A Smoky Awakening

CRASH! I jolted awake after hearing a booming noise. Once I was up, I started to smell the overwhelming sense of smoke, and the fact that it was so much warmer than normal. After the initial haziness of waking up was gone, I realized something. The house was on fire. As soon as the thought got through my mind, I turned to my girlfriend. I tried to shake her awake, but at first, since she’s such a deep sleeper, it didn’t work. 

“Abi!” I shouted, but no response. 

“Abby, love!” Still nothing

“ABIGAIL.” I hated scaring her, but she needed to wake up. 

She screamed, but at least she was awake. 

“What?” Her voice was breathless, and I didn’t blame her for that. 

“Our house! It’s on fire!” I was starting to panic, so my voice was starting to shake. 

“What?” She froze, trying to register what I had just told her. 

“No time to talk, we need to go.” I said, grabbing out phones then grabbing her hand and pulling her up out of our bed and started to drag her to the hallway. 

“What about all of our things?” I turned to look at her, and was pained by the heartbreak in her eyes. 

“Abi, we have to go now, I’m sorry.”

“Let me just grab our box, please, Ellie. ” She sounded so desperate.

“Okay, I’ll wait for you here.” I said, giving in. 

Our box was a small shoebox in the top shelf of our closet. It was full of things that either we’ve given each other or small things from any of our dates from the past 4 years that we’ve been together. It had ticket stubs from movies, small rocks, some jewelry, some small stuffed animals, and other stuff like that. 

I’m actually glad that she remembered that. I don’t know what I would have done if it had gotten burned. 

“No, you go get Sirius and get out. I’ll come out after you.” Her voice now had a sense of determination in it. 

“But-”

“No time to argue, do it.” She cut me off, and turned around.

“Okay, fine, I love you.” I called to her as she ran back to our room. 

“I love you too!” She called over her shoulder.

I ran downstairs to Sirius' kennel. He was our black german shepherd that we had adopted almost one and a half years ago. He was also my service dog, so I really needed him to be safe. 

As I ran downstairs, I saw that the fire was starting in the living room. Luckily it was nowhere near Sirius, but it was still getting bigger by the moment. I stopped for a second, slightly mesmerized by the fire, because although it was deadly, it looked kind of pretty. I shook my head, remembering that I was trying to get out of here as soon as possible. 

“Sirius!” I called out to him.

I could hear him whining from his kennel. I felt so bad, he was probably getting really hot from the fire. 

“Hey, hey, hey, you’re okay. It’s okay, I’m here.” I tried to calm him down as best as I could. 

I let him out, and he immediately jumped on me and started licking my face. 

I giggled at his action, glad that he didn’t just run away as soon as I opened the door. I got up to hurry and grab his leash and a small bag of treats. I also grabbed his vest, just to be safe. Luckily for me, he was right on my tail as I was running around the kitchen. 

“Okay, let’s go.” I said, rushed as I needed to get out as fast as possible. The smoke was kind of getting to my head and I started getting a headache. 

He paused and looked up the stairs, and started pulling towards the stairs. I realized that he was looking for Abi, noticing that I was slightly panicking and she wasn’t with me. 

“Hey, she’s coming. Let’s go outside, come on.” It took some effort, but he slowly started to come outside with me. 

I ran out the door, and slipped on some sandals before running outside. I turned around, making sure that Sirius was coming. As soon as I got to the door, I threw it open and ran outside. 

I stopped in my tracks as I had realized that a group of people had formed around my house. A couple were on the phone, a couple were recording, and a couple were just pointing. I heard some sirens and hoped that they were coming to my house soon.

“Oh my gosh!” “Are you okay?” “What happened?” “Awww puppy!” As soon as the people noticed me, I was bombarded with questions. 

“I- I’m fine, I think. Does anyone know if a fire department is coming?” I asked, getting nervous from all of the attention. 

“Yes!” I heard a lady call out, “I called them as soon as I saw the house, they should be getting here soon.”

I ran up to her, thanking her. I noticed that she had a little boy with her. I turned to wave to him, but he backed behind his mother. Which is understandable, but I thought of something to make him less scared. 

“Hey,” I knelt down towards him and spoke in a soft voice, “do you wanna see my puppy?” 

His face soon had a smile and his eyes lit up. He looked towards his mom, asking for permission. 

“Of course you can see the puppy.” He squealed with excitement at his mother’s permission. 

“I’ll bring him over here.” I skipped over to him, glad for the slight distraction. 

Sirius got excited as I walked towards him. I gestured for him to come to me, and he did. I brought him to the little boy, and Sirius loved him. 

But as always, good moments must come to an end. I heard a loud bang from inside my house. Everyone screamed, and that’s when I remembered, Abigail was still in there.

“ABIGAIL” I cried out.

