The Scorched Girls Signed Paperback

Raye Diante dipped his brush into the large tub of paint, then swept his arm in an
arc, splattering the canvas with a red the same shade as blood.

As was his signature style, his painting was of the
desert on a large canvas. He guessed some would call it abstract art—in that it
wasn’t immediately obvious what the image was—but it made sense to him.

He stepped back to take in the whole picture and
tugged down the hem of his short-shorts, ensuring his butt cheeks were covered.

Raye didn’t class himself as a transvestite or
even a drag queen, he simply enjoyed how he felt in what society called women’s
clothing. His cowboy boots hit mid-calf, exposing what he thought to be a great
set of legs. They were bare right up to the frayed bottoms of his washed-out
denim Daisy-Duke shorts. His top was equally revealing, showing off his naval and
abs, and today his long hair was braided, Viking style, as was the style of his
makeup, with black eyeliner ringing his baby-blue eyes. He considered his eyes
to be his best feature, which was saying a lot, as he generally thought all his
features were pretty damned good.

It was four in the morning, but the small town
around him was far from sleeping. After the sun went down was when Sandtown,
California, came to life.

It took a special kind of person to live in the
middle of the desert during the summer. In the daytime, temperatures rose to
more than a hundred degrees, and it was impossible to do much other than sleep
under the misting systems that most of the long-termers had installed around
their trailer homes.

Raye used the nights to work.

He sold his art to tourists who came to gawp at
the place many considered to be the last lawless town in America. It made him
chuckle how much people were willing to pay for something that only took him a
matter of hours. It wasn’t that he didn’t put much effort into his work, but he
painted in a flurry of energy and excitement, caught up in the moment, so the
piece was completed quickly.

The tourists thought it made them cool to take a
real part of Sandtown home with them.

 Raye took
pride in his work, and not every piece made it to the small store he ran off
the side of his trailer home. He didn’t even need much money, especially since
he was clean now. Most of it went to gas or the generator, or food and water,
or simply more painting supplies. He didn’t want for much.

The nearest grocery store was a Mini-Mart four
miles away in a town called Calrock. The residents of Sandtown didn’t have the
infrastructure to keep substantial quantities of food chilled or frozen for any
length of time, so they did runs into town, often picking things up for their
friends and neighbors to save too many unnecessary trips. Gas was expensive
these days, and though they lived in RVs and campers, they didn’t all have
separate vehicles as well.

Raye rinsed off his brush and dipped the bristles
into the yellow paint pot this time.

Before the paint reached the canvas, he stopped, lifted
his chin, and sniffed the air. Above the sharp tang of paint and denatured
alcohol, something was burning.

That wasn’t unusual in itself. People often had
bonfires, sometimes to destroy trash, other times to simply party around. The
smoke in the air didn’t smell like a bonfire, though. It was different, and his
skin prickled with awareness that something wasn’t quite right.

Raye lowered the brush and dunked it back in the denatured alcohol to prevent it drying out. He picked
up a cloth, wiped his hands, then headed outside.

His neighbor, DeeDee, sat out on a hammock,
reading a book by a small lamp and swatting away the numerous bugs attracted by
the light. A crocheted rug covered most of her body as protection against the
night chill. She was a skinny woman who could be anywhere from forty to sixty.
Whenever he’d tried to find out, she’d tapped the side of her nose and said, ‘That’s
only for me to know.’

She noticed him standing there. “You okay,
sweetie?”

Raye frowned. “I’m not sure. You smelling that?
Something’s burning.”

DeeDee worked in fashion, altering old items of
clothing she picked up—making bags out of old pairs of jeans, or dresses out of
oversized t-shirts. Her shop—which was another trailer—was where he’d gotten
his short-shorts from. They all had to make a living some way or another. More
recently, a few of them had started doing online work, even making YouTube
channels about their lives out in Sandtown, but for the most part, the long-termers,
known as Sanders, still made their money selling items to tourists or each
other.

DeeDee sat up and put her book to one side. “It’ll
just be them over at The Crowbar, won’t it? Partying, as usual.”

The club, located on the other side of town, often
had live music, provided by the residents of Sandtown. The bands and singers
didn’t get paid to play—it was simply something they enjoyed. Hella Billy—an
ex-biker from Florida—ran The Crowbar and had done so for years.

“Nah, that’s more like metal burning,” Raye said.

Clutching the blanket around her, DeeDee swung
her legs out of the hammock and got to her feet. She craned her neck as though
hoping to spot something. “Maybe someone’s set fire to one of the old vehicles on
the outskirts of town. Teens screwing around. You know what they can be like
once they’ve got a few drinks, or something a bit stronger, into them.”

