My Butterfly (13 page)

I turned my head from side to side, looking in corners and down hallways, searching for the man
through the smoky haze. I couldn’t see the fire, but I knew it was slowly eating its way over to our side of the house and that with each inch forward, we were that much closer to its flames.

Suddenly, the captain stopped in front of an open door. I stopped too and peered inside. Beyond the doorway, there were stairs leading down to a basement, and there was clearly a light on in one of the corners.

We stood there motionless for a moment. Then, I thought I heard something.

“I think he’s down there,” I said, through my mask.

I watched as the captain first glanced down the hallway in front of us. The flames were popping out of the rooms on the far end of the house now. We could have minutes, or we could have seconds. Either way, it wasn’t much time.

I eventually followed the captain’s gaze back to the flight of stairs before he angled his face toward mine and nodded. That was my cue, I guessed, because our next steps were down the series of wooden planks.

As our boots hit each board, I gripped with my gloved hand the banister. And seconds later, we were both at the bottom of the stairs and standing on a concrete floor. To the far right of us, the ceiling had already started to give way. A wooden beam was sticking halfway out of the first floor. It was charred black at its end. And through the hole it had left, I could see the big, orange flames raging their chaos above us.

“I’m over here,” called out a strained voice from the other side of the basement.

The voice was faint, and I wasn’t quite sure how I had heard it over the fire’s havoc in the background.

I turned to see a man slumped over a box in a corner. He was conscious, but from the way it looked, he was barely conscious.

I patted the captain on the shoulder and then hurried over to the man. When I reached him, I took off my mask and put it to his face. I knew I wasn’t supposed to, but it looked as if he could barely keep his eyes open. He was probably one breath away from passing out.

“Put your mask back on, Will,” the captain yelled when he reached me.

He hastily removed my mask from the man’s face and shoved it into my chest. Then, he took his mask and forced it over the man’s nose and mouth.

“Here, help me get him up,” he shouted.

I watched him bend low and throw the man’s arm around his shoulder. I slid my mask back on and did the same on the other side, and together, we hoisted the man to his feet and started toward the stairs again.

But before we had even made it a couple
of steps, there was a dog bark, and the man seemed to come to again and lift the mask from his face.

“My son’s dog,” he said, stopping and trying to turn back.

“It’s all right,” the captain shouted. “We’ve got to get you out of here.”

“Please,” the man cried, locking his heavy gaze on me.

I lifted my eyes and found the captain’s stare, and I knew immediately what he was commanding me to do.

Then, suddenly,
a beam crashed to the concrete floor on the other side of the big room, and the loud sound it made caught the attention of all three of us.

“Is there an exit down here?” the captain asked the man.

The man’s eyes glazed over in fear. I looked up and caught the captain’s stare again, and then we followed the man’s gaze to a door now completely engulfed in flames.

“Come on,” the captain shouted, pulling the man up the stairs.

The man hesitated but soon complied, allowing us to guide him to the door at the top of the steps. I stopped once we got there. The fire down the hallway was closer than it had been before we had gone down the stairs, but it looked as if there was still some time before the last exit to the basement was completely closed off by the flames. And I knew I was fast. I could do it.

The captain and the man made it a couple more steps before they noticed I wasn’t by their side.

“Will, let’s go,” the captain yelled behind him.

I glanced at the fire down the hallway one more time, then at the captain. There was a brief second where our eyes met, and then I turned and flew down the stairs.

“Will,” I heard him call out after me.

But I was already down the flight of stairs, and I couldn’t turn back. In fact, I had gotten back to that small corner so quickly that I hadn’t even realized the steps I had taken to get there.

Once in the corner, I shoved the box away. The dog was there in a tiny crawl space, whimpering, with its tail between its legs.

“Come on, boy,” I said into my mask, squatting down and reaching out a gloved hand.

He was just far enough back there that only the tip of my glove could reach his fur.

I squatted down even more and squeezed my shoulders as much as I could into the crawl space. With my hand blindly reaching now, I felt the dog’s leg and then its shoulder, and then in one
, solid effort, I grabbed a hold of its skin. I pulled the dog closer to me until I could reach it with both hands. Then, I scooped it up into my arms and flew back to the base of the stairs. But when I looked up, my heart sank into my boots, and I stood there for a moment staring at the doorway, now covered in a thick cloud of billowing, black smoke. And behind it, was a fierce, bright glow.

