In the living room, he walked the walls. There was a nice strong nail there lodged in the drywall. He pried it out with the claw of the hammer, his fingers numb with cold. He looked for more nails and came up with a row of three in the kitchen and pried those out too. Another a good half inch long from the bedroom. He stuck them in his pocket and picked up the towels. He draped one over the living-room window and measured with his eyes. If he used all three towels, it would do. After he nailed down the towels across the top, he looked at the other window. He would have to use the quilt. There was nothing else. He took it from the pile and hung it in place. He secured the bottom part against the wall with the cinder block. He opened the duffel and got out the duct tape and taped down the towel and blanket edges against the window casings. Matty stood wrapped in the blanket, watching everything. “What are you doing?”

“We need to keep out the cold.”

“Should I help you?”

“No. You stay here.”

Jack went out the back door and loaded his arms with split wood and carried the pieces inside and heaped the fireplace full. He struck one of the matches and opened the damper wide. Curls of smoke looped up the flue. The wood caught flame. He set a can of beans on the fire and brought in more logs and stacked them in the corner. In front of the hearth, he laid out the tarp over the carpet and made a nest on top with the blanket and the pillows. He put the duffel in the middle. His chest hurting. His lip. The cough in his throat.

He pushed the piano to the edge of the tarp to form a wall and hold in heat. He stood there in the glow of the fire. Outside the small pool of light, he could see darkness spreading. A black to choke him.

He looked at Matty.

Hiss of flame.

Matty went to the duffel and pulled out the deck of UNO cards. He sat cross-legged in the blanket nest and looked up at Jack. His face in the firelight. The cold air. “It’s like a fort.”

“Yes,” Jack said. “Like a fort.”

They played UNO and ate beans straight from the can, passing it back and forth between them. The old hearth warming. Faint fireshapes on the wall. Matty won three games, then set to building card houses while Jack brought in more wood. After they put away the cards, Jack covered Matty in the blanket and scrunched it around him and took off Matty’s shoes and rubbed his feet over the socks. They had to sting from the cold, but Matty didn’t complain. After a while he said, “Your lip is bleeding.”

“Yeah. A little.”

“Your face is all beat up.”