Pick o' the Day: The Grackle Catcher (cont.)

            “FIRE!” yelled Hank.  “OH, NO!”  The ancient, dried-out canvas that formed the sides and ends of his humble shelter was ablaze!  The first things that came to his mind were “THE CATS!”, and then “THE POPCORN!”  He grabbed at the trailer’s door and yanked it open.  Immediately, the three full-grown cats flew out, hitting him in rapid-fire succession as if they were shot out of a semi-automatic cat-gun, and knocking him down to the ground in the process.  Hank immediately picked himself back up and dove into the trailer, keeping low to avoid the dark cloud of choking smoke that was quickly filling the upper half of the small living space.  He heard the frantic mewing of the kitten in a far corner of his bed, and he crawled to it, ignoring the hot ashes falling like blazing snowflakes onto his head.  He then cradled the tiny, terrified tabby in the crook of his right arm, in much the same way he would a grackle, and because of this, he had to crawl back out using a sort of side-stroke swimming technique to pull himself along the floor using only his left arm.  Reaching the doorway again, he slid out headfirst straight to the ground, gave the kitten a gentle toss into a tuft of green grass, and started rolling in the dirt, thinking for sure he was on fire himself.  Finding that not to be the case, Hank sat back up, wiped his eyes, and started back to the trailer.  He had to get the popcorn out of there before it blew!  There were at least five cases of Orville Redenbachers’s stacked on a small counter next to the little microwave, and if the intense heat of the out-of-control fire made it all go off at once… a horribly vivid mental picture formed in his mind of a gigantic, Jiffy-Pop-like mushroom cloud erupting tens of thousands of feet into the sky out of “Hoolia’s” back yard, followed by a devastating shock wave leveling the entire impoverished neighborhood, followed by a light, buttery fallout raining down upon the smoking ruins!  Hank could not, would not, let this happen!

            Just as he was about to throw himself back into the burning trailer, a sudden blast of ice-cold water hit him in the back, just below the shoulder blades, and the unexpected shock of it made him let out a girlish shriek as he jumped about three feet into the air!  Upon landing, he turned around and immediately got it right in the face.  “Stop it!” he spluttered, waving his hands blindly in the air, not knowing what was going on.  The assault on his face ceased, and Hank, wiping and blinking the water out of his eyes, discovered it was “Hoolia” doing the shooting.  She was standing there wide-eyed, with garden hose and high-pressure nozzle in hand, and she was now spraying down his legs.  He understood then what she was doing.  She knew he had to go back into the burning trailer, and that there would be no talking him out of it, so she was wetting him down first.  This could buy him a few more seconds, maybe.  He was soon completely sopping, and she looked satisfied with her work, so she lowered the hose, made the Sign of the Cross, and said, “Vaya con Dios, Hank Wendt!”  Then she turned her attention and the full force of the hose onto the raging fire.

            Back into the mini-inferno he went!  He would have to try to hold his breath, for there was no air left in the smoke-filled trailer, and he certainly could not see anything.  But he knew where the popcorn was stacked, and before you could say “John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt”, all five cases, one after the other, were quickly heaved out.  And right behind the last one came Hank, coughing uncontrollably, carrying the microwave oven under his left arm and his treasure box under his right.  After taking three wobbly steps away from the trailer, he collapsed.  And then everything went dark...

(Next week:  The Grackle Catcher continues as Hank's unconscious mind travels back in time to revisit his failed marriage to his childhood sweetheart.)