A. Homes: Music for Torching

"They're safe enough," the cop says, answering a question that hasn't been asked.

The cop leads them around the perimeter of the house, the beam of his flashlight cutting back and forth across the grass like a tail wagging.

"I feel like a spy," Elaine says. "Like I'm sneaking something."

"It's like one of those historical house tours," the cop says, trying to add something. And they all fall silent.

They're in the backyard. The ground is damp, soggy. With every step there is a thick sucking sound. Their feet sink in. The charred, curdled smell of something gone awry hangs in the air.

"Burnt toast," Elaine says.

"Barbecue," the cop says, and again they are quiet.

The back of the house is black, the stone scorched. Ten feet above their heads the dining room window is blown out, the frame torn from the house.

"This is the worst of it," the cop says.

Elaine sees the grill on the ground, spilled onto its side, the debris of what earlier in the evening seemed so promising lies there like rot. She looks at Paul. "Remember," she says, thinking of seven o'clock when the fire was so thrilling, full of possibility. "Remember?"

Paul says nothing. He was the one who lit the match, who started the fire. Elaine leaned against him to kick the grill, to tip the flames onto the grass. Together they burned down the house, or so it had seemed-so they had hoped.

Elaine moves closer, poking at the grill with the toe of her shoe; the metal has been cooked, baked brittle. Now it is cold and crispy like it could crumble. Are houses like cars? she wonders. Do they ever declare them totaled?

"Can we go in?" Paul asks.

"Water and smoke," the cop says repeatedly when they are inside. "Water and smoke." And where Paul is comforted by the fact that the house has not been completely destroyed, Elaine is depressed. All their huffing and puffing barely blew the diningroom wall down. While Paul and the cop poke at the wall examining the damage, Elaine goes upstairs. There is a dim glow at the end of the hall-Sammy's ducky night-light running on backup batteries. She takes the duck by the neck, holds it in front of her like a candle, and makes her way back downstairs.

Outside, the horn beeps, cutting the night like a blast.

Paul, Elaine, and the cop hurry back to the car.

"Where am I?" Daniel asks. He's sitting up in the front seat.

"Home," Paul says.

"Why aren't we inside?"

"There was a fire," the cop says.

"Did I know that?" Daniel asks. "Am I awake? Am I weird?" Daniel drones.

"Shhhh, don't wake your brother," Elaine says, putting the duck down on the dashboard. It takes a nosedive, landing between the seats, the orange rubber feet poking up.

"Go back to sleep," Paul says, urging the boy into the backseat.

"Is there someone you'd like to call?" the cop asks Elaine. "A friend, a neighbor? Is there somewhere you'd like to go and spend the night?"

"We'll stay here," Paul says. "It's our house, our home." "First thing in the morning you'll want to call your insurance agent, and then come down to the station. This'll be typed. You can just give it your John Hancock."

What is it, Paul wants to know, a report or a confession? He wants to know but doesn't ask.

"Again," the cop says, handing Elaine his card, "I'm sorry about the house. If you need anything, if there's anything I can do, just call."

"What was that all about?" Paul asks when the cop takes off.

"Community service," Elaine says.

She and Paul get back into the car, they roll up the windows and lock the doors. Elaine turns off the duck. They tilt the seats back and close their eyes.

Elaine dreams that she is on a plane. She is on a plane at night, she is alone, she is happy, she is going, going, gone.

When she wakes up, Joan Talmadge and Catherine Montgomery are staring at her through the windshield. They tap on the glass.

"We thought you were dead," Catherine says.

Elaine tilts her seat up. Paul and the children are gone, the backseat is empty.

"We thought you were dead," Catherine repeats.

Elaine rolls down the window.

"Are you all right?" Joan asks.

Elaine nods.

"It was awful," Joan says. "I smelled smoke. 'Is something burning?' I asked Ted. 'Is something burning?' I asked Ted. 'Is something burning? I smell smoke.'"

"We heard the sirens," Catherine says. "I could feel the rumble of the fire trucks. 'Search,' we yelled at the fire chief, 'search.'" "I thought of you and the boys," Joan continues. "The car was gone, but that could have been Paul. Paul could have taken the car."

"Where is Paul?" Catherine asks.

"Right behind you," he says, coming up from the rear.

"You frightened us," Joan says, and it's not clear whether she means last night or now.

"Where were you?" Elaine asks, opening the car door.

"I took the boys for breakfast. I called the insurance agent. It's Memorial Day-there was a parade. I bought this legal pad. I'm making a list."

"What can we do?" Catherine asks.

"And I got a camera so we can document the damage," Paul says, waving a disposable camera.

"Oh," Catherine says, reaching for the camera, "let me take a picture of the two of you."

Paul stands next to Elaine, puts his arm around her, and Catherine snaps. Later, when Elaine picks up the film, the last picture, the thirty-sixth exposure, will be of a breast.

"Whose boob?" she'll ask Paul. "Do you recognize this tit?"

"Tit for tat," Paul will say, looking at the negatives. "It's the last frame. Maybe the guy at the store fired off the last shot. Who can tell?"

It is a holiday. Their friends and neighbors are slow to rise, they sleep late, paying the price for the night before.

"Cooler today, warmer tomorrow, then rain. That's the forecast," Paul says.

Mrs. Hansen from across the street brings over a mug of coffee for Elaine. "I would have been out earlier," she says. "But I drank too much last night. Sugar? Milk?" Elaine shakes her head. "I'm so sorry," Mrs. Hansen says. "About the house. I would have been out, but I drank. It's a federal holiday today," she says. "No bank, no mail, and the liquor store is closed."

In the front yard, the boys play competitive Houdini. They alternate tying each other to the maple tree with pieces of the crime scene tape, timing how long it takes each one to get free. So far, Sammy is winning with a minute thirty-seven.

In a kind of dislocated fugue, broken off from each other and themselves, Elaine and Paul wander back and forth, in and out and around the house, surveying the damage, the aftermath.

"Where does one begin?" Elaine asks.

"Not over the mouth," Paul shouts at Daniel, who's taken the game a bit too far and is now not only tying Sammy to the tree and blindfolding him but taping his mouth as well.

"Let him live," Elaine says, and it's not clear to whom she's talking.

Pat and George Nielson arrive, presiding over the situation like town elders. Even though they are all the same age, the Nielsons did everything first: married, had children, bought a house, a boat, a summer place.

"I don't know where to start," Elaine tells Pat.

"Why don't we go inside and see where you really are," Pat says, leading Elaine and Paul back into the house.

Inside, Elaine notices things she hadn't seen before: melted curtains, the dining room table cleaved in half, singed chairs, bubbly walls, blistered paint. She plucks a broken candlestick off the floor. "Broken," she says. "Everything is history."

"It can be fixed?" Paul asks.

"Who knows? I'm not an expert," Elaine says.

"Almost everything can be put back together, if you've got the pieces," Pat says.

George puts his hand on Paul's shoulder, steering him into the dining room, while Pat takes Elaine's elbow, easing her away. Like trainers, or chaperons, they take Paul and Elaine into separate corners and give them a few pointers, helpful hints, ways of winning, the art of war.