CHAPTER SIXTY TWO
I
saw the smoke
before I smelled it. At first glance, I couldn’t make sense of the grey,
ephemeral tendrils rising from the cracks between the floor and walls on the
north side. Then, Mikey and I stared at each other in horror.
Why do these crazy bitches like fire so much?
Joyce hadn’t made a run for it. She was busily setting fire
to the barn. To smoke us out? To finish off what she’d started with Astrid? Or,
if poor Astrid was dead, was she trying to destroy the evidence?
“We got to go,” Mikey said. With that, he flipped over on
his belly, unmindful of the prickery hay, and slithered over the side.
Oh, crap. I followed, far more mindful of my stomach being
razored open. Just in case, I tossed up another quick prayer—this time for a
gravity-defying miracle that would keep me from bashing my head open on the
plank flooring, nearly two stories below.
Somebody must have heard my plea, because I made it down
safely.
I started for the stairs, but Mikey yelled a warning. I’d
been so busy concentrating on not falling down the haystack that I hadn’t heard
what was going on below. Joyce had, indeed, returned and, although I couldn’t
see what she was doing, the smoke rising on one side of the building coupled
with the sloshing and bumping sounds I heard from just beyond the stairs told
me she was kindling her fire at the front of the barn. If we took the stairs,
we’d run right into her.
Mikey grabbed my hand, pulling me back toward the haystack
away from the stairs.
“Mikey, no, we can’t go back. We have to get out of here!”
He clamped his hand tighter on mine and kept tugging. I was
afraid if I pulled out of his grasp, he’d take off on me, panicked into running
the wrong way like a wild animal darting toward a car’s headlights.
“Come on!” he persisted. His face, when he turned to me, was
set in grim determination. This wasn’t panic. He had an idea. I looked up at
the bales of hay. Then, it came to me.
“Mikey, is there a hay door up there?”
“Yeah, come on!” He almost pulled my arm out of the socket.
“Mikey, it’s three stories down! We can’t jump out of
there!”
But wouldn’t that be better than sitting on the floor waiting to
burn?
The smoke became more insistent and the wind outside seemed
to be rising, too, a blowing, susurrant sigh that seemed to encompass the whole
structure. I would have expected a breeze to dissipate the smoke. Instead, it
hung suspended in dense veils, solid and unshifting. If anything, it seemed to
be thickening.
Because, of course, it wasn’t wind. It was fire.
In the distance, sirens wailed.
“ABOUT DAMN TIME!” I bellowed.
But were they too late? A surge of resentment clouded my
thinking. The one time I was ready to trust my life to the authorities, and
they’d taken so long, it had turned into a weenie roast. I decided if it got
too bad I could try to free-fall on top of a cop. At least my mom would have
one small pleasure from my death, and it would serve them right for taking so
damn long. Mikey scurried up the stack like a trained squirrel. I got about six
feet before I remembered something.
I dropped down, landing with a thud that rattled my teeth
and sent shooting sparks through my legs. Mikey’s worried face appeared over
the edge of the topmost bales.
“Go on,” I told him, waving him away. “Go find the door.
Wait as long as you can for the police or firemen before you jump. They might
be able to catch you.”
He reached a hand over the side. “Come on! You’re gonna get
burned up.”
“I have to get Astrid. She’s hurt down there. I have to try.
You go on. Get going!”
His face scrunched up and he started to cry again. But he
left.
I headed back to the stairs, arguing with myself the whole
way.
I don’t even like Astrid. I didn’t like Regina, either, and look what
happened.
The closer I got to the stairs, the harder it got to see. And
breathe
. She probably isn’t even down there anymore. Maybe she crawled to
safety.
I took my shirt off, holding it to my face. I found the first stair
by tapping forward with my foot, churning the billows with my frantic jabbing
motions.
This isn’t my job. I shouldn’t have to be doing this. The only
thing I should be worrying about is myself . . . And Mikey. Okay, two things.
Isn’t that enough? Do I have to save
everyone?
