The Unicorn's Going Home

Jolene Tyre is not a real person. Everything around her is.

The fellowship hall of Southside Baptist Church in Nahunta, Georgia, smells like instant coffee and someone else's laundry. It is Thursday, April 23, 2026. Three days since a wildfire ignited near Highway 82 in Brantley County. Two days since it blew across more than eight square miles of drought-killed pine flatwoods and took dozens of homes in a single afternoon.¹ Jolene Tyre is sitting on a folding chair near the kitchen pass-through. Her four-year-old, Cora, is asleep across two chairs pushed together beside her. A pit bull mix named Gravy is under the table. Jolene is thirty-four. She does medical billing in Brunswick, a forty-minute commute on a good day. Her house on Highway 110 West is either standing or it isn't. She has not been allowed back to check.²

Can you walk me through what happened Tuesday?

Jolene: It was a normal morning. Normal as anything's been lately. I had the kids up, I was about to leave for work, Darren had already gone. Then around noon it was just firetrucks. Coming down 110. And a deputy pulled up in the yard and said you gotta go. Not "start thinking about it." Go.³

So I grabbed the diaper bag because it was by the door. Got Cora, got the dog, yelled at the boys to get in the truck. And my oldest, Tanner, he's ten, he ran back inside. I'm screaming at him from the driver's seat. He comes out holding his Xbox controller. Not the Xbox. The controller. [laughs] I cannot even be mad about it. That boy saved one wireless controller with Cheeto dust on it from our entire house. That's his contribution to the family emergency plan.

What else were you able to take?

Jolene: My purse had our IDs. I got the kids' medicines, Cora's got an inhaler. I did not get the insurance papers. I did not get the photo albums. I did not get — [pauses]

The cake was still on the counter. From Cora's birthday. We had her party Saturday. Half a sheet cake from Winn-Dixie. Funfetti. I keep thinking about that cake sitting there in my kitchen and the fire coming through the door.

Which is stupid, right? Of all the things. But I keep seeing it.

Tell me about the party.

Jolene: [exhales] It was so good. That's what kills me. It was just a Saturday. We had maybe fifteen people in the yard, her cousins, some kids from church, my mama brought potato salad. Darren set up the slip-and-slide but there wasn't enough water pressure because everything's been so dry.⁴ The grass was like cereal under your feet. Dead. Crunching. But the kids didn't care. They never care.

Cora had this little dollar-store crown on, and she wanted a unicorn party, so I got the unicorn plates, the unicorn napkins, and I got her this balloon from the Dollar Tree right here in Nahunta. One of those shiny foil ones? Big ol' unicorn, iridescent, with a horn. She carried it around by the ribbon all afternoon like it was a pet.

And then right before cake she let go of it. Or the wind got it. I don't know. And it just — [gestures upward] — went. Straight up. Gone. She's standing there in the yard watching it go with her little crown on, and I thought she was gonna lose it, but she just looked at me and said:

And everybody laughed. She forgot about it in two minutes.⁵ Kids are like that. They just let things go.

[Jolene watches Cora sleeping on the pushed-together chairs.]

I keep thinking about that afternoon. Last Saturday. I was worried about the frosting melting because it was so hot out. That was my biggest problem in the whole world.

Have you been able to see the house?

Jolene: No.

Nothing at all?

Jolene: Darren drove up as far as they'd let him yesterday. Couldn't get past the roadblock on 110. Said you could see the smoke from there but couldn't tell which houses were — he couldn't tell.⁶ Our neighbor Victoria, she saw hers burn on a security camera feed. Roof on the ground. Everything ash.

So. We're preparing ourselves for that.

What do you need right now?

Jolene: [long pause] Underwear. [laughs] I'm sorry. I know that's not — but underwear. The kids need underwear. Cora needs pull-ups. People have been so incredible, the church, the Red Cross, all of it.⁷ But nobody ever thinks to donate underwear.

Is there anything you want people to know?

Jolene: I want people to know we were here. That's — yeah. We were here. Darren's granddaddy built the barn on our property. My boys learned to ride bikes in that road. Cora took her first steps in that living room. I know to everybody watching the news this is just a fire in south Georgia, and tomorrow it'll be something else on the screen. But we were here. We had birthday parties in the yard.⁸ We had a good Saturday. We had a really good Saturday.

[She reaches over and adjusts the blanket on Cora without looking.]

I just want to go home. I just want to know if I have one.

Footnotes

1. The Highway 82 fire ignited Monday, April 20, 2026. By Tuesday it had destroyed dozens of homes; by Thursday the confirmed count exceeded 85, most lost "in that initial eruption" on Tuesday. It became the most destructive wildfire in Georgia's recorded history. News4Jax, April 24, 2026 ↩

2. A mandatory curfew covered the east side of the Satilla River from the Atkinson area to the Waynesville area, including Highway 110, from 8:30 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. Road closures prevented residents from returning during active fire operations. News4Jax, April 24, 2026 ↩

3. Grandparents Elizabeth and Tony Spear, also evacuated from Highway 110, recalled: "Firetrucks came down the road and said we had to leave immediately. I threw a few things in a bag — our medicine, cellphone, charger, just very minimum — and went flying out the door." They lost two chihuahuas, a black lab, and everything they owned. CNN, April 25, 2026 ↩

4. Brantley County was classified under "exceptional drought," the highest designation on the NOAA scale. The region had been in drought since July 2025. From mid-March to mid-April 2026, the area received less than a quarter of normal precipitation. Dried timber debris from Hurricane Helene, which struck in 2024, remained scattered throughout the county's forestland, creating what a Georgia Forestry Commission spokesperson called "a tinderbox." Jacksonville Today, April 27, 2026; AP/Local3News, April 2026 ↩

5. On Friday, April 24, 2026, the day after this conversation, Georgia Forestry Commission Director Johnny Sabo stated at a press conference: "So the Brantley fire was absolutely a, it's like a kids party balloon that has the aluminum-look to it, landed on a power line, caused a spark and that's what caused this wildfire, so that has been determined." Governor Kemp confirmed: "We believe the other fire was a balloon that landed on a power line and created an arc, which then caught the ground on fire." WTOC, April 24, 2026 ↩

6. Victoria Holloway, also on Highway 110 West, left for work Tuesday morning believing firefighters had the fire contained. A neighbor's security footage captured her home consumed by flames. The roof is on the ground. Everything reduced to ash. First Coast News, April 2026 ↩

7. The Red Cross shelter operated from Southside Baptist Church in Nahunta, the county seat. At least 25 displaced residents moved into shelters, with officials expecting the number to grow. Median home value in Brantley County: $99,600. Homeownership rate: 79.9%. AP, April 26, 2026; DataUSA/ACS 2019–2023 ↩

8. The Highway 82 fire destroyed more homes than any wildfire in Georgia's recorded history. Governor Kemp, touring the scorched area on April 24: "The two most dangerous fires in the nation are in South Georgia." Two Brantley County firefighters lost their own homes while fighting the blaze. WTOC, April 24, 2026; Jacksonville Today, April 27, 2026 ↩