I yell to the others, “Run!” We move further into the bowels of this building, discarded so long ago. The halls are like mazes and we are the rats as we run without direction. Our only goal is to escape. But the fire is a living thing and it is has us within its sights. We are the prey running away from a violent predator. Yet, I know in my heart we will lose. Fire consumes all until there is nothing left. It may be futile to outrun the inevitable, but that doesn’t mean you give up. I’ll be damned if I let that yellow beast devour me. We turn left at the end of the hall and see a door. Salvation at last! I’m the first to get to the door; Martin pushes me aside, grabs hold of the knob and tries to turn it but to no avail. It’s locked.
“What the hell?” yells Martin, clearly as frustrated as I am with the lack of exits. “Why do they bother locking a door to an abandoned building?” he asks frustrated.
“See if you can break the lock or the door. Its hinges look old,” I say, forcefully trying not to panic as well. Martin nods his head and begins to rattle the knob with all of his 145 pounds of brute strength. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t move. Clearly more panicked by his failed attempt at the knob, Martin begins to throw himself wildly at the door. The sound reverberates off the old walls, making the sound even that much more disturbing to hear. I try to tell Martin that it’s no use--the door won’t budge--but he doesn’t hear me.
“Let’s just go back and try to find another door quickly,” I suggest, hoping to still be ahead of the fire. The words no sooner left my mouth when around the corner comes the yellow devil, snaking its way toward us, as if saying ‘found you!’ My heart sinks.
“We’re trapped!” yells Julia from in front of me. She grabs her long, straight blonde hair with her hands, in obvious agitation, and her blue eyes are round and full of tears. I want to comfort her but there is nothing to say. We are trapped. Tears fill my brown eyes, as well, but more from the smoke that envelops us. I cough loudly in unison with the others in my group, most of whom I just met today after volunteering for this cleanup project. I refuse to give up and wrack my brain to find another way out. But the more I think, the more the fire advances and the more hopeless things become. The thick, black smoke surrounds us now as the yellow devil hunts us from above and below. I fall to the floor next to Julia, and we hug as we cough, desperate for air and for hope.
Suddenly, I hear a loud thud from the locked door behind us. I look around but the smoke is so thick that I can’t see a damn thing. I can hear Martin coughing up a lung, as we all are, but I can’t see anything else beyond Julia and me. The air is getting thinner and thinner by the second. My lungs burn from lack of oxygen as vertigo overwhelms me. Beside me, Julia goes limp and it’s all I can do to keep her head from hitting the floor. I’m so sleepy I can barely hang on but the fear of falling into the abyss with a yellow monster on my tail keeps me awake. I don’t want to die here. I want to make it back to that villa in Spain where the sun was so huge in the sky at dusk that you could almost touch it. Or back to Italy where I tasted the best blend of red wine in the entire world. Not to mention I still haven’t hiked up to the Incan ruins at Macchu Picchu in Peru. There’s so much I still want to do in my life. It can’t end here in a rotting building in the middle of Atlanta, Ga.
Without warning, I hear another thud but this one much louder than the first. I slowly turn my head to the direction of the door and am blinded as the door gives way. Daylight fills the small hall in which we are all crouched—some of us conscious, some not. I look up through the clearing smoke and see a tall man in a yellow suit enter through the haze. The light behind him gives off an angelic glow as I watch him move forward and kneel beside me. I see his beautiful blue eyes shine through the mask and know he’s asking me something, but I can’t seem to move; his eyes have me transfixed. Words escape me as time freezes in this one moment. Is this what it’s like to die? Am I already seeing an angel from heaven? I want to ask, but my throat is scratchy, and I can’t get enough air into my lungs to form the words. Behind my angel, more men in yellow suits enter quickly and scatter to save everyone else.
