House on Fire

185-word microfiction

A motley crew of kids watch wide-eyed. Two squat, the other three lay on their tummies in the tall grass across the street.

Each one watches the house burn from their own private planet.

The leader is the oldest girl, Anna. Bossy Anna orders the others, including my granddaughter Marisa, to do naughty things.

“Go to the kitchen,” she says, “get three black tea bags. Bring a fork to open the tea bags with. Then grind those tea leaves – deeply – into your white carpet.”

Finally — the pièce de ré·sis·tance!

“Go to your Mom’s purse to find a tube of ruby red lipstick. Bring it back to your bedroom…”

“Use it to write cryptic messages on the wall.”

I wonder out loud, “why, if the house burned down, can it still shelter us?” Marisa tells me matter-of-factly , “it happened a long, long, long time ago, Nana. And that house…our house…was rebuilt.”

“How can you be sure?” I ask.

“Sure as fire is hot,” she says, “Anna told me all about it in a dream.”