Home Ablaze

I first started typing this quite some time ago. I didn't get a chance to finish it until now.

Here is my first attempt at a short story my senior year. This is from 2/1996. This is the last work of fiction that I completed. Shortly after finishing this story my high-school finally caught on to the fact that I only attended the classes I chose to.
I would usually show up around lunch time (for the inexpensive food) then go to the few afternoon classes that I would make sure ended up after lunch, so I could sleep in. I would go to classes like Creative Writing, Drama, Cinema, Spanish, Computers, Psychology, and History for the most part (a little math and science when there was nothing better to do).
I had been doing this all 3 years of school, but had never been caught until 3 months or so before graduation (which I wouldn't have gotten to do with my class because my terrible lack of attendance credits). I was given an ultimatum: Either attend all my classes and pay attention to attendance credit or I could finish my senior year at "alternative" high-school or enroll in adult ed. since I was 18. I thanked them for their time and said adios. Then it was off to adult ed. where the credits where insanely easy to complete.
Anyway, here is my last work of fiction to post here until I get around to writing something new (which this blog will hopefully inspire me to do).
Enjoy.


Home Ablaze

Groggy from falling asleep early as she waited for Derek to get home from "Guy's Night", Susan stumbles a little as she rushes out of their bedroom. The crackling sounds of burning wood rages in Susan's ears as the blazing inferno engulfs the bedroom behind her. She narrowly makes it to the hallway, off of the living room, which leads to the bedrooms.

She has no idea how or where the fire started, but it is now raging throughout the entire house. She is struck immediately with a Mother's instinct that she must save her child. She spares a brief, disgusted glance at the smoke detector that failed to warn her of the oncoming danger as she starts for Charlie's room.

*****

Derek stops in front of his house with an ear piercing screech of tires and a smell of burning rubber fills the air around the car. He had seen the flames which lit up the night sky from a few miles away, and had begun to feel the stirrings of anxiety. It looked like a small sunset, but in the wrong side of the sky. Somehow he knew that it was his family's home that was ablaze, so he sped home as fast as possible.

His fear leaps up tenfold as he notices that there are no firemen even on the scene yet. The flames are reaching far into the sky and have nearly surrounded the entire house. He supposes that no one has responded to the fire since none of their neighbors are closer than a block away. He scans the yard to make sure that his wife and two-year-old son have gotten out safely. His heart drops as he notices that they are nowhere to be seen, and must not have escaped their flame infested home yet.

With no time to despair, he rushes toward the front door to attempt to rescue his family. He notices that the roof is badly burnt and already near to collapse. It will only be a matter of minutes before the ruins fold in upon his underlying home.

Derek's adrenaline is coursing through his body like a wildfire in a dry field and the only thing he can hear is the surging of his pulse resonating in his ears. The heat billowing from the house is so hot he can feel hairs getting singed on his head, arms, and brow.

"Susan...! Susie...! SUSAN!!!!" Derek shouts to no avail. His voice is no match for the sounds of their home burning.

He reaches out, grabbing the brass doorknob without thought. Recoiling from the sudden pain, he looks down stupidly for a second at the melted flesh on the palm of his right hand. Forgetting the pain and the doorknob, Derek kicks at the door with all his might. Once, twice, and third time is the charm. The bolt breaks free from the door frame and the door flies open with a crash.

*****

Shielding her eyes from the intense glow of the surrounding flames, Susan drops to the ground for cleaner air. Surrounding her is a thick, charcoal-colored blanket of smoke which is choking off her oxygen supply. She pulls herself toward the end of the hall and into the last doorway on the left.

She sees her son, Charlie, standing in the middle of his bed. Surprisingly enough he isn't crying, just staring with a wild-eyed expression of terror at the flames billowing around his room and bed. In his child's imagination, he sees tigers surrounding his bed, getting ready to leap onto the bed and eat him up.

Susan breaks into a run toward him and leaps at the last second to fly over the three foot flames rising from the floor. She makes a perfect landing next to Charlie on the bed. After gathering her balance, Susan snatches him into her arms and hugs him tightly against her.

"Mommy, don't let tigers get us," Charlie wails. Susan realizes it is only shock that has kept her son from crying hysterically.

"Don't worry, baby. Mommy's got you. Now I need you to hold on tight and don't let go, okay!?"

Charlie answers by tightening his grip around her neck. Since Charlie is facing back the opposite way as his mother, he sees the beams begin to crash down from the roof, at the edge of his room. Just then, Susan crouches and leaps toward the door with all of her strength.

*****

Panic-stricken, Derrick peers into the flames in search of motion or any sign of life. Without hesitation, he throws himself through the firestorm that was once the doorway to the front room of his home. The air is so thick with black, billowing clouds of smoke that all he can see with any real clarity is the fire eating away at the wooden structure of his home.

