“He ran right into me,” said the man, who had tied the rope about his waist, and when Asher got a good look at him he saw that he was the songwriter who lived down the road. He had that look of country music singers who never become stars nowadays, but always used to: square-jawed, handsome, but with too much worry on his face, too much living through the hard times. These days those men were the songwriters but not the singers.

“Thank you for bringing him back,” Asher said.

The other one laughed in a good-natured way. He was black-headed, black-eyed. “He brought us,” the dark one said.

“I’m sure glad he did,” Asher said. “I could have never gotten them out by myself.”

“I’m ashamed,” the smaller one said, “that I froze down there. I couldn’t make my legs move. I just couldn’t move.”

No one said anything. It seemed that if they did his shame would bloom larger.

For a brief time they watched Caleb breathe, gulping at air, then breathing so shallowly they could barely see his chest rising. Then the songwriter said his name was Jimmy and his partner was Stephen and they had only recently built the house down the road, the one Zelda and Asher had watched collapse earlier. Since Asher knew a songwriter owned the place, at first he thought Jimmy meant Stephen was his songwriting partner. But the way Jimmy said the word let Asher know he was searching for a reaction. Then he remembered Jimmy kissing Stephen down there by the water. He had not imagined it.

Asher said “Oh,” nodded. He had never met a gay couple in his life—that he knew of, anyway. More than one of his congregants today had blamed this new flood on the Supreme Court’s ruling. No coincidence that the rain had started the same day as the marriages started happening over in Nashville, they said. Asher had said nothing because how could he argue with people who had just watched their lives carried away on the river?

“We lost our house today,” Stephen said. “We’d been following the water’s edge for the last couple hours, and then this little feller showed up.”

“I told them they could stay with us, Dad,” Justin said.

“You’re that preacher, right?” Stephen said. There was some amount of suspicion in his voice.

Asher told him he was and saw the men’s eyes meet.

Justin’s head came to rest against Asher’s arm.

“Poor little feller,” Jimmy said. “He’s a sight, now, ain’t he?”

“He sure is,” Asher said, and situated Justin on the seat so that his neck wouldn’t be cricked.

“We didn’t know what else to do,” Jimmy said, “but to keep walking until we found somewhere—”