The farther down I went, the hotter it became. The heat and
smoke became solid, a pressure, something I had to push against to get through.
The big double doors were aflame. Tongues of fire flowed along the edges,
biting and hissing at the century-old wood. More flames danced along the walls,
racing up the timbers, sucking at the oxygen, and growing as they fed.
I found Astrid by tripping over her body. I fumbled over
her, blinded, eyes burning. Feeling my way to her face with hands that quickly
grew sticky with blood. All I could hear was the fire, roaring now, an element
of combustible rage.
She wasn’t breathing. I couldn’t find a pulse. I made
certain
there was no pulse. That was the most I could do.
I crawled back up the stairs, coughing and choking so hard I
saw dots again. The smoke burned down my throat and air suddenly became a thing
to be diligently sought after rather than taken for granted. I stumbled my way
blindly across the loft floor until I ran headlong into the wall of bales.
The only direction was up, and that’s where I went. Midway,
a bout of coughing almost launched me off the side. Snot and tears ran freely
down my face, but I dug my hands in between the bales, hanging on til I could
force a foot up. Then, the other. And kept going up.
I got confused at the edge. I couldn’t find any more “up”
and my mind was too busy wrestling with the lack of oxygen to make sense of my
position. Hands grabbed at me, twining in my hair and pulling.
The roaring had risen to an ear-splitting howl. The barn,
all around us, moaned in its death throes. I couldn’t think. I crawled,
following Mikey’s heels, knowing that if I lost him now . . .
A piercing screech of metal added to the cacophony, as Mikey
shoved one side of the sliding door sideways. He’d found it. I lunged forward,
thrusting my head through the space into the air. The craving for clean air
more urgent than any thirst.
Smoke billowed skyward, black plumes blotting out the sun.
Despite that, this half of the barn didn’t seem to be completely engulfed,
though in a structure stacked with hay and made of dry, aged wood, we only had
a few moments at most. Mikey clattered the other side open and stood peering
over the side. I struggled to my knees and fought to speak.
“Wait . . .” A coughing spasm wracked my body, twisting my
insides into one convulsing, cramping muscle. I grabbed Mikey’s arm and waited
for it to pass. “. . . heard sirens,” I managed. “They’re coming.” But
when
had I heard sirens. How long ago? Did they even know where we were or that we
were even here?
Mikey knelt down next to me, placing his black-streaked,
earnest face nose-to-nose with mine. His eyes, big and imploring, stared into
my own. “There’s a wagon. We jump in it. Just do what I do.”
And, in front of my disbelieving eyes, he stood, squared off
on the edge of the three-story high opening . . . and jumped.
He fell through the grey swirling mass and disappeared
beneath it. Leaving me alone, staring out into a day turned into writhing
night.
I didn’t hear him land, but that might be because of all the
screaming. Mine, of course, and the barn’s. And then I coughed so convulsively
I hit my head on the floor, banging my nose so hard I thought I heard it pop.
Again with the stars.
Grabbing the edge of the wall, I leaned out as far as I
could, blood running in rivulets from my nose, adding a new twist to the
tear/snot/smoke effect.
“Mikey!” I screeched. “
Mikey
!”
“I’m okay! Jump!”
“Are you freakin’ kidding me? I can’t
jump
! I can’t
even see you.”
“Just jump where I did. You’ll land in the wagon.”
A thousand questions ran through my head—all of overwhelming
importance and entirely unanswerable.
How big was the wagon? Exactly
where
was the wagon? Would my heavier mass create greater velocity, thus
slamming my body through the wagon and halfway to China? Why hadn’t I paid
closer attention in physics class? Was there going to be a pitchfork issue at
the bottom? Was Mikey out of the way? Was I really as high as logic told me I
was? What if I missed?
How long could I wait for the firemen before burning up?
Another coughing fit brought me to my knees, and I
realized I wouldn’t die from the flames. It would be smoke that would do me in
and a lot sooner than the fire. I’d pass out very soon and lie here,
unconscious and unfeeling, on top of the hay at the edge of the world.