Though my salvation lies within the blue eyes of the man staring back at me, I can’t stay with him. My eyes sting and my lungs burn; I feel dizzy and can’t quite keep my eyes open. The cloud of smoke that surrounds us is so thick that the small bits of light created by the blown open door can’t penetrate it. The darkness is all consuming. I cough, desperate to clear my lungs of the poison I can’t help but breath. I lie down on the floor, feel my cheek against the cool concrete and wait for the blessed darkness to take me to a place where nothing hurts and fresh air is abundant.
In the next moment, my face is lifted gently off the floor and I’m weightless. All I can think of is that my descent into the afterlife must be beginning because there’s no other way I would be able to boost myself up off the cool, damp floor. Nor would I want to. My body is numb. All I want to do is sleep. I rise, nonetheless, as strong arms cradle me. I feel the scratchiness of the plastic suit against my face so I know this isn’t a dream and I’m not dead. At least, not yet. I swear I hear the flames hiss at us, clearly upset at having been denied its prey.
A murmur reaches my ears, it sounds so far off, muffled. I’m having trouble making out what it’s saying. After a minute or so, the same words are thrown around in my brain: “You’re going to be alright.” Suddenly, a blinding light penetrates the haze and my world is once again illuminated. I turn my head further into the yellow plastic suit to shield my eyes. Once the small silver lights stop flashing behind my eyes, I look around and see that we are outside the burning building. I’m being carried to a stretcher. Again, I hear the words closely resembling ‘all right.’ I sigh and cuddle closer to the man carrying me to a stretcher beside an ambulance. He lays me down, and I cough anew as the fresh air works hard to get the poison from my lungs.
Above me, the sun is blocked as my blue-eyed savior in yellow leans down and unlatches his helmet. I watch as the he removes his tarnished makeshift head and places it onto the ground. I look up into the face of my angel, a face with sparkling blue eyes that brighten the heavens and short dirty blonde hair that accentuates his face just right. It’s a face I knew from long ago. He smiles at me; a smile that lights up the darkness and smoke billowing all around us. I smile back, sure that I will never see my angel again. I open my mouth to give him my thanks, only to be stopped cold by fierce coughing. He lifts me up and gently pats my back to help me replace the smoke with air into my lungs. I want to say how grateful I am but nothing comes out. He slowly lowers me back onto the stretcher. Once I’m back in place, I see him staring at me with a strange look upon his face. He gently removes a stray hair that fell in my eyes and pushes my long hair behind my ear. I smile back at him, the only way to tell him how grateful I am that he saved me.
“Everything will be okay now. Right, Anna Claire?” asks my angel. I smile; his voice is like smooth silk against my ears. I open my mouth to verify his name but I’m so sleepy. All I want to do is close my eyes. I have no idea how long I was out but when I opened my eyes again, my angel was gone. And so, I feared, was my heart.
Chapter Two
~ Budding Flame ~
The constant beeping of the machines in the hospital room awakens me. I open my eyes to the harsh white light above and blink a few times to orientate myself. I move to sit up, but vertigo hits me so I lie back down and groan. Will this incessant feeling ever end?
“Finally, you’re awake,” states a deep, masculine voice from beside me. I look around and see Steve pacing beside the hospital bed. I don’t even get to see if his grey eyes are concerned since they are always looking at his phone. The phone gets to see more of him than I do. He’s decked out in his usual crisp, clean, double-breasted suit and conservative tie. Not a speck of dust blemishes the fabric. I’m not surprised that he isn’t sitting in the chair right beside the bed, since he hardly ever sits down. He doesn’t like to do anything that might make his suit wrinkle.
I try to sit up but weakness forces me back down onto the pillow. I groan, which solicits a sigh from the man still pacing the room.
“I’m glad you’re safe, Anna Claire, but can we please dispense with the dramatics? You know how I dislike that,” Steve points out.
I cover my face with my hand, resisting the urge to groan again so as not to bother my fiancé. Just then, the nurse comes in to check my vitals and smiles at me. Her grayish hair is in a bun and her aging face is kind.
“How are you feeling my dear?” the nurse asks genuinely concerned.
