Rae had just read her mother's second message when the kitchen light flickered.
A sharp snap came from inside. Len shouted. A pale flash lit the service doorway, and smoke pushed up the two steps.
She was on the porch. She went as far as the open front door.
“Dad!”
Jory came through the hall, backing toward her. “He's down.”
Len stumbled into the kitchen, one hand held against his chest. He caught the table, knocked the orange to the floor and kept moving. Rae could see behind him for a moment. No Elias.
“Where is he?”
“Back wall. He fell.” Len coughed so hard he couldn't finish. Jory took his elbow and got him outside.
Rae updated the operator: smoke, flash, one worker out, Elias still inside the service room. She didn't know how badly he was hurt. Her phone showed eleven nineteen.
“Stay outside,” the operator said. “The crew has the update.”
“I'm outside.”
She was saying it from the threshold, hand on the doorframe. Ruth touched her coat.
“Come here.”
“My father—”
“I know.”
Rae gave the service location again. Through the kitchen she heard a cough, then Elias calling Len's name.
Len bent over beside the van. Rae crouched far enough away to see his face.
“Why can't he get out?”
“His knee. He tried to stand and it wouldn't hold. His arm's burned. I couldn't pull him up.”
“Where exactly?”
“Beside the equipment. Far wall. He was turning back when it went.” Len's breath scraped. “I held the door. He couldn't get up. The smoke—”
He coughed again. Jory was reporting what he knew on his own phone. Rae went along the side of the house, still outside, nearer the kitchen door. Its glass was gray at the top, clear below. She could hear Elias more plainly.
“Rae?”
Her whole body moved toward him.
“I'm here.”
“Don't—”
A cough took the rest. She stopped a pace from the door. She could still see the table through the glass. The room beyond it was two steps lower. She had walked that route carrying coffee and a toolbox, had caught the yellow rail without looking.
Coming back through the kitchen.
The words seemed to fit the place so exactly that she felt late to something she'd already agreed to do. She put a hand against the side wall. Brick pressed hard into her palm.
Ruth called from the front. “They're here.”
Lights washed over the café windows. Rae went to meet the officer, holding the phone out of her way. She gave him her father's name, the service-room position, the steps and what Len had said about the knee and burned arm. She couldn't verify the present electrical state.
“All residents out,” Ruth said, lifting the envelope. “Eleven. In the café.”
The officer took command and directed them clear. He was going toward the rear approach.
“If you hear him from outside, tell the operator where the voice is coming from,” he told Rae. “Keep this access clear.”
The operator on her phone confirmed that the arriving crew had the latest information. She could speak to the officer and call back with any change. Rae ended the connection.
Her phone rang almost immediately. Elias.
She answered so quickly she nearly dropped it.
“Dad?”
Coughing and an uneven sound came through. He wasn't speaking clearly. She said his name again. The connection ended.
She stood with the phone at her ear. A firefighter passed her, carrying equipment through the yard gate. She moved for him, then looked toward the kitchen door again.
Ruth stood close, saying nothing.
Maya's number lit the screen and stopped before Rae answered.
The depot clock showed eleven twenty-one.