by Lisa Lace
Choking, I slammed the door shut and ran to the other side of my room by the window. I was shaking and started to cry. Terror was making my limbs feel heavy. There was a ball in my throat. I felt like my thoughts were lost in the smoke, too. I could barely think straight. My whole mind was buzzing with fear. I couldn’t hold onto a single thought.
It took a moment to gather my senses enough to race for my cell on the bedside table. It was hard to make a decision about anything with the smoke blinding me and making me choke. With shaking hands, I dialed 911.
“911. What is your emergency?”
“My apartment is on fire! Help me! Please, help me!”
My voice came out as a piercing shriek when I screamed down the phone.
The operator remained calm. “Where are you, ma’am? I need the address.”
“I’m at Walton Apartments, Brayford.”
“All right, ma’am. I have you located. We’re sending help. Now, I’m going to need you to listen to me carefully and try and answer my questions, all right? I’m going to keep talking to you until help arrives.”
I was crying and shaking and nodded in response. It took me a moment to remember that I needed to reply. “Okay.”
“Where are you in the building, ma’am?”
“I’m in my bedroom.”
“And where is the fire?”
“In the hall.”
“Can you reach an exit?”
“No, I’m trapped.”
As soon as I said the words, the reality of the situation sank in, and I began to sob. I was trapped. Ahead of me were walls of fire. Behind me was a window with a five-story drop onto concrete. How was I going to survive this?
“Okay. I’m going to need you to shut any doors between you and the fire.”
I tried to push out the panic from my mind enough to answer the operator. “The door is shut.”
“Good. All right, now, I’m gonna need you to go to the window. Do you have a window in your room?”
“Yes.”
“All right. Go to the window and open it—just a little. Only open it enough that you can call out. Can you do that?”
I did as I was asked, and slid the window up just a fraction. “It’s open.”
“Stay by the window. When you see the fire engine, you’re gonna need to shout out. Which apartment are you in?”
“5D.”
“I’ll let dispatch know. Keep calm. What’s your name?”
“Jenna.”
“Okay, Jenna. Stay calm. How you doing?”
I was shaking too much to answer. The heat of the fire outside my door was building in my room. It was already sweltering, and the smoke was overwhelming. I felt my head begin to spin and I sunk down under the window.
“Where are they?”
“They’re on their way, Jenna. You’re doing great. They’re close. Really close. You should hear them soon. Stay on the line, now. Stay with me.”
It was getting hard to breathe. I was coughing so hard it felt like my lungs were being ripped out of my chest, and I folded at the middle. I could see the flames themselves now flickering under my door. Soon they would engulf the room, and me too if I didn’t do something.
I lifted myself to my knees and looked down at the street outside. Could I do it? Could I jump?
“Jenna? Are you still there?”
I kept clinging to my cell, but I didn’t answer. I was fixated on the ground below, and the choice I might have to make if those flames got any closer.
In that moment, I felt the loss of everything that could have been. A fulfilling career, a long relationship with Nate, my own kids; a happy life. It was all minutes away from being lost forever. I was moments away from the flames.
Could I jump? That was the question. The decision I would have to make. My fingers slid under the window pane, ready to lift it up; ready to sit on the sill and get one step closer to falling. Just as I was about to lift the frame and get ready to jump, I heard sirens and saw the fire engine come reeling around the corner.
Maybe it wasn’t too late…
I crouched down low and tried to keep breathing. I dared dash to my bed to grab a pillow, and I held it over my face to protect me from the smoke. I was suffocating. My eyes were stinging. My body was starting to feel heavy. My vision was starting to swim.
I heard the fire alarms of the building ringing. My hazy thoughts turned to Carla and the other residents. I felt my heart drop into my stomach—what if they didn’t make it?
Even with my head swimming and my thoughts confused, I knew one thing for sure: this was no accident. Victor had done this. I could smell the gasoline. The fire had started at my door. My life was dangling on the line because of his jealousy and mania. But how many other lives were on the line, too? I prayed for Carla. I prayed for them all.
I dragged myself onto my knees with the last of my strength. My throat and lungs were burning, but I summoned all the voice I could to scream out the window. I reached my arm out under the window pane to wave, careful not to open it any further in case the air fueled the flames.
The engine came to a stop on my street. Looking down, I could see that a crowd had gathered to watch the rescue. Behind me, the flames had caught the covers of my bed. The heat was so intense that it was starting to form waves. My skin was turning pink; not yet burning. But soon. If I wasn’t rescued in minutes, then my skin would be the next thing to succumb to those flames. I screamed louder.
I screamed even though my voice was hoarse and my energy was waning. I screamed even though I felt like I was close to giving out. I screamed because I wanted to survive. I didn’t want it to end this way.
Through stinging eyes, I could see the fire engine begin to extend its ladder towards my window, and relief washed over me.
“Yes! Yes! I’m here! Thank God…I’m here!”
I looked over my shoulder. Those flames were so close—but I thought I might make it. Survival was possible. Escape was possible.
There was a firefighter on the ladder coming towards me. He was dressed head to toe in protective gear, his face obscured by a helmet and face shield. He was climbing the steps of the ladder even as the rungs still stretched towards me.
