Classwork

Fire and Water

"Goodbye."

The word carried with it an air of finality, the silence broken only by the crashing of waves against the dock. The salt filled her nose, and the air was dense, causing her hair to stick to the back of her neck. She took one step forward and deftly caught his wrist.

"We both know that I won't let you leave. You will go down swinging with the rest of us, don't you forget it," she snarled, pulling him back towards the mainland.

"I no longer serve this city. Leave me to die on my own terms." He pulled weakly against her grasp, his gaze flicking over her head to where the city of San Francisco was enveloped in fire. A tendril of ash came from the sky and landed on his face, smearing black. His eyes swept down to the ocean below, crashing relentlessly. "I'd prefer drowning to burning. We all die either way, you know this."

Her eyes were a perfect match to the blue-green of the ocean in the daytime, but he could only see the flames reflected in them. "You were the mayor. You are the mayor. You didn't even give an emergency address. And now you're on the pier trying to die without even trying to save your city?"

He took a deep breath, slowly lowering his eyes to peer into hers. "Yes."

She raised her other hand and slapped him. Even with the cacophony of howling wind, crackling lightning, roaring thunder, and booming waves, the resounding crack from her blow rang around them for a moment. "You coward."

"I have never denied it."

She stared at him for another moment, contemplating another hit, when a rogue wave slammed over the deck, catching both of them in the mouth of the ocean, pulling the both of them into its depths. The dock broke under them, splintering into millions of pieces of what would, one day, become but driftwood floating along a calm beach.

With the last breath of air she would ever take, desperately clawing her way from the clutches of nature itself, she spoke but one word.

"Coward."