And
then
the fire would charbroil my stupid,
chicken-shit ass.
I sent up one more prayer to the Higher Power that now had
my full attention, if he wanted it. Then, I pushed out, aiming for the spot
where I’d last seen Mikey, and let myself fall through the dark and the grey
and the air and the emptiness.
CHAPTER SIXTY THREE
T
here is nothing
remotely fluffy about a wagonful of straw. When I hit, the breath whooshed out
in a rush, and all I could manage was short, shallow gasps—a respite from the
coughing jag, but worrisome in its not-enough-oxygen, gonna-die implications.
Finally, my lungs hitched in enough air for my panic to
lessen. Slightly. I was still lying on a bed of flammable straw on a flammable
wooden wagon adjacent to a flaming inferno.
Not to mention a killer sill running around, literally
fanning the flames and (presumably) cackling with glee.
Mikey.
I crawled over the sidewall and flopped to the ground,
setting off another round of coughing. I hacked up phlegm, half expecting it to
be as black as ashes, but it wasn’t. Mikey was at my side in an instant,
grabbing my arm, asking if I was all right. His concern almost did me in. Tears
had runneled two clear paths down his black, sooty face. For a moment, I lost
track of who was taking care of whom, and then it came to me that, aside from
hollow reassurances, I’d pretty much been dead weight for him.
I wiped a tear from his cheek and he flung himself at me,
wrapping me in a full-body, all-boy hug. Maybe dead weight has some uses, after
all.
It was too soon to relax. “Mikey, we’ve got to find the
cops.” Never,
ever
thought I’d say those words. “And the firemen. Hear
the sirens?”
Don’t know how I’d missed them in the first place. The
strident wails and siren blasts added to the confusion. “Come on,” I said.
“Joyce is still . . .” I stopped before giving voice to the fear. “We can’t
quit now, big guy.”
We staggered along the side of the barn, pushing through
knee-high weeds that clutched at our feet as though the earth was in league
with the killer. The smoke wasn’t too bad on this side, making me worry we’d
run into Joyce as she made her rounds. When three black-suited firemen came
tearing around the corner, I let out a shriek that would have broken glass.
The sight of us caused a bit of excitement for them, too.
They were on us like we were the winning lottery ticket in Saturday’s
MegaMillions drawing. The weeds ceased to be an issue as I was half-lifted,
half-dragged between two of the firemen to the front of the building, where all
hell was breaking loose. Or, rather, where trained professionals from three
adjoining communities were battling to shove hell back into its cage. Mikey was
carried to the closest ambulance, of which there were plenty.
Cop cars, fire trucks, too many to count; at least four ambulances;
pickups with little swirly blue lights—personal vehicles of the on-call
emergency workers—filled the farmyard like an Emergency Vehicle Expo. With
relief, I saw that Paul had called out the cavalry. One of the ambulances had
parked outside the kitchen door, the driver just barely waiting for the doors
to close behind its occupant before wailing away. Paul stood on the porch,
blank-faced watching the transfer of his charge; then his eyes met mine across
the controlled frenzy between us. His face lit up—it might have been the sight
of me in my bra—and he started toward me. A cop pulled him back, already
starting the questions. Already digging backwards into this mess. The
authorities were involved with a vengeance.
They could have it.
And before the wash of relief took hold—because God forbid I
should feel
that
for very long—I spied Astrid safely ensconced between
two paramedics with a police officer hovering just to the side. The EMTs were
wrapping one of her hands with gauze and she clutched an oxygen mask to her
face with the other. The scream she let loose when she caught sight of us put
shame to the sirens and nearly caused the cop to draw his gun.
What the hell? Astrid?
I slammed my feet into the
ground, causing my firemen escorts to almost rip my arms out of their sockets.
They re-gripped and hauled me to yet another ambulance, barely waiting for the
EMTs to take over before racing back to the fire.
