Page 65 of The Troll’s Summer Flame

Her silence is every dark space I’ve lived in combined. She’s my sunlight. My music.

“Is that, like... a proposal?” Andrea whispers back.

“No! Oh, no, I know. I would have a ring. One knee. I have seen enough movies to know that’s the best thing, the way women like to be asked. I was... I was only planning. Talking.” I shake my head at the stars and sigh, “I am not good at talking.”

“You are excellent at talking. And you’re right. If a guy wants to marry me, I want a ring, and a pretty proposal, and I want my mom and dad to know the guy. But... But that was excellent planning for the future.” Andrea tilts her head back. Her eyes are bright, even in moonlight, and her smile is soft and sleepy. “I approve.”

She approves of me being her husband one day.

“Why four cats?”

“Hm? Oh. I don’t know.”

But I do. Matthew, Randall, Hugo.

And me.

Four little creatures who could grow up in a blend of home and wilderness. Happy. Safe.

“Four little kitties. I love it.”

“I love you.” I kiss Andrea’s hair and sink back against the old stump that cradles us.

This is the life. Everything I thought I knew before?

No comparison.

Chapter Fourteen: This Way Comes

This is the bumpiest car ride. Dad must be driving. Mom isn’t a great driver, either, but Dad thinks everything is a plane.

“Dad, slow down. Speed bumps!” I protest, trying to stop my head from banging against the headrest.

It turns out not to be a car ride. It’s Gordon, who might be faster than a car when he’s in a hurry.

“I’ll be right back. Everything is fine. If you see red haze or thick smoke, I want you to drive away and call 9-1-1.”

My eyes fly open. Gordon is putting me in his truck, which is stupid, because I don’t even think my feet will reach the pedals. I’ll have to stand up to drive.

“Wait! Why am I driving? Smoke? Fire? What’s happening?”

“I think there was a lightning strike in the woods. Minor. Maybe. I have my phone, and remember, I can’t get hurt. You can, so you stay here and be ready to drive, just in case,” Gordon says sternly, and then he bolts.

“No! Wait, you can get hurt. Gordon! Gordon Middle Name Rockland!” I scream.

But my lover is gone, running towards something I can’t see.

When I get closer, I know it’s not a lightning strike. The air doesn’t smell like ozone, and there’s no rain. It’s a balmy night, a little humid, but nothing that would earn heat lightning.

The air smells like sulfur and blood.

I freeze, senses stretching, suddenly acutely aware that I left my Andrea alone. And there are things in Pine Ridge that are unfriendly. To be sure, they don’t last long, but something is here now.

I find the singed spot about a mile and a half from my backyard, a distance that I covered in only about ten minutes. I was sound asleep with Andrea on my chest, basking under the stars and the warmth of the night and the contained, fading embers of our “campfire.” Something woke me. A loud noise and smoke on the wind.

Instincts.

Noises.