“I’m still dizzy but okay, I think,” I answer, realizing I mean it. I am definitely feeling better than I did after leaving the smoke but also weak, as if I’ve run a short marathon. How long ago was I rescued anyway? If the increasing darkness descending upon my hospital room is any indication, it has been a few hours.
“How long have I been here?” I ask the nurse.
“About three hours, my dear,” states the nurse as she takes my wrist to check my pulse. Satisfied by my progression, the nurse proceeds to take other vitals. I turn my attention to Steve again, intending to tell him to go home. First, I have to peel his attention away from his work.
“Um, sweetie?” I begin but stop abruptly. I’m now acutely aware of how much the effort to speak hurts my throat. But I push on in the hopes that I don’t have to say much to get his attention. No such luck. Steve is busy typing something. “Thank you for coming, but honestly I’m feeling better. If you need to work, then by all means go back to the office. I’ll be fine. I promise.”
Steve looks up from his phone, a strange mix of skepticism and relief written all over his face. He studies me for a minute before he answers. I can practically hear the inner debate going on in his mind right now. Courtesy and societal rules demand that he stay, pressing matters of law demand that he leave. You don’t get to be partner in one of the biggest law firms in Atlanta without ambition. And winning a big case doesn’t hurt either. Steve is a simple creature and a very predictable one. That’s part of what my father likes best in him. I wish I shared my father’s preferences. I never had a doubt which option Steve would choose.
Steve straightens his tie and buttons his jacket as he approaches the bed, a smile on his face. I swallow the bitterness as he comes near the edge of the bed, ready for him to be gone.
“Well, if that’s what you want, my love, then I’ll go back to work. I’m just glad that you’re okay.”
“Me too,” I answer because let’s face it; what else is there to say? I hold my breath as Steve kisses my forehead before quickly leaving the room, his phone still buzzing.
The nurse clears her throat beside me as she changes my IV fluid bag. I put my head back down onto the pillow, hoping to avoid any questions. Today obviously wasn’t my day. “Well,” began the nurse carefully, “he seemed to be in quite a hurry to leave. Was he all right, my dear?
I cringe, not sure how to explain the man I plan to marry. We aren’t exactly the most conventional couple. “Steve is a good guy, just a very busy lawyer who wants to be partner. That doesn’t leave much time for anything else, including me.” The nurse gives me that sympathetic look that I have begun to hate with all my soul. Marriage isn’t always about love. I turn away, feigning sleep until the nurse finishes her checkup and leaves. Alone in the darkened hospital room, my mind wanders back to the man that saved me, and the blue eyes I can’t seem to stop thinking about. Tears spring to my eyes as I think of how pathetic my life has become. If I were truly happy, I wouldn’t pine over a stranger with eyes like the sea after a storm. If I were happy, I would never have taken that stupid ass job to design a new front for that abandoned building my father bought on a whim. I’m a good architect with a small firm of my own. I didn’t need or want his help. But who am I kidding? Years of walking on eggshells around my successful father, while at the same time trying to gain his approval, takes a toll. I would have accepted any job just to show him I could succeed. That’s the only love my father knows.
Peeling myself from my own melancholy, I try to sit up again in the hospital bed and am happy to see that I don’t feel like vomiting from the vertigo. I attempt to focus on happy things I still want to do with my life and be grateful for the second chance. But as I sit lonely in my hospital room, I wonder: am I destined to be alone as I experience all these things? A tear runs silently down my face, my mood as dark and sad as the room. I mentally shake myself as I wipe the tears away. I’ll be damned if I’ll let that stand in my way. I have a guardian angel and I sure as hell won’t waste the second chance he gave me at life. It’s time for me to start living.
Chapter Three
~ Smoking Embers ~
The hospital released me the next day. My father’s assistant came to pick me up in the company limo to take me back to my father’s house. It’s times like these that I miss my mother the most. She died when I was five so I have little to no memories of her, save the picture I keep in my room at my father’s house. My father tells me stories of how she was a gentle soul taken too early by breast cancer. He doesn’t speak of her often, but when he does it’s evident how much he loved her. Most memories I have of her are like mist; they come and go and I can’t quite grasp onto any of them. I remember her perfume. She loved Sweet Pea from Victoria’s Secret. I keep that in my drawer for days I feel down.
