This morning Keisha had meant to get to work early. She’d set an early alarm, but for some reason she slept through it. Whenever that happened, she always felt as though some cosmic force were trying to sabotage her plans. She’d skipped her shower to make up time, and now she stood hunched at the back door, fumbling with her keys, trying to cram the flat metal into the lock while her backpack and purse dragged her right shoulder earthward and threatened to upend the jellied toast balanced in her left hand. Stuffing the toast into her mouth, she finally slid the key into the lock, turned it, then yanked it out and trotted awkwardly toward her Prius, which was parked in the narrow driveway beside the house.

Keisha thanked God for her keyless remote, which she clicked with an immense sense of relief. As she tossed her purse across the driver’s seat, someone called to her from her front yard. Keisha forced a smile as she turned, expecting her elderly neighbor—who was always watering his flowers—or even maybe Penn’s daughter, Annie. What she saw instead was an old white woman wearing a leather jacket and holding a McDonald’s cup in her hand.

“Can I help you?” Keisha asked.

“I hope so,” said the woman, who had stringy gray hair and a harsh edge to her voice. “Here’s a present for you, pretty girl!”

Then she threw the contents of her cup in Keisha’s face.

The shock of the liquid hitting her skin and eyes made Keisha gasp and drop her backpack. She shook her head like a dog trying to dry itself, then held up her hands in case the woman meant to physically attack her.

No attack came.

Keisha didn’t realize her eyes were closed until she heard laughter, and some part of her brain registered that the laughter was receding.

The woman was retreating, thank Jesus.

“Goddamn,” Keisha sputtered, pulling the tail of her blouse from her jeans and using it to wipe her face and eyelids. “Crazy bitch.”

As she wiped, her eyes began to burn.

She blinked several times, then tilted her head back, but this did nothing to relieve the burning, which seemed to be worsening.

Shit, she thought as the pain rapidly grew intolerable.

Keisha gasped, then cried out and wiped harder. The pain kept ratcheting up the scale. Then she realized her face was burning as well.

Panic detonated in her chest, robbing her of breath and judgment. By the time she thought of her garden hose, she could barely see. Stumbling across the St. Augustine grass, Keisha began to scream.

“What’s that?” Annie asked sharply.

I stopped with a spoonful of oatmeal nearly to my open mouth. “What?”

Mia froze halfway to her feet. “Somebody screamed.”

When the second scream came, Mia bolted from the kitchen, Annie on her heels.