Page 5 of The Troll’s Summer Flame

“Tuna?” Andrea asks, rushing to hold it out to me.

She’s so short that I have to come down several steps to reach it, even when she’s in these strange shoes with big flat heels and laces all over her foot. Sandals meet heels, I guess. “Thank you.”

“Th-thirty volunteers are a lot.”

Why do people in emergencies try to make small talk?

I guess this isn’t an emergency. “Mmhm.” Half of them are members of the paranormal community. Three Wymark warlocks who can put down almost any blaze before it turns into a two-alarmer. Ian Fenclan, the big old Orc, King Silverbow, the pretty boy hockey player, even with his dodgy knee, and the two mothmen in town, our own smokejumpers. But I can’t tell her that.

“It’s good for a small town.”

“I guess being civic-minded is important here.” An edge creeps into her voice, and I don’t like it.

“Mmhm.” I don’t like it, but I’m not gonna talk to her about it. I’m creeping up on the cat with the tuna outstretched like an offering to a supreme being, moving nice and slow.

“If you’re not volunteering for everything, you’re going out of your mind, I guess. There’s nothing to do in this town. It’s... It’s such an old people town. And everyone is paired up. It’s like, if you don’t have a significant other, what do you do? There’s a movie theater, a bowling alley, hockey games... Things you go to with someone. And the only bar or thing that’s close to a club is that roadhouse outside of town that’s kind of... Yeah. I wouldn’t go there alone.”

Well, she’s right about Jax Alley. “Good cat,” I say, and almost die of shock when the cat, who has its claws embedded in the wood so far that I can see the little pink sheaths around the base of each little white claw—gives me the cutest, sweetest meow, head turning towards me. If a cat could talk, I would think it just said, “Thank God you’re here. Save me, big ugly non-human!”

“Almost,” I tell the lady beneath me, eyes locked on the cat. I put the tuna in front of him, right under his nose. He takes a tentative sniff and waits.

“The next place I get is going to have some kind of cat-proof door. Or at least better latches. This one pops open if you don’t slam it hard. I think he followed me out when I took out the trash. He never has before, but...”

“You getting one of the new townhouses at Pine Point?” I ask. I just did, after years of sleeping in the woods and, after I took this job, the station. Of course, I still sleep there when I have to be on overnight duty. Maybe it’d be nice if she were in the neighborhood.

“No, I’m moving out of the town as soon as I find another job in the Jersey City area.”

“Ah.”

The cat is distracted by the fish, and I brace my feet, put one arm on the branch at the base where it connects to the trunk, and grab.

The cat protests, but I’ve got him, and I’m fast. I swing down the ladder without too much regard for how I’ll land, since troll bones are a similar consistency to granite. In three seconds, I’m down, and the cat is back in Andrea’s arms.

If I thought she was pretty before, it’s nothing compared to the adoring, relieved, utterly overjoyed look she gives this furry troublemaker.

It’s nothing to the smile she gives me. It’s like a ray of sun, and some trolls turn to stone in the sunlight. I don’t, not being aligned with creatures of darkness any longer, but for a second, I feel like I’m a frozen statue. I don’t think anyone has ever made me feel like pure sunlight has shot through my soul. Which is funny, because I’ve helped save lives, delivered babies, picked up elderly people from falls, saved people from fires and car wrecks...

And now Andrea is alternately hugging and scolding the cat, speaking in two languages, and wagging her finger in the cat’s face, even as it purrs and rubs itself all over her cheeks and chin.

Lucky cat.

Lucky kids, I find myself thinking. Kids who get to learn from her every day, with her pretty voice and her sweet smile. Even the way she scolds seems like a blend of serious and silly. As though she wants you to do better because it’ll be sad if you don’t, not that you need to be scared of pain and punishment if you fail.

My father is the one who decided it was too dangerous to continue living in the way most trolls choose, preying on any living thing, being dirty, dangerous creatures often mistaken for serial killers and poachers—and I guess we were both. He made my mother, brothers, and me learn a different way of life, a life that was human-adjacent. There was no schooling, though, except from my mother, and she wasn’t a kind or willing teacher.

“I should have known, huh?” Andrea is still cradling the kitty with adoration seeping from every pore, almost singing to it, swaying from side to side. “There are new teachers at the school every few years. High turnover rate. Must mean that this town—”

“Must mean what?” I surprise myself by asking the question in a harsh voice.

Yes, I love this town. It’s the only place where I’ve been treated like a valuable person, like a helper. Like a friend, even if I don’t want friendship. I still know that people will rush to help me if I need them, and that’s something trolls can’t say, as trolls are known to fight to the death over everything from a leg of mutton to a prime cave spot.

“That this town... That this town isn’t right for me.” Andrea looks startled.

“Why?”

Why is right! Why am I asking? It’s her life. I don’t care if she moves to Mars and takes a whole herd of cats with her.

“Well, not just me, but a lot of young teachers, I guess. It’s a nice little place, but it’s not great if there’s downtime. In the summer, a teacher who can’t afford to travel and who doesn’t have friends and family here would go out of their mind.”