Not only was the door closed, it was dead-bolted and chained. He knocked. He waited. He remembered the spares he had been given, and where he had left them in the glove compartment of his car. Two keys had been given to him. One for the door, one for the shed in the back, which housed an expired gallon of ethanol gasoline and one measley shovel. One key was jagged and zig-zagged, the other just slightly notched. Which had he used before, when she had called from two towns away, having forgotten to turn a burner off on the stove? He relived the phone call that had preceeded that event. He paused, in the cold of the night, on the porch, locked out by someone behind the door.

"Remember, the pointy one because it looks like a heart rate from the side, and 'home is where the heart is', right? Right? Whatever, just try them both out, but fucking hurry because I have spent too much time painting that kitchen for it to go up in a fucking stove fire."

The tip of his nose burned and his fingers took turns being stung by the metal keys. He gave up. Whoever was inside did not want him inside if they had not opened the door in the fifteen minutes he spent stupidly wondering which key to use on a door that wouldn't open too much, no matter which he had decided to use.
As if his thoughts and intentions were understood through the door, he heard the chain's tug backwards and clamour on the wood. He hesitated on the edge of the porch steps. Perhaps he'd best leave. The dead-bolt clicked out of place. The handle turned, and the wreath on the door was knocked out of place