Derek's lungs feel as if they are burning up. Knowing that he'll do no one any good if he chokes to unconsciousness on the smoke, he drops to his hands and knees to try and get below some of the cloud. He crawls quickly forward, toward the hall. He can see that the kitchen beyond the hall is in flames and probably won't work as an escape route out the back door. Secured to the ceiling is a stout, oak arch marking the beginning of the hall which leads straight through to the kitchen. A left turn from this hall leads down a longer hall to the bedrooms.

*****

With Charlie in her arms, Susan rushes to the end of the hall and turns right, which puts her into the smaller corridor that leads under the arch and into the living room. Again, she and her baby are choked by the clouds of ash and smoke, so she drops to her knees.

Just as she begins to crawl forward, still holding Charlie close to her with one arm, Susan screams out in agony. One of the beams from the ceiling and part of the wall had crashed down and landed across her lower leg. If the raging holocaust had not been so loud, she would have heard the bones in her right leg snapping like twigs. Using her left hand, Susan throws herself forward, leaving the burning beam behind her. With every move, a piercing pain surges down her shattered leg. Little Charlie, clinging to his mother, finally burst into tears.

*****

Derek hears a scream from his wife, which he realizes is coming from the hall. Forgetting the smoke, he stands and runs for the sound of his wife. Dimly he can see Susan's face and Charlie's head on the floor through the smoke and flame.

Susan looks up through her tears of pain with overwhelming relief to see her husband rushing toward her like a rescuing angel.

"Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!" Charlie shouts when he sees his father through tear filled eyes. Somehow everything will be okay now that Daddy is here, he thinks and recedes back into shocked silence.

Derek tries to pull Susan to her feet and she screams again as pain flares from her broken leg and nearly collapses back to the ground before Derek can support her.

As Derek begins to ask her what is wrong they hear a screech of nails being pulled from wood coming from the direction of the living room. What they see strikes renewed terror into their hearts. The oak arch is going to crash to the floor at any second, blocking their chance of escape.

Quick as thought, Derek realizes that they may not have time to get out before it collapses. There isn't even enough time to take Charlie from Susan. There are only a few nails, which are even now, losing their grip in the wood.

"MOVE!" he bellows and hauls Susan, who still has Charlie clinging to her, forward. She does her best to hobble on her left leg to avoid putting any additional pressure on the fracture she has suffered in her right. Derek is concentrating solely on the progress of the falling arch as he tows his family behind him.

As they approach the oak arch at the end of the hall, they hear a very loud creak as the large arch begins its decent of destruction. Derek realizes that Susan and Charlie won't make it, so with all his strength, he uses his momentum to sling Susan and Charlie ahead of him, and under the falling arch.

The arch, as well as half of the hall, collapse and strike Derek's shoulder, driving him to the ground. Susan stumbles forward in surprise at the force that hurls her and Charlie through the fire-filled living room, out the open front door, and into a heap on the lawn.

Susan immediately releases Charlie and looks back from the front lawn in search of her husband. Dimly she sees a shape lying on the floor amidst the inflamed rubble and attempts to go back in after him.

"Derek!" she shrieks. She stumbles back to her feet and limps toward the front door. Charlie begins to cry again, but she knows he's okay for the moment. Before she can get to the door the entire front of the house caves in and she is forced to retreat back to the lawn. The pain in her leg is excruciating, but it may as well be someone else's pain for all she feels. Shock of what has happened has put her thoughts far elsewhere.

*****

Derek sees Susan rush toward him, but then the roof over the living room collapses, blocking his view. Ignoring the searing pain in his shoulder, he struggles to stand. By the time he gets to his feet, burning pieces of wood dropping to the ground, he knows he's been badly burned. Also, he can feel at least two broken ribs and a sprained, at best, shoulder.

He retreats back down the hallway as the collapsing roof pursues him nearly stride for stride. He is stopped suddenly when confronted with a wall of fire blocking his path. He has only two options, neither of which are enticing in the least. He can hope the flames in front of him aren't too thick and jump quickly through them, into the kitchen, and leave out the back door; or he can head back toward the bedrooms and try to escape out a window.

Figuring a chance of escape out a window is preferable to a leap through fire, he tries to make a run for the bedrooms. His path is once again blocked and he is forced to retreat when the entire hall caves in and a cloud of extreme heat flows over him. He freezes in a moment of paralysis before the billowing wall of flame, then leaps as fast and hard as he can through the wall of flame and toward the kitchen. He squints his eyes in an effort to protect them, but also not wanting to find out what awaits him in the kitchen with eyes entirely closed.

During the brief seconds it takes to pass though the flames and into the furnace of a kitchen, Derek feels a strong sensation of heat roll over him like a wave. Just as he feels he is going to begin to incinerate, it is over as quickly as it began. He sees that he made it through the wall of fire and instinctively brushes at himself to put out the flames he's sure must be there.

