Mark woke up at 6:00 AM, hours before the Reys normally did. I’ve got a couple of free hours to burn, he realized.

Slowly and quietly, he climbed out of the bed he was sharing with Jennifer. Jim had put an extra mattress in the room as he said he would, but Jennifer and Mark had just waited for him to go to sleep in his room, and then Mark climbed in bed with Jennifer. They didn’t do anything, just slept. But it felt right. We’re in love, right? Besides, it’s getting cold, and somebody has to keep her warm.

Mark turned the knob and opened the door slowly so it wouldn’t creak. Of course, it did anyway. He swore silently and looked to see if Jennifer had woken up. She rolled over but she didn’t look awake.

Mark walked into the living room. The computer in the corner was turned on. Perfect. He sat down and moved the mouse. A box asking for the screensaver password popped up. Oh, wonderful.

Mark tried to remember what Jennifer had told him the password was. The name of a city in Europe. But which city? Was it Athens?

Mark thought for a minute. Oh, wait…

All right! He signed online and went to the website he used to check his email when he wasn’t home. He had 37 new messages, and all of them were junk mail. Where do they get my email address?

Then he closed the e-mail site and checked a news website run by a friend at school. To his mild surprise, a group of fifteen kids was planning to toilet paper the principal’s house. Mark shook his head. Even the end of the world can’t stop pranks.

He shook his head again. It isn’t the end of the world. If it were, a lot more people would be committing suicide. A few cult groups and many lone individuals had, but 99% of the population lived on. Life goes on. Maybe people see freezing to death as a pleasant death, or maybe nobody thinks the world’s gonna end. I’m beginning to think that it won’t. He remembered hearing freezing was actually the most peaceful way to die if you did it right. When the cold saps your energy and you start getting tired, go to sleep. You die in your sleep. Pleasant.

Mark tried to remember what else he had been planning to do. E-mail, news, what else? He couldn’t remember. Was I going to buy something?

He had long ago memorized his father’s credit card number for making emergency online purchases. This is about as big an emergency as it gets, but what the hell was I going to buy?

After a moment’s though he gave up. He logged off the Internet and went back to bed with Jennifer.

Mark woke up with a start. He could hear footsteps. He jumped out of Jennifer’s bed and leaped quietly into his. He landed without a sound. Perfect! He yanked the blankets over him and pretended to sleep.

The door opened and heavy footsteps walked in. "I knew they’d behave," Mark heard Jim say softly. Then he heard the door close. Suspicious waited for a full five minutes without moving. Finally, Jim opened up the door and really left, satisfied that Mark was in actuality asleep.

Mark grinned. It was a good trick, but it didn’t stand a chance against him. After all, he had done it himself dozens of times. He would just pretend to leave and then wait for the unsuspecting person he was watching to emerge from their hiding place.

He sat up and grabbed his Gameboy from Jennifer’s desk. As he was turning it on, Jennifer woke up. He shrugged and turned the Gameboy back off.

"Hey, Jennifer, how ya doing?" he asked her softly.

Jennifer turned and looked at him sleepily. "I feel like I just woke up."

Mark laughed quietly. "Jen, we should stay in here for a little longer. You dad was just in here and he thinks we are still sleeping."

"Okay, whatever." She rolled over and went back to sleep.

"But… oh great, now what am I going to do?" he whispered to himself. Oh right, the Gameboy. He flipped his Gameboy back on. The little Nintendo logo scrolled across the screen. Then the batteries died. He wasn’t even surprised. That’s my luck for you.

Mark slowly climbed out of his bed. He walked over to the door and opened it as quickly as he could. It still creaked. There goes my luck again. He sighed and walked to the kitchen.

Jim was at the table eating a bowl of oatmeal. He looked up from the paper. "Oh, hi Mark."

Mark carefully assumed the look of someone who has just woken up. "Hi Jim," he said mock-groggily. "I just woke up. Got anything to eat?"

"Sure. What do you want? We’ve got oatmeal and 5 brands of cereal."

"Uh, oatmeal sounds good." He sat down at the table.

