Page 6 of Burn
“Fuck!” I scream, throwing my back against the pile of charred and burning wood and plaster as more rains down on us. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
He screams in my arms, vocalizing the panic he feels rising in me as I thrust myself into the barricade over and over again.
“Come on motherfucker!” I bark out, kicking backwards with my foot, trying to move the bottom of the pile and have it come crashing down.
It shakes and tilts but doesn’t move enough. It’s not going anywhere with just my force. I need a fucking miracle to get us out now, and as I close my eyes and hold my breath, I do something I haven’t done since I was that terrified little boy, locked in my room, waiting to die. I pray.
To whom, I don’t know. I’ve never really believed in a benevolent being in the sky above. I mean if he existed why would people die, why would children get cancer, and why would I be the way I am?
“To whoever is up there, fuck, or down there, can you please give me a fucking hand here?”
Is it an answer? Or is it just goddamned stupid fucking luck that the heap of debris shakes, rattling against my back just before voices call out from behind it.
“Coming through!” Someone hollers out from the other side.
“Fuck yes! Buddy, were good.” I cough and choke out to the kid, squeezing him tighter, tapping the helmet that’s way too big for his little head.
It sounds like thunder as I move us out of the way and the trash heap falls, tumbling down to the floor and scattering at my feet, and precious light blasts through the opening from the torches on the helmets of the next wave of responders. There’s an army of them waiting to usher us out, blasting the flames with their hoses. The calvary has finally arrived, and just in time.
“Fourth floor,” I cough hard, “one trapped, single team.” I hack out, stumbling through the opening, my eyes watering so badly I can barely see, my legs so tired that my knees buckle with each step.
Hands reach out to me, grabbing at my arms, but I shake them off. I need to get him out the last few steps, but they need to go help my brothers. With nods of acknowledgement and pats to my head, they leave me and follow the path I just came down.
The lights from all the trucks outside cut through the night and the smoke, dancing in the black sky and bouncing off everything around us as I stumble out the door, gasping for the air that I need, my body shaking, my feet dragging and sliding through the debris. I’m wrecked, I can’t breathe, but in my arms, the little boy looks up at me with wide eyes of awe at the killer who just saved him. That right there is why I’m still here, right? That look? Or is it to punish the one who did this to him, if she survives?
“Fuck.” I curse out, dropping to my knees on the sidewalk outside, leaning back on my feet, letting go of him as others rip him from my hold, whisking him away to an ambulance.
The world spins, the ground tilts, and everything goes dark, as I fall forwards, my soot covered face hitting the cement like a sack of bricks.
Chapter
Four
“Hey. You good?” The words filter through my sleep, while a hand smacks my face, tilting it to the side.
“Fuck man. Let me sleep.” I grunt out, blindly swinging at the pest bothering me.
“You’ve been sleeping for days straight. Up and at ‘em.” Pete, my captain and only father figure in my life says, slapping my face again.
I never had a father in my life, I don’t even think the whore of a mother I had knew who he was, and Pete knows this, and has always tried his best to fill in where I was lacking, ever since one of his boys pulled me from hell.
“No.”
“Your bike’s in the way, and I’m tired of moving it around the garage every time we need to wash the trucks and shit. Come on dude.” He says, breathing out a heavy sigh.
“Fine.” I grumble, wiping the sleep from my eyes, wincing at the pain from the burns across my cheeks.
I can breathe almost normally, but a deep breath in has me coughing violently, forcing me to bolt upright on my cot, holding onto my chest as I feel it rattle with the exertion.
“Smoke inhalation is a bitch huh?” He snickers, slapping my foot before he walks away shaking his mostly bald head, murmuring under his breath about me being a hero, yet again.
“Yeah she is.” I wheeze, bracing myself with my hands wrapped around the edges of the small bed.
I don’t remember being thrown into my little cubby and onto my cot. The past few days have been a blur while my body recovered from the fire at the high-rise building. I’m still sore, but now it’s mostly from lack of movement and everything being tight from the extreme exertion then nothing. I feel like death warmed over and need to get my ass back in the gym, that is if my lungs will cooperate.
The bed squeaks as I swing my legs over and put my bare feet on the cold tile floor. It makes me shiver at the sensation, when the last things that I recall touching me were hot as hell. My chest hurts as I cough through another round of goosebumps and my head swims, making little sparkling flashes appear in my vision.
Fuck me.