*****

"Where's Daddy...? Mommy, where's Daddy...?" Charlie repeatedly asks Susan as she hobbles around the front of the house, trying unsuccessfully to see her husband until she is sure that he must be dead.

Nearly the entire house is collapsed and in flames and I don't think he can get out if he hasn't by now, she thinks in horror.

She looks one more time over the cinders of her home and life with disbelief then tells Charlie through her tears that Dad is in heaven now. She can contain the desperate grief no longer and breaks into uncontrollable sobs, clinging to her crying son and rocking back and forth. Between sobs, Susan tells him, "Daddy had to do what he did to save us. There just wasn't enough time for us all to get out."

After a few moments, and really the whole scene has played out in only a short while, Susan realizes that she should be doing something... Calling 911, thinking (as painful as it is) about the next step, something. She is surprised when realization bubbles up from her subconscious that several neighbors are in motion, many rushing toward her and Charlie, and that there are sirens blaring and coming closer. Susan realizes there is nothing to do but wait, and even extinguishing of the fire will do nothing for the aching emptiness in her heart.

*****

Derek feels some small relief to note that his clothing isn't on fire, but this feeling leaves as quickly as it came. His ribs and shoulder are throbbing steadily and because of the annihilation overtaking the room, there is no time to waste. Portions of ceiling and wall are plummeting to the ground and the furniture of the room is engulfed in flames. What isn't quickly closing in on becoming ashes, soon will be.

Black specks are floating on the edges of his vision, which is beginning to tunnel, and he is shocked to realize that he is dangerously close to passing out from lack of oxygen. His eyes are streaming tears because of the smoke but they are drying nearly as fast because of the heat. The kitchen is beginning to blur and Derek's head feels light and dizzy as he stumbles through the kitchen, toward the back door.

*****

Neighbors are crowded around now, asking Susan where Derek is and if she and Charlie are alright but all she can do is cry harder and point to the house. Some of them run frantically toward the house to attempt to spot him. Susan watches them as she sobs and hugs Charlie tight, but she knows it is too late. Only seconds after the arch had pinned her husband to the ground, the entire front portion of the house had fallen. She knows that he couldn't have lifted the weight of the arch off of himself in time to escape, and she manages to convey this to some of the nearby neighbors between sobs.

One man says that he can see part of the interior of the house and the rest run to see. There they see the top corner of the flaming arch, but the rest is surrounded by burning debris. They realize that Susan must be right, that he couldn't still be alive under all that.

The neighbors retreat back to the lawn and Susan's friend, Jennifer, takes Charlie gently from his mother's arms and reluctantly she lets go as an ambulance and fire truck finally arrive.

*****

Derek reaches the back door and falls against it. He no longer has the strength to keep his feet and the door and a portion of the burned wall collapse under his weight as he careens into them. The man, door, and flaming portions of wall fall out away from the house and onto the cool of the back lawn. Having enough awareness that he is finally out but still too close to be out of danger he begins to crawl around toward the front yard. He is almost to the front corner of the house and trying to make his voice work to call for help when he hears a tormented cry of anguish.

*****

EMT's and Firemen are bustling forth from their vehicles and coming toward the people on the lawn. People are asking questions like, "Are you seriously hurt?" etc.

The pain, grief, and reality of her situation overpower her, and Susan wails a wail that contains all the emotions she is suffering. Then she falls forward onto the grass, not caring about anything around her or the pain she is in. In fact she welcomes the physical pain as a distraction to her emotional and mental pain.

She lays, facing the right front corner of her torched home, husband, and life. Absolute despair sets in and she no longer even cares about life, death, or anything else.

*****

Derek, feeling extremely weak, pulls himself across the grass and partially into the view of the front yard. His strength gives out on him and he swoons at that spot.

*****

Susan is lying on her side and looking at her home without really seeing. Until something moves that catches her eye that is, and she sits up abruptly, scaring the EMT who is trying to get her attention. She doesn't even dare to hope as recognition of the figure begins to dawn on her! Everyone on the scene is startled and stares at her in wonder when she dives forward with a shout and begins crawling frantically toward the side of the house.

When she gets close and sees that she can hope in what seems like the first time in an eternity, she almost dives onto him in joy and relief!

*****

At her touch, his eyelids flutter open and his eyes work to adjust to what he sees. Tears of joy such as they never expected to feel begin to pour down their faces while she kisses every inch of his face in an outpouring of love and relief.

The neighbors see what is going on and respectfully back away to give them their privacy. EMT's rush forward to see to the couple and firemen are already hard at work extinguishing the remaining flames. Both Susan and Derek are put onto stretchers and loaded into the ambulance with Jennifer promising to watch Charlie and bring him to the hospital.

For the duration of the ride to the hospital, the reunited couple can only impart their love to each other and thank whatever "powers that be" for their reunion. They both know in their hearts that they will never take their family, health, or life for granted... and they don't!