By the time the ladder reached my windowsill, he was already at the top, ready to reach out to me. Still clinging onto my phone, I knelt in front of the window and waited for him.
When he reached me, the firefighter put his fingers under the pane and wrenched it upwards. The flames swelled at the sudden influx of oxygen, and I screamed.
The firefighter reached out to me. His voice was muffled under his face shield. “Take my hand! Climb out the window. It’s okay…I’ve got you.”
I was terrified as I lifted my leg to step out the window. I felt my head spin when my first leg swung over the sill. The firefighter took my hand with one of his, the other circling my waist and helping me out the window. I was shaking.
“It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
I was sobbing as my bare feet met the cold rungs of the ladder, and I clung onto that firefighter for dear life. He clung onto me. The ladder began to descend.
As we started to move towards the ground, I looked back up at the window where I’d been. Those flames were incredibly close to where I’d been. My apartment was engulfed.
Looking down, I saw the residents of the building milling in the street in a crowd. Everybody was in their pajamas. I could hear children crying.
All this…All this mayhem. I closed my eyes against the guilt I felt and pressed myself against the firefighter. I was dizzy and scared of falling. He held me close.
“I got you.”
I knew that voice. The way those arms held me was familiar. It was hard to see past the face shield, but I thought I knew who my rescuer was.
The ladder was fully descended. The firefighter helped me onto the ground and removed his helmet.
I felt a fresh sob gather in my throat when I saw that it was Nate who had saved me. I threw my arms around his neck and ki
ssed him. He held me like he was never going to let me go.
“You saved me.”
“Thank God, Jenna. Thank God you’re okay.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Nate
I held Jenna in my arms and breathed in the scent of her. I could still smell the jasmine beneath the smoke. The feeling of her hair against my cheek filled me with the greatest sense of relief I’d ever known.
When the call that there was a fire at Walton Apartments had come into the station, I’d felt my heart drop beneath my feet. Instantly, I’d known. It was too much of a coincidence that a fire would break out at Jenna’s apartment building after she received those two notes from her ex.
That knowledge had filled me with dread, then a rush of pure adrenaline. That adrenaline had pushed me to move faster than I ever had.
The two-minute journey from the station to Jenna’s street had seemed eternal. I’d fought enough fires to know how quickly they could spread, and how destructive they could be. My mind had immediately started swimming with images of Jenna surrounded by flames, choking; trapped.
I’d fought back my fears for her through sheer determination that I would not let anything happen to her. I made that promise, and I intended to keep it. As soon as we pulled into the street, I’d been the first out the engine. My eyes darted straight to Jenna’s window. Sure enough, there she was—screaming for help.
She was at the window. Good girl.
I dashed to the ladder and screamed at Lewis to get it moving. The moments it had taken to reach Jenna had felt a lifetime. When she stepped out that window and into my arms, I felt all the fear I’d been pushing back crash over me. I held onto her for dear life.
Now, we were on the ground, and she was safe with me.
I drew back to examine her. “Are you all right?”
She was shaking head to toe but managed a nod. “I think so.”
My eyes traveled over her to check for injury. Her skin was flushed from the heat, but apart from a small mark on her arm, she hadn’t been burned. She was grimy from the soot of the flames. My hands ran down her forearms, and I held onto her as if to check that she was real.
I hugged her again, pulling her close and kissing her forehead. I shut my eyes and allowed myself just a moment to savor the fact that she was safe and alive.
I heard another set of sirens behind me and turned to see the ambulance had arrived. “Come on, Jenna. Let’s get you checked out.”
“I’m all right, Nate…” Jenna’s voice was hoarse.
“Please, Jenna. You’ve breathed in a lot of smoke.”
She didn’t argue with me anymore, and let me lead her to the waiting ambulance. A paramedic rushed out to attend to her.
“She was rescued from inside,” I informed him. “Take good care of her.” I turned back towards the fire.
Jenna grabbed my arm. Even though the paramedic was trying to press an oxygen mask over her mouth, she shrugged him off and clung onto me. Her eyes grew round and frightened. Her hair was disheveled, her skin flushed and blackened. She was afraid. “Where are you going?”
“I have to help my crew. That fire’s still going.”
Her eyes brimmed with tears. “Don’t leave me.”
I gently pried her hand away from my forearm, held it tightly, and kissed it. “I’ll be with you again before you know it. You’re going to get some medical attention, and then I’ll come find you.”
I could see Jenna battling with herself. I could tell from the way she was having to set her jaw to stop it from trembling, and the way tears still hung suspended in her eyes, although she wouldn’t allow them to fall, that she didn’t want me to leave her. But Jenna was too strong to beg me, and as she looked around at the chaos of the residents milling in the street, crying and comforting one another, she knew I had to go.
She bowed her head. “All right.”
I took her face in both my hands and kissed her head again. “I’m sorry.”
It pained me to leave her, but the fire was still burning. The flames compromised the whole building. If the structure gave out, it could cause even more damage, and pose a risk to the people in the street. I had to think about the residents and the turmoil it could cause if the fire spread and destroyed more homes. Some of these people had kids.