"Okay, I’ll get you a bowl." Jim got up and walked to the pantry to get the oatmeal.

Jennifer walked in. She looked at her dad and then at Mark. She quickly caught on and assumed Mark’s still-sleepy appearance. "Hey waiter! I’ll have what the cute boy over there is having," she said, sounding half-joking and half-serious.

Her father laughed and turned around. "Did you just wake up too?"

She nodded slowly. "Yeah."

"How are you?"

"Tired."

Mark turned to her as Jim went back to the oatmeal. "How did you sleep?"

Jennifer shrugged. "Fine. What about you?"

"Not as much as I would have liked to, but hey…"

Jim returned to the table with the bowls of oatmeal. "Do you want me to warm them up?"

"Please," Mark and Jennifer chimed at the same time. They both laughed.

After opening the door and setting the cooking timer, Jim stuck the bowls in the microwave. Then he closed the door and walked back to the table. There, he sat down and started reading the paper. "So far we don’t have a way to keep warm, at least not a logical one."

Mark nodded. "But the constraints of time often leave no room for logic."

Surprised, Jim looked up at him. "That’s a pretty good quote. Where did you get it?"

"I came up with it, actually. You like it?"

Jim nodded vigorously. "It’s genius. I think you’re right. Maybe, with so little time left, logic should be thrown out the window."

"But we haven’t even come up with anything illogical yet." Mark frowned. "I wonder if we’ll ever figure this out."

The microwave buzzed. Jim stood up. "I don’t know. I really hope so. But really, you two are too young to worry about it." He walked to the microwave and took out the oatmeal.

Mark couldn’t resist. "No we aren’t, because we are too young! That’s the thing! We’re too young to die!"

The response was sad but resigned. "Everyone dies eventually."

"For God’s sake, I’m seventeen! You can’t complain, you’ve already lived half of your life." He coughed. "Uh, sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude…"

Jennifer slugged him playfully. "Hey, he’s not that old."

Shaking his head, Jim set down the oatmeal on the table. "Oh, yes I am. I’m 42. I don’t need to live any longer. Life has given me all it can. But you are right, Mark. The two of you are getting treated rather unfairly. You are old enough to appreciate life, unlike young children, but you haven’t lived long to benefit from it, like adults."

Mark nodded. "It sucks."

"The only thing I can suggest for now is to focus on the good things."

"Mm-hmm." Mark dug into his oatmeal. "Hey, this is pretty good!"

Jennifer laughed. "Don’t lie to him Mark, he’s a bad cook and he knows it." She took a bite. "Whoa, this is pretty good. Who made it for you, dad?"

"It’s a different brand," Jim explained as he sat down.

The doorbell rang. Mark loved the Rey’s doorbell chime. It was a happy little tune that he remembered had once been common, but the Reys were one of the only families he knew that still had it.

Jim got back up. "I’ll get it." He went to the door and opened it. A man was standing there, bathed in the light coming from the hallway. Jim shivered at the cold air rushing in and motioned for him to come inside. "Hey, Mac, what brings you here?" he asked the man.

Mac grinned. "The end of the world. What else?" He sat down at the kitchen table.

"Actually, we are trying to avoid the end of the world. That’s why I’m here." Mac began. "You might have noticed that it’s cold outside. Thanks to your floodlights, it isn’t so dark, but it’s still pretty damn cold. We’ve decided to take a simple approach to the solution, a step backwards if you will. Fire, of course. We are going to line the center of the streets with steel drums, fill them with wood and anything else that burns, and then set the stuff on fire. It should generate a fair amount of heat."

Jim nodded, but he looked skeptical. "It’s gonna take a hell of a lot of fire to warm up the whole atmosphere."

"We aren’t trying to save the whole planet yet, Jim, just our neighborhood. Hopefully we can keep a few blocks warm for four or five hours."

"Hopefully. Well, it’s definitely worth a shot. It’s by far the best idea I’ve heard yet. Let’s do it!" Jim turned to Mark and Jennifer. "You guys want to help?"

Mark looked at Jennifer. "What do you want to do?"

Jennifer smiled. "Sounds fun to me! Let’s go!"