I darted towards my house, ignoring the protests of everyone in the crowd. But I didn’t care, I needed to make sure she was safe. I ran through the door and looked around. The fire had gotten so much bigger. But for some reason, the shoe box was on the ground, barely away from the fire. I went to pick it up, but stopped as I heard something. 

“Ahhhhh! Help!” I heard her screams from the stairs. I dropped the box and pivoted towards the stairs and ran, luckily there was still a small entrance between the fire and the stairs. I darted as fast as I could. As soon as I got up, I wished that this was a dream. 

She was under a plank. 

She was hurt. 

Abigail was trapped.

“ABI!”

“EMMA” She cried out. 

“Hey, it’s okay. I’m going to get you out of here.” I tried to stay calm for her, but I was freaking out. I couldn’t let anything happen to her. 

“I- I couldn’t find it. It was behind all of the blankets. But I threw it down the stairs, I think it made it.” She coughed out. 

“Yes, I saw it, but you shouldn't be worried about it. All that matters is that you’re safe and not harmed. Now, let’s get you out of here.” I started looking around, and then came to the conclusion that I would just have to lift up the plank. “Okay, I’m going to lift this up, and you’re going to hurry and get out. Sound good?”

“Mhm.” She made a sound of agreement.

“Okay. 3, 2, 1. Go!” I lifted it up, and hissed at the pain, not expecting it to be as hot as it was. I lifted it and she got out as fast as she could. As soon as she got up, I dropped the plank.

“Let’s get out of here.” She said, panting. 

“Okay, let’s go.” I said, holding my hand out to her. 

She put her hand in mine, and we ran downstairs, making sure to grab the box on our way out. 

We ran out, and saw some fire trucks, police cars, and ambulances. 

“They made it!” Someone yelled. And then they all started cheering. And then we were almost knocked over by our puppy jumping on us. 

“I’m glad to see you too.” Abi giggled

“Is there anyone else in there?” We turned and saw a firefighter jogging up to us. 

“Nope, it was just us.” I replied, smiling, glad we were both safe. 

“Okay, good. Would you mind if we took you to the ER just to make sure you guys didn’t have any serious damage done?”

“Can we at least stay together?” Abigail asked, leaning close to me.

“If that’s what you want, sure.” He said, shrugging. 

“Also, we need our dog with us.” I said, pointing at Sirius. 

“I’m sorry ma’am but we don’t allow dogs in.”

“He’s my service dog though.”

“Oh okay, then he can ride with you guys.”

“Okay thank you!” I said, going to grab him.

I jogged up to the lady and her son. 

“Oh thank goodness you’re okay.” She sighed in relief. 

“Yes, thank you for watching him.” I said, gesturing to Sirius, who was now playing with her son again.

“Of course, hon.” She said with a sweet smile on her face. 

I looked towards Abi, who looked very confused. 

“Oh! Abi, this is…” I paused realizing I didn’t know her name.

“Margaret.” She filled in. 

“Abi this is Maragret, she called the firefighters for us, Margaret, this is my girlfriend Abigail.”

“Thank you so much!” Abi said. 

“Of course, I figured you two were already busy enough as it was.” She let out a slight chuckle.

“Yeah, you’re definitely right about that.” She laughed along. 

“We better get going.” I said, remembering that we had to go to the hospital. 

“Wait, can I give you girls my number. You can stay over with me and my son while we wait for you guys to have somewhere to live for a bit.” Margaret said. 

“Are you sure?” I asked, not wanting to invade her privacy. 

“Of course! It’s the least I could do. And besides, I think that cash loves your small family.” She said, looking at her son playing with Sirius. 

“You don’t mind the dog?” Abi asked. 

“Of course not, I’ve been meaning to buy one for Cash, but I needed to make sure he would like the dog. But it seems like he loves dogs.” We were both relieved at that. 

After we exchanged numbers, I walked to Cash and Sirius while Abi and Margaret talked. 

“Hey, I’m sorry but I need to take him with me.” I said to Cash, who looked very upset about this new information. “It’s okay, I’ll bring him back to play with you later, okay?” 

He smiled at that, and ran over to his mom. I walked over with him and said goodbye to Margaret.

“Hey would you mind doing a small favor for us?” I asked, feeling guilty because she’s already done so much for us.”

“Of course, sweetie. What is it?” She asked. 

“Will you just keep this box safe until we get back?” I said, holding up the shoe box. 

“It’s the only thing we saved, it has a lot of our memories in it.” Abigail said.

“Of course I will, I’ll see you girls later.”

I then grabbed Abi’s hand, and walked towards the firetruck with her. 

“Are you ready to go?” The fireman asked us. 

“Yes sir.” Abi said to him.

“Then be my guest.” He said, opening an ambulance door for us. 

We lifted Sirius into the ambulance, and then we got in, with the help of the fireman. And sat down on the bed together, since neither of us needed major attention. While we were sitting, she laid her head on my shoulder, and in that moment I was content. I was beyond happy that she was safe, and that we were together.