The Fire Pit

Chapter One

PART 1

"Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars." –Khalil Gibran

As the sun was rising over Yuba City, a small California town, Evelyn Dane perched on the edge of the rooftop, wondering whether or not she'd break her legs if she dared jump from twenty-five feet high.

Evelyn had always been athletic, even though standing at a mere five feet three inches tall, she looked more delicate and fragile than athletic, yet underneath her small frame and soft exterior was a toned body. Her eyes flitted back and forth, watching the people rise and begin their morning rituals before heading off to work.

Yuba City was a rundown, beaten up, little craphole, but it was her rundown, beaten up, little craphole. Evelyn came from the poverty-stricken side of town. Her own house wasn't much. Where the yellow paint was chipping and falling to the earth, was the white paint that'd been there before the yellow and the brick pathway leading up to her house was in desperate need of repairs. The roof shingles had been slowly falling apart for years. Evelyn was surprised she hadn't slipped on a shingle and fallen off.

"Evie, is that you?"

Evelyn peered over the edge of the roof and looked down into the next yard. A slight old woman with short, curling white hair stood below, hands on her wide hips. It was Grandma Pace.

"Hi, Grandma," Evelyn said, smiling the way young children did when they'd just been caught doing something wrong.

"Get your skinny butt down here and into this house."

Without another word, Grandma Pace stomped back into her house. Arabella and James Pace were Evelyn's next door neighbors, an older couple in their mid-eighties. They'd been there for as long as she could remember, one of her only constants in this chaotic life.

Evelyn had lived in her current house her entire life, and the Pace's had always been there. When she was little, they'd insisted that she call them Grandma and Grandpa, and she had ever since. To them she was part of the family, and vice-versa, her own grandparents having died when she was young.

Evelyn muttered as she lowered herself over the edge of the roof, gripping tightly. She lightly swung her legs, then catapulted herself onto the nearest branch of the California Sycamore tree that stood tall and secure, right outside her bedroom window.

She grabbed the branch and, like a monkey, scaled the branch until she came to the trunk. Evelyn clung to it tightly and began to shimmy herself down the tree.

When she finally hopped down to the grass, there were pieces of light-colored bark and leaves covering her t-shirt and jeans. She brushed them off, watching them fall to the ground, before starting towards Grandma's house.

Evelyn walked down her driveway and into the street. Thomas Avenue was a short street that dead-ended into a small, circular round-about connected to a dirt driveway that led to the Pace's property. The Pace's house was the very last house on Thomas Avenue. Evelyn's was right beside it, and across from her house was the only black man on their street—BJ.

BJ was Grandpa Pace's best friend. He was younger than him by at least fifteen years, but the age difference bothered neither of them. BJ did odd jobs around the neighborhood, including mowing her lawn every week.

Evelyn walked up the dirt path until she hit gravel. The Pace house wasn't a ginormous house, but it was decently sized; sure as hell bigger than her tiny house. The one-story home that had housed at least five generations of Pace's, was as familiar to her as her own house was. Like everywhere else in the neighborhood, the faded white paint was cracked and chipping, and the windows were extremely outdated.