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Burning, dwindling, it tried to sing the song that would drahat it required, but the roaring flames filled its mouths and soon silenced it

Joel Ganowicz found hi two hundred feet from a ramshackle house that had exploded in fla a hundred feet into the clear sky, black s to billow up, the old walls of the place collapsing in upon theive up the pretense of usefulness The heat washed over hih he was not particularly close to it He couldn’t understand how a little dry wood could burn that intensely

He realized that he could not remember how the fire had started He was just suddenly there, in front of it

He looked at his hands They were abraded and filthy

The right knee was torn out of his corduroys, and his Rockports were badly scuffed

He looked around and was startled to see scores of people in his same condition, tattered and dirty and dazed He couldn’t reotten there, and he definitely didn’t recall setting out on a group hike

The house sure was burning, though Wouldn’t be a stick of it left, just a cellarful of ashes and hot coals

He frowned and rubbed his forehead

So … He was a reporter, and his curiosity was gradually reasserting itself So disturbing Very disturbing But at least it was over now

He shivered

41

When they entered the house in Sherman Oaks, the music on Scott’s stereo, upstairs, was turned so loud that the ere vibrating

Sa for Tessa and Chrissie to follow They were reluctant, probably e out of place, but he was not certain he could do what had to be done if he went up there alone

The door to Scott’s roo black jeans and a black denim shirt His feet were toward the headboard, his head at the foot of the mattress, propped up on pillows, so he could stare at all of the posters on the wall behind the bed: black- leather and chains, some of them with bloody hands, some with bloody lips as if they were va skulls, one of the out cupped hands filled with glistening ots

Scott didn’t hear Sam enter With the music at that volume, he wouldn’t have heard a thermonuclear blast in the adjacent bathroo the right thing Then he listened to the belloords of the nuuitar chords It was a song about killing your parents, about drinking their blood, then "taking the gas-pipe escape" Nice Oh, very nice stuff That decided him He punched a button and cut off the CD in ht up in bed "Hey!"

Sam took the CD out of the player, dropped it on the floor, and ground it under his heel

"Hey, Christ, what the hell are you doing?"

Forty or fifty CDs, mostly black-metal albums, were stored in open-front cases on a shelf above the stereo Sam swept them to the floor

"Hey, co I should’ve done long ago"

Noticing Tessa and Chrissie, who stood just outside the door, Scott said, "Who the hell are they?"

Sa hie, all lathered up, the boy said, "What the fck are they doing here, iddy He wasn’t sure why Maybe because he was finally doing so responsibility for it He said, "They the fck are with ain

He felt sorry that he had exposed Chrissie to this, but then he looked at her and saw that she was not only unshaken but giggling He realized that all the angry and bad words in the world couldn’t hurt her, not after what she had endured In fact, after what they’d all seen in Moonlight Cove, Scott’s teenage nihilisether ridiculous

Saan to tear the posters off the wall, and Scott started screa up full volume, a real tantrum this time Sam finished with those posters he could reach only froot down, and turned toward those on another wall

Scott grabbed him

Gently, Sam pushed the boy aside and clawed at the other posters

Scott struck him

Sam took the blow, then looked at him

Scott’s face was brilliant red, his nostrils dilated, his eyes bulging with hatred

S

At first Scott clearly didn’t understand as happening He thought his father was justto punish him, so he tried to pull away But suddenly it dawned on hied, his oldhiers When that realization hit hi, pushing hard against Sam, desperate to escape, because this didn’t fit into his belief in a loveless world, especially if he started to respond

That was it, yes, damn, Sam understood now That was the reason behind Scott’s alienation A fear that he’d respond to love, respond and be spurned … or find the responsibility of commitment too much to bear

In fact, for a moment, the boy ht It was as if the real Scott, the kid hidden under the layers of hipness and cynicisood reed

But then the boy began to curse Sam in more explicit and colorful tered hian to tell him that he loved him, desperately loved him, told him not the way that he had told him he loved hiht Cove on Monday night, not with any degree of reservation occasioned by his own sense of hopelessness, because he had no sense of hopelessness any more This time, when he told Scott that he loved hiain and again, de now, and Sa, too, but he didn’t think they were crying for the saet away, his energy depleted, but still struggling So Saoing to care about me, one way or the other, sooner or later Oh, yes You’re going to know that I care about you, and then you’re going to care aboutto care about yourself, too, and it’s not going to stop there, either, hell, no, you’re going to find out you can care about a lot of people, that it feels good to care You’re going to care about that wo to care about that little girl, you’re going to care about her like you’d care about a sister, you’re going to learn, you’re going to get the damn machine out of you and learn to be loved and to love There’s a guy going to cos, and he believes life is worth living Maybe he’s going to stay a while, see how he likes it, see how he feels about it, ’cause maybe he can show you what I was too slow to show you--that it’s good, life’s good And this guy’s got a dog, what a dog, you’re going to love that dog, probably the dog first" Sahed and held fast to Scott "You can’t say ’Get outtaand expect hiet out of your face, so you’ll have to love hi , just a s on, i"