I began to jog back towards the building, turning back over my shoulder to give Jenna one last glance as I returned to fight the fire. She had the oxygen mask over her face now, but I could still see the anguish in her expression as she stared up at her burning apartment. The flames were curling out of the window now, sending smoke spiraling into the sky.
I was already worried about her again, but I had to focus on the task at hand. I had to minimize the risk to people and surrounding buildings. I had to do my job.
I was running back to the building when a familiar figure came rushing over to me, pushing past other people to get to me. It was Carla. She was in her pajamas and looked stunned. Her eyes were wide, her hair a mess, her feet bare.
She grabbed me by the arm, frantic. “Nate! Is it Jenna’s apartment? Is she okay? Please God, tell me they’ve got her. Please, Nate, tell me she’s okay.”
I didn’t have time to talk to her and tried to brush her off quickly. “It’s all right, Carla. Jenna’s fine.”
“Nate! Did her ex do this?”
I stopped and turned to Carla. I nodded. “Probably.”
Carla gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. “Where is she?”
I nodded towards the ambulance, putting my hand on Carla’s shoulder and giving her a gentle push in its direction. “She’s getting some medical attention. Stay with her, will you? She’s in a bad way.”
“I will. I’ll look after her.”
I nodded. “Thanks, Carla.”
Carla’s frightened gaze lifted to the burning building, and she swallowed. “Nate, please be safe.”
“This is what I do, Carla. I’ll be fine.”
She nodded and reluctantly stepped away. She looked back at me over her shoulder as she headed towards Jenna, eventually breaking her gaze and jogging the last of the distance toward the ambulance. I saw Jenna stand up from the back of the ambulance and open up her arms to Carla, who rushed into them and gave her a giant hug.
I was glad that Carla was with her. I didn’t want Jenna to be alone. As I jogged toward Sam to take up my place at his side, I found myself scanning the crowd, examining the faces. I was looking for him; Victor.
I didn’t know what he looked like. Dark, fair? Tall, short? Any one of the men in this crowd could be him, gleefully witnessing the chaos he’d wreaked. The faces I scanned didn’t look gleeful; they looked horrified. Husbands were holding their wives; fathers were holding their children. I couldn’t pick out any figure looking pleased with the sight of the flames.
Still, as I stood behind Sam to lift the engine’s hose and jumped into fighting the fire, I felt uneasy. Victor had been here. That fire had started in Jenna’s apartment—there was no other explanation. He could still be here.
I wanted to be with Jenna; to comfort and protect her. I wanted to stand guard at her side until the culprit was caught and behind bars.
I instructed onlookers to step back, waving them away from the building. Then I turned back to the flames.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Jenna
Carla and I sat side by side on a bed in a treatment room, our hands wrung together in one big bundle on our laps. Carla was squeezing mine tightly, trying to offer comfort, but I knew she was almost as shaken as me.
Her skin was pale, and she had large, dark bags under her eyes. She kept swallowing and blinking like she was trying to hold back tears or trying to keep her composure. Every now and then, she would lift her hand from the top of the bundle and gently pat mine, or she would stroke the back of my hand. I think she was trying to distract herself.
I wondered how far the fire had spread from my apartment. Was Carla’s home destroyed, as well? How long would
her life be in disarray before the building was repaired? What happened to her now? To any of us?
I felt guilt wash over me like a wave, and I folded in half, sobbing. My tears were brought on by guilt and terror in equal measure. I felt so sorry for all the damage that had been done to the building, for the disruption the damage would cause to all the residents, because of my ex. More than this, I was confronted once again with the reality that Victor would stoop to any low to make his message clear. Now to find you.
Carla extricated her hands from mine and began to rub my back. “Sh, honey. It’s okay. You’re safe here.”
My eyes were already red and stinging from the smoke; now that I was crying, I could hardly see. I let myself fall against Carla’s shoulder and sobbed while she cradled me like I was a child. “I just can’t believe what he’s done. He could have hurt so many people…”
“Sh, sh. It’s all right. It looked to me like everyone got out fine. The alarms went off really quick. People evacuated before it spread. I’m sure of it.”
“If anyone was hurt because of me, I don’t think I’d ever forgive myself.”
“This isn’t your fault.”
“How far do you think the fire spread?”
Carla bit down on her lip like she didn’t want to tell me.
“Carla… how far?”
Reluctantly, she told me what she’d seen. “It spread to at least two other apartments on the fifth floor. There was a lot of damage, but I think everyone got out all right. I saw Melissa, from the apartment next to yours, at the window. The ladder was already extended toward her. I’m sure she made it.”
“Did you see her get out?”
“I’m sure she made it.”
That wasn’t the answer I wanted to hear. I wanted Carla to tell me that she’d seen Melissa’s rescue with her own eyes. And what about the others? It made my chest twinge to think about the residents closest to me in the building, and whether they were okay.
I closed my eyes, and my voice came out in a whisper. “I should have run, but I was stubborn. I didn’t want him to win again.”
“What are you meant to do, Jenna? Live your life on the run? Always looking over your shoulder? Never settling down? You couldn’t have known what he would do. You were being brave.”
