The Viking carried the guitar through the darkness of the subway tunnel. He stopped to listen in a shadow between the dim red-orange LEDs that illuminated the length of the narrow maintenance path.

He brought the bottle to his lips and let the wine unfurl its ribbon over his tongue and through his teeth. He closed his eyes and could smell and taste the sweet oats they used to keep in a bag on the tack shed floor for the horse, the plum fruit of her nape, the crisp pine needle crushed between finger and thumb and inhaled up a nostril, and a dark chocolate finish.

They watched the van burn, a blazing funeral pyre on this frozen eve. And though the old hippie did not believe in any god, he said a quiet word for the people who were gone: Bridger, Katelyn, Alan, Mickey, and the boy known as Spike. He shut his eyes, trying his best to will their memories into the ephemeral and eternal flames.