The limo pulls up to the cozy eighteen-bedroom house in Sandy Springs, Georgia. The driver runs to the side to help me out of the car. The housekeeper, Alissa, runs out of the front door and wraps me in a big bear hug. “Oh, Anna Claire, sweetie, I’m so glad you’re okay!” she says as she pulls me closer.
“Can't breathe, “I say through a scratched throat in a raspy voice. It is obviously too low to hear since Alissa won't let go. I decide a tap on her shoulder might be the best course of action. “Please! Air,” I wisp out, hoping that this time she hears.
“Oh! Sorry, baby girl,” apologizes the only mother I’ve ever known. She releases me and I instantly draw a few big breaths of air. It’s like my lungs are afraid to let any air go for fear they might never get anymore again.
I smile at Alissa to let her know that I’m not mad. “It’s okay, I'm fine,” I say, but it comes out as more of a croak than a voice. Alissa's face darkens instantly, and she puts her hands on her hips.
“No thanks to that worthless, absent father of yours,” she blares out. “If he cared about you half as much as he does that damn law firm of his, he would have never sent you into that condemned building to work!”
“It wasn't condemned Alissa, just abandoned and unkempt,” I point out.
“Well, it should have been condemned from the looks of it, and stop defending that father of yours to me. I have his number already.”
I shake my head and say nothing else. History has taught me that Alissa doesn't like my father, and nothing I say will change her mind. Truthfully, I don't want to change it because I know she's right. I follow Alissa into the den and am immediately struck with memories of my mother.
I can see her sitting in the overstuffed leather chair by the fireplace that dominates the room. She watches over me as I play on the soft rug in front of the fire. My mother wanted this one room for herself, and she picked out every piece of furniture and artwork. I never knew why this was her special place, but it’s the most welcoming of all the rooms in the house. Since she burned everything she tried to cook, Alissa kicked her out of the oversized, marble dominated kitchen years ago. The two of them were best friends and did what they could to make this stark museum a home. But my version of home was destroyed when she died.
The weakness jars me back from my memories, and I almost collapse. From behind me, Alissa huffs as I allow her to help me onto the couch. Though I’m better, I still feel like I've been run over by a truck and very weak. Lack of oxygen will do that to you, I guess. I lie back and relish the feeling of the soft leather against my cheek. The older couch has always been one of my favorite pieces, since i
t smells like history and feels as soft as a teddy bear. I used to fall asleep in my mother's arms on this couch. It's the only thing in this mausoleum of a house that actually feels like home.
Alissa disappears into the kitchen and brings me back my favorite red wine blend. “I figured you could use this after the day you've had, sweetie. Drink up.”
I smile as she hands me the crystal glass full of 2007 Montevertine Italian wine with some charcuterie and cheese. It’s been my favorite since I traveled in Italy years ago. I take a deep sip and visibly relax; it’s just what I needed. “Thank you so much. It's perfect.”
Alissa simply pats my head and says she'll see about dinner as she leaves me alone with my thoughts. It’s a state I find myself in a bit too much lately. Having gone through a crisis, and come out the other side relatively untouched, puts things into perspective. The life I have let my father build for me isn't what I want. Back in the old, abandoned building, with the engulfing smoke and the fire coming for me, I was sure that I was going to die. All I could think of was what a shame that I have never really lived the life I chose. Now that I have a second chance, I need to set things right. First, I need to thank Ethan for saving me.
Chapter Four
~ Budding Flame ~
The firehouse on 5th street and Main is like any other firehouse I’ve seen before: a square building that can house large fire trucks and mini rooms off to the side for working out and meetings. I walk into the front door, my hands clasping my purse a bit too tight. I start to bite my nails but then force myself to stop. I don’t want to seem like the basket case that I am. I look around for someone but the place seems deserted.
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