An EMT with the name Whitman stitched over her breast
slapped a mask over my face, while a male counterpart hauled the stretcher out
and helped me to lie down. Even as they sought my pulse and did the flashlight
eye thing, I fought to sit back up.
“
Joyce
is dead?” I said. The mask muffled the words,
and I pulled it off.
Whitman put it back on. “We can hear you. You have to keep
this on.”
“Astrid killed Joyce? Is Joyce still in there?” That was
stupid. Of course she hadn’t. That had been a very dead body I’d touched. And
bloody. My hands were sticky with it. My stomach did a lazy, ominous roll.
“Is there someone else in the barn?” the guy this time.
“Hey! Chief!” He waved the chief over.
“What’s goin’ on?” The voice coming through the mask sounded
all Darth-Vader raspy, but in a reassuring way.
“She says there’s someone else in there.”
The chief pulled a radio up to his face.
I grabbed his arm, yanking the mask off again. “That’s not
what I meant.” A cough wrenched from my body, twisting me until I was almost
hanging off the stretcher. Someone slapped the mask back on. I pointed at
Astrid. “She and Joyce were fighting. I thought Joyce killed—” More coughing.
It seemed to be getting worse.
“We found the body. Is that who you mean?”
I nodded, holding the mask tight enough to leave dents in my
cheeks. I’d learned my lesson.
“I thought it was Astrid. I mean, I thought Joyce killed Astrid.” I couldn’t
make sense of it.
“Was there anyone else in the barn?” The chief,
understandably, was bulldog-focused on that question. He spoke slowly,
enunciating each word, his face inches from mine.
“Just me and Mikey and Joyce. Astrid came in later.”
“Three of you are out. One fatality. You’re sure no one else
is in there?”
I shook my head and he charged back into the fray, leaving
me to wrestle with the facts.
I kept thinking that. Astrid killed Joyce, okay, no arguing
that. Astrid: alive. Joyce, not so much. I still had blood on my hands from
checking her body. But then why the fire?
Why?
Off came the stupid mask again and I slid off the stretcher
in one smooth move, then charged the fifteen feet between our ambulances.
Astrid saw me coming and started screaming again. Behind me Whitman shouted,
alerting Astrid’s team, who jumped in front of Astrid protectively, each
grabbing at me as I tried shoving my way past their protective wall.
As well she should.
“Why, Astrid?
Why did you set the fire?
” Instead
shouting, my voice graveled into useless hoarse croaks. I sounded like a
hysterical frog. Plus, I could barely hear myself over the din. I writhed
against their restraining hands like a mad thing, trying to get close enough to
Astrid so she could hear me, so I could see her face when I made her answer.
“Why the
fire
? Astrid! Why did you set the barn on fire?”
They were pulling me away. I didn’t have the strength to
fight, so I went dead-weight, dropping out of their grasp, and then crawled
through their legs. I popped back up, right in Astrid’s face. Eye-to-eye. I
must have looked like a beast, red-eyed, soot-blackened face, snarling and
snapping. I hoped I did. “Astrid!
Why
? Why the fire? Why did you set the
barn on fire?”
The cop got between us, and all the paramedics piled on, but
as they dragged me away, Astrid screamed, “I didn’t know! I didn’t know you
were in there! I didn’t
know
!” She broke into hysterics, and I saw her
paramedics move to push her down against the white sheets, blocking me.
That was as much of an answer as I was going to get, at
least for now. The fight drained out of me, leaving me hollow, shaking and
nauseous and cold. I stopped resisting. They hustled me back to the ambulance,
tossed me on the stretcher, and refitted the mask. I let them do their thing.
Their hands moved professionally, tending to my body; I distanced my mind,
retreating.
Only once I sat up, searching for Mikey. Whitman grabbed my
shoulder, ready to pounce, but as soon as I saw him, safely being loaded into
his own ride, I lay back down. His ambulance peeled off, with Astrid’s a few
moments behind. I’d made my EMTs so nervous, they made a cop ride in the back
with the male paramedic. And then we were off.