She was probably right, but Raye couldn’t shake
the feeling that something was off.

“I think I’m gonna check it out,” he told her.

She shrugged one shoulder. “Be my guest.”

Raye grabbed a light jacket from his trailer and
headed along the road in the direction he thought the smoke was coming from.
None of the roads in Sandtown had been paved, but they’d all been driven on so
much now that the sand and dirt had compacted into a solid surface.

Though most people who lived here year round
started their homes in a trailer, most expanded their living space with more permanent
structures created out of whatever they could get their hands on. Raye had been
in Sandtown for six years now, but before that he’d spent most of his forty
years homeless, trying to get by in Los Angeles. Like many of the other Sanders,
he’d had issues around alcohol and drugs, something that had been the result of
mental health issues since he was a teen. His brother had found this place for
him and loaned him the money to buy the trailer which was now his home. Raye
didn’t know where he’d be without that helping hand.

Most likely dead.

As he walked, he noted the art that was
everywhere. It was one of the things he loved about Sandtown. Bright graffiti
covered the sides of the trailers and RVs, and pretty much anything else that
was standing still long enough for someone to paint. Metal scrap work had been
turned into sculptures and art installations created out of them.

Sandtown was a mecca for creative people, but
also people who struggled in normal society. Drug and alcohol use were rife, as
was crime. People got desperate, and there was no police department here. The
inhabitants of Sandtown took care of those who wronged them in their own way.

Raye nodded his hellos and lifted his hand to
those residents who acknowledged him passing. He didn’t ask any of them about
the fire, aware he’d most likely get pulled into a conversation and it would
delay him actually finding out if his suspicions were right.

An endless expanse of stars stretched overhead.
He thought it was the most beautiful thing in the world. Kind of ironic that
the most beautiful thing in the world wasn’t actually part of the world, but
something beyond it. He’d never known so many stars even existed before he’d
moved out here; the light pollution in Los Angeles meant he hadn’t been able to
see them. Strange how something that was supposed to help you see actually made
you more blind to what was really out there.

In the distance, an orange glow lit the desert
sky.

That direction was nowhere near the club, or the
pile of abandoned vehicles that were basically metal shells now. The glow
looked like it was coming from one of the trailers.

“You okay, Raye?” Nelson, an older skinny man who
ran the garage, called out to him.

Raye didn’t pause his pace but called out, “I
think one of the trailers is on fire!”

As a rule, Raye didn’t run. He couldn’t remember
the last time he walked at anything more than a brisk pace, but he found his legs
moving faster than they had in a long time. Tension ramped up, and his heart
beat faster, his mouth running dry.

He turned a bend, bringing him to one of the
areas of town that normally served the snowbirds. Most of the sites were empty
this time of year, waiting to be filled by those who only arrived when the
cooler months did.

But there was one trailer sitting there. And it
was burning.

The orange glow in the trailer’s windows wasn’t
anything like an electric light, and it was far too bright to be that of
candles. The way it flickered and moved, like a living thing, jolted something
inside him.

“Fire!” Raye yelled, picking up his pace. “There’s
a fire!”

He racked his brains to try and remember who
owned the trailer but drew a blank. Old Fitz used to have this spot, but he’d
died going on twelve months ago now. His old body couldn’t take the heat anymore,
and he’d finally succumbed to it. The site had been standing empty for months
after that. It had only been recently that someone else had taken the spot, but
for the life of him, Raye couldn’t remember who. People were always coming and
going from Sandtown. During the summer months, like now, there tended to only
be a couple of hundred of the long-termers here, but in the winter months, the
numbers swelled to the thousands. It was impossible to keep track of everyone.

The shout of ‘fire’ had brought others out of
their homes, and now he found he wasn’t alone. Other residents had joined him,
so he’d created a trail of them behind him.

Living somewhere as dry and hot as Sandtown, and
being a long way from any fire department, fire could do some serious damage.
One of the other long-termers—another artist, but one who worked with metal,
called Tye Guess—lost his entire home and workshop not so long ago because he’d
left a chunk of glass in a spot that had magnified the sun, and a nearby piece
of paperwork had caught fire. They’d been lucky in that it hadn’t spread to any
nearby properties, but the place had been burned to the ground, and poor Tye
had been forced to start over.

More people came running—most of whom he’d known
for years. DeeDee had left her hammock and joined them, as had Nelson Buccani,
the mechanic. Raye even spotted some of the guys from the club. News of the
disturbance had got them on their motorbikes to check it out.

