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mess. Even though the rain was finished, water still dripped from above. Droplets rolled off the leaves and kept splattering my glasses. Although the mist had dissipated somewhat, thick wisps of tenacious fog still floated at ground level, obscuring everything below our knees. Between that and all of the fallen branches, our progress was slow and treacherous. Both of us stumbled several times.  
    “Maybe we should unload the guns until we get there,” I suggested, fearing an accident if either one of us fell.  
    Jeff shook his head. “We need to be ready. What if it rushes us? I’m sure as hell not facing down that thing with an empty rifle.”  
    I took a deep breath and tried not to puke.  
    When Dylan was six months old, he got sick one night. It was the weirdest thing. He’d been fine all day, happy and cooing. Then, night came and he started throwing up. His fever spiked, refusing to go down. We’d rushed him to the emergency room and watched, helpless, while the doctors tried to figure out what was wrong. Marlena sobbed. I felt numb—stunned, like someone had smacked me in the head with a hammer. In the end, everything turned out okay. He’d caught a bad case of the flu. They got some liquids in him and arrested his fever and we took him home. A few days later, he was back to normal. But I’ve never forgotten it. I remember that time well, because I’d never been more scared in my life.  
    Until now.  
    We reached the top of the hill, and the mist cleared. Thena’s shed was just a few paces away from us, right on the edge of the woods where her backyard ended. Beyond the shed, on a slight downhill slope, sat her house. It was silent, and there was no sign of the snake—or anyone else. I glanced across the swollen creek and caught a glimpse of my own home. It seemed very far away at that moment. I glanced up at the sky and wished the clouds would part and the sun would come out in full and burn the rest of the fog and the gloom away, but it didn’t.  
    Jeff raised his hand and motioned me forward. He readjusted his grip on the rifle, and nestled the stock between his arm and shoulder, holding it at the ready. Maybe he was trying to project confidence or bravado, but the whole thing seemed ridiculous to me. We weren’t soldiers. He was a retiree in his sixties and I was a pudgy comic book artist who got winded if I ran more than a quarter mile. But there was no one else to help Thena, or her kids, and helping is what neighbors do. Like it or not, it came down to us. If the situation was reversed, I’d want my neighbors to do the same for me and my family.  
    We stepped out of the tree line and crossed through the yard. The grassy slope was slippery, so we moved slowly. The only noise was the ever-present floodwaters, and Jeff’s heavy breathing, which sounded very loud in the silence. Thena had a dog, a small Beagle named Henry. I used to see him running around in their yard with Derrick and Josie. He had the most annoying bark in the world. When Henry wasn’t running around barking at ducks in the creek or taunting Sanchez from the other side, she kept him tied out back, in a small doghouse between the shed and the house. I wondered why we didn’t hear him now. Surely, Henry would have sensed the presence of the snake, just like Sanchez had done. Then, we rounded the corner past the shed and I saw why. Henry was missing. The doghouse had been flattened. A steel chain lay in the wet yard. One end of the chain was attached to the pile of splintered lumber. The other end was attached to an empty dog collar.  
    The ground around the doghouse was pretty muddy, and a long, wide trench led from there to the house, and then disappeared around the side. I shivered. I’d seen trails like it before. We had lots of black racer snakes and garter snakes on our property. Sometimes, if I was under deadline and put off mowing the yard, and the grass was higher than normal, they’d leave tracks like this.