Point Blank Seal

The sirens wailed louder, and Jennifer pointed to the side of the house. “Should we meet them?”

Her neighbor Stephen called over the back fence, “Is that you, Jennifer? What’s going on?”

She yelled, “Fire in the front bedroom. Everyone’s okay. I think the fire department just got here.”

“Oh, my God. Mikey’s room?”

“Yes, but he’s fine. We’re going out front now.”

She led Miguel to the front of the house on the other side of where the fire was blazing.

Mikey lifted his head when they got to the street, now bathed in red light. Neighbors clustered on their porches in their pajamas. The firefighters started working before the trucks even came to a full stop.

Jennifer waved at a police officer getting out of his car, and he approached them.

“Is this your house, sir?”

Miguel pointed to her.

“I rent it. I live here with my son.”

“Is the boy okay?”

“Scared but not injured.” She shifted Mikey to her other hip.

“What happened?”

She felt Miguel stiffen beside her. They hadn’t discussed what to tell the authorities. The truth?

“I—I’m not sure. We were talking in the living room, heard a crash from the front bedroom window and smelled smoke. I heard my son cry out, and my...friend went into the room and grabbed him. We all ran outside to the back of the house then, and I called 9-1-1.”

“A crash, like a broken window?”

Miguel cleared his throat. “Like somebody threw something through the window.”

The cop narrowed his eyes. “You know anyone who would do something like that, ma’am?”

“Of course not.”

Taking out a notebook, the officer asked for their names.

Jennifer didn’t blink an eye when she heard Miguel identify himself as Mike Esteban.

As they continued talking to the police officer, the firefighters seemed to be making short work of the fire that had engulfed Mikey’s bedroom, where flames were shooting up to the roof through the broken window.

Mikey squirmed in her arms, kicking his legs against her hip.

“We need to stay here, Mikey.”

“Do you want me to take him to watch? He seems interested, not scared.”

Miguel hadn’t even formally met Mikey yet. This was his first real contact with his son, and it couldn’t be more disastrous.

With her throat tight, she spilled an all-too-willing Mikey into Miguel’s outstretched arms and murmured, “He likes action. He’s his father’s son.”

Miguel wandered to the other side of the house where Mikey could get a good look at the firefighters at work.

“Ms. Lynch, is that the boy’s father?”

“N-no.”

“Where’s the boy’s father?”

Was the officer trying to imply some former husband had a motive for firebombing her house? A case of jealousy while she enjoyed the company of another man?

“His father’s dead.”

“I’m sorry.” He scratched his chin. “If what you heard is accurate, this sounds like a deliberate act. The arson investigators will do a full analysis, but I’m just trying to get as much information as I can from you to assist them.”

“I understand. I’m a fifth-grade teacher at Richmond Elementary. I don’t have any enemies that I know of and no irate parents that would go to these lengths.”

“You never know what lengths people will go to—until they do.”

Jennifer crossed her arms and shivered. “I suppose I’d better call the rental management company and let them know what happened.”

The cop looked up from writing in his notebook, peering over her head at the house. “You won’t be staying here tonight.”

About an hour later, the fire chief on the scene allowed her to go into the house to collect some of her things.

Miguel joined her inside the house, a sleeping Mikey nestled against his shoulder.

She touched Mikey’s cheek. “Thanks for sitting in the car with him while I talked to the police and firefighters and called the rental agency. You even got him to sleep.”

“After the excitement of watching the firefighters at work, he conked out.” With one finger, Miguel pushed a lock of dark hair from Mikey’s forehead. “He’s incredible.”

“You can put him on my bed while I pack up some of my stuff. The fire didn’t get much farther than Mikey’s room, but I’m going to have to replace his clothes. What the fire didn’t destroy, the water did.”

“It’s just stuff.” Miguel walked past her into the bedroom and put Mikey’s head on the pillow.

A firefighter called into the house from the front door. “Folks, you’re going to have to hurry it up.”

“Just a few more minutes.” She wheeled a suitcase from her closet and shoveled clothes into it. She dumped Mikey’s dirty clothes from the laundry basket into a plastic bag and shoved that into the suitcase.

When she came out of the bathroom with a bag of toiletries, Miguel was on his knees by the side of the bed studying Mikey’s face, stroking his hand with one finger.

Her nose tingled. Miguel’s introduction to his son might not have been ideal, but Mikey had his father back and that’s all that mattered.

“I’m ready. Did you come in a car?”