Page 46 of Due At The Same Time
“Dad?Dad?Fuck!”
I saw Ambrose rattling madly at the back door, but it was locked.
“Dad, wake up!”
Shit
Through the flames, I saw the shape of Harold clearly outlined in the living room window, lying on the couch taking an afternoon nap.
“Be careful!” I cried. “I think the roof is going to cave in!”
“I have to get him!” he roared back.
Ambrose had always been as stubborn as a mule, and he stayed there despite the falling sparks lighting up his collared shirt, the ash that blew through his hair.
There was a crash from one of the upper floors. The ceiling supports were starting to crumble.
I saw him glance around on the ground, then grab one of the heavy decorative rocks that lined the garden walkway, ripping through his silk sleeve and wrapping the cloth around his hand.
Then he smashed through the glass panels of the door and and ripped it open.
I shrieked as one of the second-floor windows imploded, holding my hands over baby Julian’s ears so he wouldn’t hear the terrifying sounds of the building collapsing.
A firetruck siren sounded in the distance, getting closer.
My heart was pounding so hard I was afraid I was going to faint, and then Ambrose burst out the door, his father’s unconscious body slung over his shoulders.
My god
My ex-husband’s face was sooty and slick, his glasses broken, and his shirt was in tatters, blood running down his wrist where the glass had cut his arm.
“Indi, get back!” he called sharply, and I saw his eyes flare at me as he stalked across the yard.
Goddamn, Ihated, definitely hated when he used that bossy domineering tone with me. I was very safe all the way over here in my own yard.
But I retreated back even further until I was on my front step.
Ambrose jogged with his father across the yard and then over the fence just as the roof collapsed.
Julian was still asleep like an angel on me as Ambrose laid Harold out carefully on a soft patch of my grass.
“Dad, Dad!” Ambrose cried, his voice breaking as he loosened his father’s collar and began to pat his cheeks vigorously. “Wake up, Dad! Please—God, please be OK!”
I felt my heart give a ridiculous lurch inside me as the firetrucks swung into the driveway.
“I can’t feel a pulse, Indi!” Ambrose cried, and he looked up at me with such haunted eyes, his face looking like skin scraped over a skull.
And of course, immediately Harold popped up like a rabbit out of a hat asking, “What’s wrong? What’s all this? Can’t an old man take a nap in peace?”
Ambrose’s shoulders slumped and he gripped his father in a tight hug.
“I thought for a minute we’d lost you. Fuck! I—love you, Dad.”
Harold looked over at me, bewildered but patting Ambrose on the shoulder.
“I love you too, son. Er, sons?”
“Looks like someone tried to burn down the house while you were still in it,” I put in.
