Fire

by Ola

A/N Three chaptered little story, half based on a dream I once had. Review if you liked. Thanks. Enjoy )

Part 1-

It was hot. So unbelievably hot. It took the little breath that I had left after running all the way from home to his place. But it didn’t matter. I stumbled into a halt next to a group of onlookers, managing to ask what was happening. What I wanted to know was whether he had been home when it started. When the fire started. Had he? I didn’t know. It was around six in the evening. The time he got back from work. Usually. Sometimes he was detained a bit longer, and I prayed today was one of those days. Nobody has seen anyone leave the burning house…

…And nobody seemed to have noticed the gray silhouette in the window of the second floor. My heart skipped too many beats as I saw that shadowy figure staggering around and fighting vainly against the flames. I think I screamed then although it might have been someone else when I plunged into the burning house through the smoldering threshold. No summer heat could ever compare to that inferno. No pain could ever compare to the thought of losing him. And so I ran, then walked, then staggered towards the stairs, along a path I knew all too well. Screaming his name all the way. My lungs filled with smoke and my hands groped for support as coughs raked my body and I had to stop for a few minutes, bend in half, trying to inhale the little oxygen that had not yet gone up in smoke. But then, I saw the stairs. And I knew he was still up there. And I called his name again then ran up the steps thanking god they were still intact. The same could not be said about the second floor. It was dim with smoke. Darker than twilight amid the irregular bursts of yellowed fire light. The fire must have started in the kitchen, far away from the stairs. And yet it was spreading at an alarming rate. I could barely stand as the heat increased. I would have laughed at myself for noticing such an unimportant thing. What good would a change of a few degrees do? If I didn’t get to him, we would, will, both burn here together before the firefighters arrive. Wooden houses go up in flames fast. Houses filled with flammable books go up even faster.

I cursed at my wandering mind, shielded my face against the terrible heat and gasped as another blow of heat burst through a door in the hallway, or what was left of it.

“Bran! Braaaaan!!” Where was that window I saw? What room did it look out from? In the haze of my mind, I couldn’t quite remember, poking my head into the first doorway on the left. No, no. It was on the side of the street. The right. It must have been where his room was. My skin was starting to burn painfully and I cursed my mindless run headlong into this conflagration without a second to grab a sweater to put around my face. But any second lost may have cost his life. So where the hell was he?

“Braaaaan! Where are you!! Bran!! Damn it! Answer me!!” There is only one way down. The stairs. And I didn’t see him anywhere on the way. He had to be upstairs. Maybe passed out from the smoke. I had to stop again as I was wracked by coughs. Yeah, his room just had to be the one right above the kitchen, where the fire had seemingly started. The flames were eating at the walls, an orange hue that Bran would have loved to paint. I was losing my voice and calling him was becoming more and more painful. I screamed his name, and then just plain screamed as the window imploded and I was thrown hard against the wall from the blast. That was the window behind which I had seen Bran. My head hurt. From the explosion and the smoke. I could barely hold my eyes open, full of stinging tears. Of smoke and of despair.

“Braaaaan!!” My voice broke, but I continued to search his room, crawling on my hands and knees despite the shards of glass digging into my palms. I had to find him. I had to find him, damn it! I cried and screamed and pleaded with anyone who would listen to please let me find him! Please! But he wasn't there. I had upturned the fallen curtains and the pile of books in the corner, yelping at the first touch to the incandescent metal of the knob of his closet and all the cupboards big enough to hide even half of him. No one under his desk. Or his bed. I wanted to go over to the window to gulp some fresher air, but it was already full of flames from the floor below, as the fire had climbed up the wall and was now a bright illumination to the carnage upstairs. The silent proof pointing its frightening finger to the absence of Bran.

He got out! Maybe he did get out! I sank to my knees in relief. This was the only place he could have been. I had searched on the way up. He had to have gotten out. Thank god. He was out.

… and I was still in. The short respite of ecstasy turned into tired fear as I realized that I was in serious danger. Laugh all you want but that had not crossed my mind as I had blindly ran to his rescue. His life was more important than mine. And it still is. As long as he is safe, I will be glad. … although the staccato beating of my heart and the silent screaming of my mind were not agreeing. I wanted out. Out! Right now!

I strained one hand to reach beyond the other and slowly dragged myself toward the door, my throat too tight and dry to swallow. It was away from the window. Away from the flames coming from the kitchen below. Right? Away from the heat. One step. Another. My mind and vision narrowed to my shaky hands, black with charcoal. Breath. Keep breathing. Stay low to the ground. I remember those words. Spoken by a friendly firefighters to us fourth graders so long ago. Where were those damn firefighters now when we needed them the most? I sobbed dry tears, my eyes incredibly itchy as everything swam in a dark haze. I don’t know whether the hallway was already so full of smoke or whether I was just losing my sight. Or maybe a bit of both. I’m moving to Alaska as soon as I get out of here. Snow. I want snow. I allowed myself a glimpse of that dream and it gave me enough strength to drag myself out past the second bedroom upstairs and onto the stairs landing…

…where I let my hands fall to my sides in disbelief. The stairs were gone. They were gone. Lying on the floor below in a pile of smoking rubble. I didn’t even have enough energy left to scream or curse. I just looked at my last chance of making it out alive going up in smoke. The smoke was everywhere now, as thick upstairs as in an oven, and just as hot, scalding me beyond any sunburn I could have ever gotten. And everything was swimming in a red haze, turning all around, until I found my head connecting with a thud on the floor. Oh. My shallow gasps of air were not drawing enough of anything but the scorching heat as I lay next to the stairs, my body just as crumpled as that structure. I closed my eyes in a vain attempt to protect them against the dehydrating heat. Did it matter now? I don’t know. Probably not. Nothing seemed to matter anymore. I couldn’t bring myself to care.

“Bran,” I croaked a painful whisper, clinging to the hope that he had really escaped this insanity. He had! I know he had! It was the only thing that did matter.

Not the heat, not the famished flames, not the far away sound of sirens, nor the darkness that was invading my mind, and the final blackness of oblivion.