“Where do we go?” Jaden asked. He turned in a slow circle, his boots squelching in the mud. “They said at the shelter that FEMA was coming, that they’d set up trailers, but where do we go until then? What do we do?”

I opened my mouth to say I didn’t know, but then, before a sound came out, I did. In the middle of the ’trosh scene, there were still these high-rise buildings, luxury condos. I found a stone the size of my head that must have drifted in in the water. I picked it up in both hands and walked over to the glass door of one of the buildings. Lifting it high up over my head, I threw it through the door. The whole pane of glass shattered and what stuck in at the edges fell away as I kicked at it with my boots. Then I put one arm across my waist, stretched the other out toward the door, and bent.

“After you, milady,” I said to my grandmother. Granny’s seen some shit in her day, I know. She kind of giggled in this tired way, and stepped through the empty frame.

I picked up the big rock and we made our way up the dark stairs to the third floor, where the water hadn’t reached.

Light was streaming in through a huge window at the end of the hall when we came out onto the third floor. There was a long hallway and only four doors on it. The apartments must have been enormous. I walked over the first door and tried the handle. It was locked. I lifted the rock up and smashed it down. The door moved a bit, but remained closed. I lifted the rock again. I don’t know where the strength came from, how I was able to lift it and smash it over and over. I’m not even sure how much time passed. But what seemed like an instant later, I was standing there with my arms shaking, the rock at my feet, and the door smashed wide open.

The apartment was as beautiful as the rest of the city was destroyed. There was a plush white couch in the center of the living room. Placed at welcoming angles around it were white leather chairs. They were so pristine it looked as if no one had ever sat down in them. Off to the back of the room, there was a marble fireplace. I had never seen a fireplace before in Brooklyn, and I wondered if it worked or was just an elaborate show.

I turned around and, behind me, Jaden, my grandmother, and the boy were all standing, staring. My arms were still shaking. They were looking at me like I had just crawled out of the floodwaters and had scales.

“Well?” I said. “Come in. I know I’ve always wanted to live in a place like this.”