“Who’s got a phone?” someone shouted. “Call
nine-one-one.”

Raye shook his head. “We don’t have time for
that. The whole place will be gone by the time the fire department arrives.”

“Is anyone living there?” DeeDee asked.

“Yeah,” Nelson said, “it’s that young couple. The
ones who arrived a couple of months ago.”

“Fuck.” Raye looked around, hoping he would see
them standing with everyone else. “Are they in there? Has anyone seen them?”

DeeDee’s face crumpled with worry. “I don’t know.
We need some water. Someone gets some buckets.”

 “Water’s
not going to do it,” Raye said. “We need fire extinguishers.”

“I’ve got one in my trailer,” someone shouted and
was met with replies of, “Me too.”

The small group burst into action, most likely
happy to have something productive to do. The fire appeared to be contained
down one end of the trailer for the moment, but it wouldn’t stay that way for
long. If the young couple was still inside, the fire—or more likely the
smoke—would kill them.

Not thinking, Raye ran up to the trailer door and
grabbed the handle. For a split second, his brain couldn’t seem to process if
what he was touching was freezing cold or burning hot, but then the pain hit
him. He let out a yell and snatched his hand away again. A bright-red line ran
across his palm.

Fuck.

He stared at the handle. The door hadn’t moved
during the brief time he’d grabbed it. Why was that? Had the heat welded the
door shut? Or was it locked?

“Hey!” he shouted. “Is anyone in there? You need
to get out. There’s a fire!”

Would anyone inside even still be alive? He couldn’t
imagine what the temperature was like inside the trailer.

He yanked off his top and wrapped it around his
hand as protection and tried again. The material protected his skin, at least
momentarily, before he had to let go. It was long enough for him to know that
the door wasn’t opening.

“Shit. It won’t open.” He turned to the others,
hoping one of them would come up with an idea about what to do next.

A couple of the men had returned with full-sized
fire extinguishers.

“Someone break down the door!” a woman shouted.

“Or smash a window,” Nelson suggested.

“Won’t that make things worse?” said DeeDee. “I
thought you weren’t supposed to allow oxygen on a fire.”

Nelson stared at her. “How can we make things
fucking worse? The whole trailer is burning up.”

Someone picked up a large rock—there were plenty
lying around—and smashed one of the windows. Smoke billowed out, toxic black
plumes into the desert night, and instinctively, Raye ducked. The flames grew
larger, but then someone stuck the hose of the fire extinguisher through the hole
the smashed glass had left and let out a blast.

Raye didn’t think there was any possible way it
would work, but amazingly, they at least seemed to be containing the fire.

Had the couple locked it from the inside, and had
there been an accident, maybe a candle caught a drape or something and they were
too out of it to notice? Smoke killed more people than fire in these
situations, though the fire would have done a number on their bodies by now as
well.

Or had someone else started the fire and locked
the couple in there?

The young woman who lived closest to the burning
trailer spoke up.

“I saw them fighting in front of their trailer
earlier tonight,” Stormi said. “The two of them were screaming at each other.
The guy got right up in the girl’s face. I was considering intervening, but
then she turned around and ran back inside.”

All kinds of scenarios ran through Raye’s head.
Had the man done something to the girl and then started the fire to cover his
tracks? Could the fire have been started on purpose?

One thing about the Sanders, when they needed to
come together, they did, and they did it well.

“Has anyone got a flashlight?” he asked. “I need
to get inside.”

Someone handed him one.

Hella Billy, who was well over six feet tall and
almost as wide, stepped forward. “Let me.”

He had a metal rod that he jammed in the
doorframe and used his strength to crack the lock. Something caught, and Billy
brought the rod down again, and the door flew open.

More smoke billowed out. It caught in the back of
Raye’s throat, and he coughed, doubling over. He held the back of his hand to
his mouth.

“Don’t go in there, Raye,” Nelson called to him.

“I have to check. Someone might need help.”

Deep down, he knew that if anyone had been inside
during the fire, they’d be dead by now, but if he didn’t check, it would
forever play on his mind that maybe he could have saved someone.

He stumbled up the steps, keeping his head down
and his mouth covered. The heat was intense. The metal of the trailer was still
hot. His eyes streamed with the toxic smoke, and he did his best not to inhale.
They’d managed to keep the worst of the fire confined to the bedroom, but there
was still a huge amount of damage.

He turned toward the bedroom. The fire had burned
a hole through the top panel of the door, and through the gap, and the smoke,
Raye was able to make out the room beyond.

In what remained of the bed, lay the scorched
figures of the young couple.

They were well beyond saving.