom stands up and almost walks out of sight, immediately returning with a yellow toy. She spins and twirls it up in the air, bobbing her head along, apparently to calm her child. Small hands reach into the light and fondle the moist fluffy toy. A trickle of unclean water glides down the boy’s arm and his silhouette sits up. Slanted, sleepless and wet, he turns his head upwards, towards mom and the light, and the ceiling, right at the moment when a big, loaded water droplet trickles from the roof and smashes down onto the spot, right between Jeff’s eyes. Startled by the splash, his drowsy face adds tears to the raindrops.
Completely inaudible from the distance, mom’s exasperated grunt is obvious to imagine from afar — midst wiping Jeff’s face with her sleeve, she stands up and arches her shoulders and back skyward, visibly pushing all the air out of her lungs and shoots the angriest of looks up at the ceiling, at the roof, at the sky and all the unfairness. Her sight is pointed directly at it — though the roof is in the way and it’s impossible for her to see the short-circuit spark that starts the fire of their demise right above.
“She can’t possibly see it, Bob”, the scarred man’s eyes were glued to the scene.
“It don’t even matter any more. It work’d, job’s done… here it comes!”
Her lungs now empty and prayers unanswered, mom’s shoulders droop to relax and she peers out the window, spotting a rarity of a parked car on the street. The men are frozen nervous, bouncing their eyes between the mom’s deadly squinting stare and the formidable flames of fire forming feet over her head.
Within seconds, the fire is raging and mom surrenders to destiny with a plop back down next to Jeff. She caresses his hair and together they play with the spongy yellow toy. With expressions of love and burden, mom speaks to Jeff and then kisses his forehead, right as lights go out and the stage goes dark. Fire spreads through the dark corners and soon a thunderous rumble shakes the foundation of the two-by-two building and small clouds of ash-dust burst out of the cracked side- panels to mix in with the pouring rain.
The car drives off and the dark street corner is ominously empty, lit by a single dim light in the center.
