Rusty Nail

CHAPTER 11

LIKE ALL CURIOUS teenagers, I’d tried cigarettes. I decided early on that a nicotine buzz wasn’t worth holding hot smoke in my lungs.

That popped into my head as I crawled across the smoldering carpet, my head pressed to the floor in an attempt to suck the last bit of oxygen floating at the bottom of the living room.

The ringing in my head was subsiding, the fire sound coming back. I squinted through the thick smoke, which felt like sandpaper on my eyes, and wondered where I was crawling to. Disorientation had dug its claws in, and I might have been crawling around in circles. I tried to go where there weren’t flames, but there were more flames than not, and they danced and jumped around, igniting more things.

The heat had officially become unbearable. One time many years ago, in an effort to bake away my clammy white pallor, I’d visited Oak Street beach in July and had forsaken the sunscreen in order to minimize my tan time. I’d fallen asleep, and wound up with a nice case of sun poisoning, my skin so red, it had blistered.

This hurt worse. Though I wasn’t actually on fire, it was so hot, I felt like I was on fire. The sweat poured out of me in rivulets, but evaporated almost as soon as my pores squeezed it out.

My knuckles hit something ahead of me. A scorched wall. I followed it, blind and hacking, and it fell away into an opening.

Stairs.

Going up is never a smart idea in an emergency situation, but I couldn’t stay where I was. I climbed the stairs on my hands and knees, my.38 still gripped in my fist. Soon it would be too hot to hold. I wondered how stable the rounds were – on top of everything, I didn’t need my bullets exploding in my gun.

The higher I climbed, the smokier it got, which made sense because smoke rises. When I reached the top of the stairs, I couldn’t see and I couldn’t breathe. My lungs felt like two ashy lumps of charcoal, and I was light-headed and in surround-sound pain. I’d begun to cry between coughing fits.

The fire was right behind me.

Not knowing which way to go, I continued on my present course and felt tile under my hands. A bathroom. I got on my knees, felt up the wall, and hit the switch, hoping to turn on the fan to suck away some of the smoke.

No electricity.

Frantic and blind, I closed the door behind me and swung my hands wildly around, bumping the sink. I turned on the water, cupping some in my hands, splashing it onto my face to clear my eyes.

It helped a little, and I could make out the window opposite the sink. A ventilation window. Too small to crawl through, but I sure could use some ventilation right about now.

I fumbled with the latch, tugged it open, and took big, greedy gulps of cool night air.

Above the din of the flames, I heard sirens.

“Help!” I tried to yell. But it only came out as a croak.

I holstered my gun and felt around for a towel. Holding it tight, I stuck my arm out the window and wagged the towel frantically, like I was signaling to surrender. The window faced one of the narrow spaces between buildings, and all I could see was the side of the duplex next to me.

Then the heat suddenly kicked up, and I noted with displeasure that the bathroom door I closed moments ago was ablaze.

I hung the towel on the window latch and then backed away from the door, almost tripping against the bathtub.

Not a bad idea, a bath.

Climbing into the tub, I tugged on the faucet and yanked up the little handle to turn on the shower.

The water came out hot, but it felt wonderful on my face and hands. I stood in the spray, opening my mouth, letting it bathe my scratched throat. Then I bent down and pulled the lever to plug up the bathtub drain, letting the tub fill with water.

Though the window was open, the flaming door was creating smoke faster than it left the room. I sat down, hugging my knees, watching death descend from the ceiling, inch by inch.

The firefighters had to be hosing down the building, right?

It was a brick construction, and that helped, didn’t it?

Didn’t they see my towel hanging out the window and know I was in here?

Though it had to be over 110 in that bathroom, my whole body was shivering.

I was soaked, so I probably wouldn’t burn to death. The smoke would get me. Or maybe the water would heat up to the point that I’d boil. It felt like it was getting close. I had turned the handle to Cold, but there wasn’t any cold; the fire was heating the water as it came through the pipes.

It was just a matter of time until they figured out I was in here and rescued me. Two minutes, tops. I could last another two minutes. One hundred and twenty seconds. Then I’d be safe.

I began to count.

One… two… three…

I stopped counting at 160.

The flames leaped from the door to the ceiling, and bits of burning plaster flaked down and sizzled in my tub, a rain of fire. I picked up the bath mat, dunked it in the sooty water, and wound it around my head. The shower slowed to a trickle, and then stopped, with my tub only half filled.

A calm came over me, possibly induced by oxygen deprivation. I was going to die. I didn’t have a choice in the matter. I knew that I should be fighting somehow, trying to prevent it. But there was nothing else I could do.

I’d been beaten.

A small part of me didn’t want to accept it and screamed for me to act. Maybe I could wrap myself in wet towels and charge down the stairs. Maybe I could bust the bathroom window and scream until I was noticed, even though that wall was on fire now too.

But the larger part of me recognized those options as futile. I’d live a little bit longer if I waited for death, rather than rushed to meet it.

Once I accepted my fate, I accepted everything that went with it.

I wouldn’t ever know if Herb had cancer or not.

I wouldn’t ever know if my mom came out of her coma.

I wouldn’t ever know if Latham would have called me back.

I wouldn’t ever know who it was that shot at me downstairs, which seemed like hours ago.

Lifetimes ago.

It made me sad.

The bathroom door burst inward, and the last thing I remembered was a large man in a firefighter uniform reaching out for me.