And who is my neighbor?

I don't know exactly why I stepped outside. It was just to see what the temperature was like, I think, and then to look up at the brightness of the night sky on an unusually warm February evening.

The moment I stepped outside, though, I knew something was off. There was the smell of fire, not of wood, but that acrid sharpness of synthetics and plastics burning. I stepped from our carport, and the street was filled with smoke, hanging heavy around the streetlights.

I called out my younger son, who agreed that there was something amiss. We prowled down the street, checking, smelling, observing.