Flawless

Flawless [1]

1.

The sensation of the fire licking my skin was something to be desired, if like me it didn’t effect, or couldn’t then you’d be free to enjoy it happily.  How the heat sent tingles through your flesh, it hurt only for a split second before the feeling became numb. However, fire is meant to destroy, as I was witnessing now. Nothing is supposed to endure fire.

It was because I ditched last period to go to TCBY, with my best friend, Poet that I’m here now. We both felt more like crunchy toffee then crunching a test. We had just gotten outside of the school gate  when we heard the fire trucks, then we saw them. Three of them passing our school in the blur of red lights and sirens, we followed them until we came to a burning lumber warehouse. I mean, come on that’s just kindling. I heard the firemen say that there were still two people inside. I couldn’t just stand by and do nothing. I slipped through a side door, and was engulfed by fire.

So that brings us to know. And me, navigating my way through a fire filled warehouse that I’ve never been in before.

“Hello!?” I called through the fire, but I got no response. I started to run, out of what was the big space where they kept everything I came to hallway that appeared to be office spaces.  “Hello?!” I called again. And this time, I got a slightl reply. At least I think it was. I heard several loud bangs coming from the end of the hall. The fire was starting to eat away at the, walls of the hallway, which meant I didn’t have long, and thick clouds of the smoke were circling the roof. The smoke filled my chest and sear my lungs, I coughed and started to move my way down the hall.

“Hello?!” I called yet again, and finally about half way down the hallway I got my long awaited response.

“Hello? Help us!” I started to run, to the end of the hall where the screaming was coming from. The door of the last office was close, and there was a series of loud bangs and screams that came with it.  I put my hand on the handle  the heat mixed with the brass of the handle and I felt the skin on my hand burn, I bit down and tried to turn the handle but it caught.

“The doors locked! We can’t get out!” the people called from the other side.

“It’s okay, I’m going to get you out!”

“Behind you! Use the ace!” ace? What were they saying “Behind you?”

I whipped around to find a fire axe in a glass case with bright red letter on the front if it ‘only use in case of fire’ I guess it was time to use it! I shaped my hand into a fist and drove it through the glass case. It shattered and glass showered to the ground.  I reached out to pull the axe out of the case and noticed several deep gashes on my knuckles the blood ran down my hand, and dripped on the floor, there wasn’t much pain. But the deepness of the cuts ensured it would take them a little bit longer to heal. I took hold of the axe, turning back to the door, I swung the axe and it came in contact with the door. It lodged and I pulled it out and tried it again. On about the fourth go the a large chunk fell out of the door, it was enough for me to kick the door and for it to swing open.

A man and women, fell into the hall way at me.

“Thank- you!” the woman shrieked! “Thank-you!” she collected herself just for a second to get a glimpse of my young face and for her to know that I wasn’t a fireman. I think I killed her fantasy a little bit.

“Come on!” I yelled at the both of them, leading them out of the hall, whose foundations where starting to shake and give way from the fire. The fire was too big in the store room to get back out the half the hallways roof had collapsed.

The man and women gripped each other and coughed together, I had forget about the smoke, I didn’t seem to bother me anymore.

I grabbed the women’s arms and pulled them both to what seem like a conference room, the fire had taken out the refreshment table, which means I couldn’t use the coffee pot to smash a window, and I had left my axe back down the hallway. I moved to the furthest part of the room that had yet to be effected by the fire but only smoke. Picking up one of the chairs I threw it against the window, the window remained as it was, I tried it again. The window smashed, and I the fresh air immediately evaporated most of the smoke in the room. Using the same chair I helped the women out, and then the man. And then myself.

I lost my footing and collapsed in the bushes underneath me. It felt good to be out of the building. To be amongst the fresh air, that was pure and didn’t dare hurt me. I stayed as I was for a few moments allowing myself to enjoy the cheers I heard from the co-workers of their escape.

“You’re okay, thank go--oh my god!” Came a hysterical voice that could only be Poet, “your legs!”

I sat up and looked down at my legs, they were shinny and pink as the fire had burned at the first two layers of my skin, the only hurt very slightly. I reached down and touched my legs, they were slightly slippery.

Poet gasped “Oh my god, does it hurt, do you want me to get an ambulance?”

I shook my head “No” I snapped “I’ll be okay, just give me a few minutes, it just has to heal” I suddenly remembered “Did you film any of it?”

Poet was still majorly shocked that she couldn’t respond properly, she nodded slowly.

“I’m okay.” I said reassuringly, truthfully my legs were starting to hurt a little bit more.

“Your legs.” she breathed, Poet usually acted like this after something along these lines happened. I thought after 10 years of this she’d be used to it, I guess not.

The burning in my legs grew more, at first it was a tingling that was uncomfortable, like pins and needles. But after a few moments its grew into a deep burn sensation that became too much for me “Get out the camera!” I said through clenched teeth as the pain grew, like a mounting wave it gathered itself, gathered momentum. Until it crashed, like a wave of pain it crashed down on me. I fell back onto my back, my legs flexing out in different directions. I shrieked in agony, it felt as though my muscles were been shredded apart. I could see Poet through my eye lashes. There were a few scattered tears running down her face as she held the camera shakily.

After a few second my cries died down and the pain subsided, I let out a long exasperated sigh.  Poet lowered the camera, and wiped the tears away from her cheeks.

“Did anyone see” I said sitting up again. It was one thing that Poet knew about this, but I trusted her, I couldn’t ever stand for anyone else to know.

“No, I don’t think so, are you okay, that seemed like it was worse than other times. She held her hand out to me and  pulled me up, there was still a faint tingling sensation in my legs, and my hands. I looked down and the skin was completely fresh as though the deep cuts on my knuckles had never been there.

“It was,” I admitted. I reached down to brushed my finger along the new skin on my legs.  “I’ve never walked through fire before, I was cool to try it.”

“Yeah,” she huffed a laugh “I’m sure your keen to try it again.”

“Not too soon,” I said.

Poet put her arm around me, and we walked off in the opposite direction to everyone else “Come on, you owe me some of This Country’s Best Yogurt”