Fire in the Sky

Far off to the west, a shawl of muted colors moved and broke apart as the memory of the sun gave way to a gray darkness. Lightning flashed in the near distance. He could smell the coming rain.

In the hills, twenty miles from the nearest town, he made his home. And a mile down a winding gravel track to the highway sat his store and gas station. He had one employee who alternated the six-hour late shift with him. That’s all he needed. A small store for a meager income and a small home in the hills. He was happy, rarely questioning his aloneness or wondering of the happenings beyond. And he sat on the flat table-rock behind his home and looked down on the light and shadow of the steel canopy that sheltered the two gas pumps. This he did on his off nights, counting the cars that visited his store.

A car pulled in, then disappeared from his view, parking close to the store. His vision took in only the canopy lights over the gas pumps and the shadows. A couple minutes later, another two cars arrived, seconds behind each other, and parked at the pumps. Busy night, he thought.

A young woman stepped from her car. She eyed the gray sedan parked close to the store, then turned as a small sports car pulled into the bay next to her. The young man in the convertible smiled and stood, closing his car door.

“You’ve been following me,” she said to him.

“I have. Sorry. It’s a lonely road, and I thought if this British machine dies on me, I could flash my lights at you, and you would rescue me.”

She laughed. “I’ve not heard a line like that before.” She stepped to the pump.

“I stopped to put the top up. It looks like rain. Did you see the lightning?”

“Where are you going?” she said, waiting for the credit card approval. “What’s your destination?”

“Bakersfield. Yours?”

“L.A.” She pulled the pump nozzle to her car and saw two men inside the store stalking the front aisle. Behind the counter, the clerk loaded a dispenser with packs of cigarettes.

The man for Bakersfield finished latching his car’s top in place. He said, “Los Angeles. Can I follow you? This car really is finnicky.”

“If you can keep up,” she said over her shoulder, then glanced back to the store. The two customers were talking to the kid behind the counter.

A flash of light from the sky, then thunder echoed. Heavy drops of water hit the pavement and sounded atop the metal canopy like falling marbles.

She removed the nozzle and hung it on the pump. Her follower filled his tank. He looked up and smiled. She couldn’t help but smile back. That smile, his eyes…

Claws of lightning opened the sky above them, illuminating the store and the surrounding hills. Immediately, thunder sounded. The young man filling his tank felt a shiver of electricity hit his hand. He dropped the pump nozzle.

“Damn.”

A muffled pop, followed by an explosion of sparks on the power pole.

The lights went out. They stood in darkness listening to the remnant thunder peel off the hills.

“Wow,” she said. “The transformer got hit. Are you alright?”

“Every hair on my arm is at attention. I don’t think I want to touch that pump.”

The pebbling rain muffled his voice. An emergency generator started. Behind him, she saw the interior of the store light up. He could see her face now and followed her gaze. The two customers stood behind the counter, one holding a gun, the other rifling the cash drawer.

He pointed. “Holy shit.”

“Did they kill that kid? We should go. Now.”

She stepped to her car.

“I’ll follow you,” he said, his eyes on the robbers.

“Hurry.” She started her car, watching as the gunman walked around the counter to the door. Pulling forward, she angled for the road, then looked over her shoulder for the man in the sports car. He flashed his lights. His car wasn’t starting. She braked. In the rearview mirror, she saw the robbers standing at the doorway. Her passenger sprinted into the rain, carrying his backpack.

On the hillside, rain fell at the store owner’s feet and stopped. As if he had nature on a leash. He often felt, high above the store, watching the hills as their hues and shadows changed in the twilight, that he was a god on some new Olympus. Tonight, though, he had to deal with a power outage. He’d seen the sparks from the transformer. He shrugged, gazing down at his store, the pumps beneath a dark canopy, only a faint glow from within the store. His thoughts were on closing the store as quickly as he knew how, rearranging the coolers, shutting a couple down to minimize the load on the generator. The store was his life. It occupied the full extent of his vision from the table-rock to his dreams: a tiny structure along a tiny stretch of highway. All else was unimaginable to him, all else happened beyond his knowing.

Lights from two vehicles left the parking lot, moving west. Perhaps, he thought, the other driver is lingering in the store, searching for a Klondike bar for the long drive ahead. He turned toward his home. He would call his night help and tell him he was on his way down.

A coyote barked. The man stopped at his door and listened. He smiled. Life goes on, he said to himself, and to the coyote: “I think I’ll get a Klondike bar. Before they melt.”

Ben Raterman writes from Virginia surrounded by trees, next to a stream that ambles to a lazy river.