Twenty minutes later, Mark, Jennifer, and Jim were in the middle of the street, lining up steel drums with the rest of the street. Jim’s floodlights provided plenty of light to work by.

"Hey Mark, can you help me with this one?" Jennifer yelled, pointing at one of the larger and heavier drums.

"Sure, Hon…" Mark looked at the people standing around him. "Uh, I mean, sure, Jen." He walked over to her and gripped the metal drum with both hands. With a grunt of exertion, he lifted it off of the ground and helped her maneuver it into position. When he was done, he nodded and wiped sweat off his brow with his sleeve.

Mac, the man who had organized the whole thing, stood back and looked at the drums. "It looks good! All right, now start loading them with wood."

Mark walked over to the giant dumpster filled with wood donated by the community. He pulled out several large pieces and carried them back to the drum he had just set up. Carefully, he dropped them in one at a time. When he finished the drum was about a third full. Then he went over to the second dumpster and grabbed an armload of old newspapers. That should do it.

He brought the pile of newspapers back. After he dropped them in, the drum was three-fourths full. There. Around him, others followed suit, loading wood and paper into the drums.

When all of the steel drums were full, Mac and Jim walked from drum to drum with lighter fluid, squirting a small amount of the flammable liquid into each one. Then they stood back.

After surveying the work for a moment, Mac groaned. "How are we gonna light them all without getting burnt by the flames?"

"Rope!" Mark yelled. He picked up a rope that had been used to tie logs together and carried one end to the nearest steel drum, where he dropped the end inside. After making sure it was in contact with the wood, he walked back to the other end.

"Can I get a lighter?" he asked. An older man he didn’t recognize tossed Mark a shiny metal cigarette lighter. He rolled his thumb across the wheel and pressed the button, igniting a small flame at the mouth of the lighter. With his other hand cupped around the flame to protect it from the wind, he stooped over and lit the rope. The flames raced towards the drum.

Mark stamped out the flames before they could reach the drum and ignite a fire. "Do that with each of the steel drums," he explained, "and we’re set."

Mac stared at him. "That’s a great idea kid! But where do we get that much rope?"

Mark shrugged. "How should I know? Try the hardware store."

Another man raised his hand. "Uh, I have more than enough rope for this at home. I won’t even charge you for it. Now, if you’ll let me go get it, I’ll be back in ten minutes."

"Ok," Mark said. "Works for me."

While they waited, Mark examined the drums. Most of them were in good condition, but a few looked like they had seen better days. He was startled to find that one drum had a small hole in it. He sighed and carefully dragged it off the street.

"Hey, Mac! Check all of the drums for holes!" he yelled.

Mac look surprised. "Holes? Some of them have holes? My God, it’s the end of the world and you still can’t buy something that isn’t broken!" Mac motioned for a couple of men to help him examine the drums.

The man who had volunteered returned with the rope. He had nearly 300 feet. That should be enough, figured Mark, especially if we don’t use all the drums.

Mac and the other men found two other drums with holes in them. Mark helped them carefully take the drums off the street. When the three drums were away from the rest, Mac and a friend of his started running 10 foot lengths of rope to each of the forty or so remaining drums.

When he was finished with the rope, Mac walked over to Mark. "Hey kid, we’ve got the rope all set up. Since it was your idea, do you want to do the honors?"

"Uh… sure, I guess."

He walked slowly down the street, lighting each piece of rope. The flames ran quickly down the ropes, shooting into the drum and igniting the flammable material inside. The flames burned bright and hot. Of course, it’s only the heat that matters.

In just a matter of minutes the air was comfortably warm. Mark estimated that it would remain at a temperature of at least 75 degrees for more than five hours. And after that, we’ve got nearly another hundred drums, and fuel for each of them.

Mark walked back to the side of the street, where Jennifer was waiting for him. He stopped next to her and turned to watch the fire with her. He put his arm over her shoulder and held her close. They stood there together, for a few minutes, watching the flames.

Finally, Jennifer turned away from the bright orange and red light emanating from the flames. She smiled at Mark. Together they walked back to the house.