“Shit,” I said, into my mask.

I glanced back at the basement door on the other side of the room, but I could only see flames there—and not even any semblance of an exit. So, without a second thought, I charged up the wooden stairs and stopped two from the top. I couldn’t see anything on the other side of the doorway through the smoke, and I knew the floorboards couldn’t be stable, but I had no other option.

I charged forward, pressing the dog close to my chest. The air was hot,
and the dog was shaking. Then suddenly, I felt my boots plunge through the floorboards. At the same time, the dog flew forward, and I instinctively reached for whatever part of the floor that was still able to hold me and caught myself under my arms.

I took a second to regain my bearings, and then I tried to pull my body back up from the floor. It was hot, and my head was starting to get foggy. I tried to block out the loud popping sound the fire made and pretend as if it weren’t there. But I could still hear the dog barking. I managed to grab the corner of the wall, and I tried again to hoist myself up. It worked a little. I was able to get more of my waist above the floorboards. But the smoke was thick, and somehow, during the fall, my mask had gotten dislodged. And now, the fumes were finding their way into my nose and mouth. I retightened my grip on the corner of the wall again and tried again to pull myself to the surface. This time, though, I didn’t budge. I breathed in another smoke-filled breath and gave everything I had to keeping my head up. The room was getting hotter, and there was a dog fading and reappearing again in the fog. I couldn’t tell for sure if it were real or part of a dream.

I felt my hand loosen its grip on the wall. It shocked me, and I immediately retightened my hold. I was starting to take shallower breaths now, and my eyes were getting heavy. I felt my fingers start to loosen again, and it forced me to think about trying one, last time to pull myself up. But really, I just wanted to rest my eyes for a little while and try again later. And if it weren’t for that dog shouting at me, I was pretty sure I would.

Then, suddenly, I felt something. It started tugging and then pulling on me. I lifted my head, and then instantly, my eyelids fell heavy over my eyes.

...

I awoke to Julia doubled over in tears at the foot of a tiny bed.

“Jules,” I said, quickly sitting up but then being pulled back by a set of plastic tubes.

My words came out hoarse, and suddenly, I noticed my head wasn’t fairing much better.

“Will,” she said, turning to me and then rushing over to my side.

She moved, and then all of a sudden, there were way too many people in the tiny room. I noticed the fire captain first, and then I froze.

“You took a little fall,” the captain said.

I forced my eyelids over my eyes, and slowly, the memory came back to me. It was fuzzy and blurry, but it was there.

“You saved me,” I finally said to the captain.

He smiled, gently.

“You saved the dog,” he said.

A half-smile eventually found its way to my face.

“Just, uh, let’s not make it that close next time,” the captain said, giving me a wink.

My mouth turned up a little more at its corners, and then my eyes fell to the white sheets that I was covered in.

Julia grabbed my hand and forced it around hers and into her lap. I watched her intertwine her fingers in mine before I met her stare. Her eyes were so sad, and suddenly, I remembered the last words she had said to me before I had left her. And then it hit me—I hadn’t been careful.

“Jules,” I started to say.

She shook her head, stopping me, as her eyes started to fill with tears again.

“Jules,” I said again. “I’m okay. I’m fine.”

She was still shaking her head; a stream of liquid was now rolling down her cheeks. I reached up and brought her closer to me.

“Will, I can’t do this…,” I heard her start to mumble into my chest.

“What, babe?” I asked her.

She was quiet except for the sniffles.

I squeezed her tighter and stroked her pretty, long hair.

“It’s okay, Jules,” I said. “I’m okay.”

I took in a deep breath and then slowly let it out.

“It’s okay, sweetheart,” I whispered again, closer to her ear. “Everything’s okay.”

Cold

“H
ey,” she said.

I switched the phone to my other ear. It had been a couple
of weeks, but I felt as if I could still hear the cracking and the popping of that fire in one ear.

“Hey. How was your day?” I asked.

“Same old, same old,” she softly replied. “How was yours?”

“You know, pretty much the same too,” I said, as I kicked off, first, one shoe and then the other. “I had to get to class early because…”

I stopped. There was something off in her voice.

“Is something wrong, Jules?” I asked.

There was a pause. Pauses like that weren’t ever good.

“It’s just that…I can’t…,” she started and then stopped.

I waited for her to finish. Instead, there was silence.

“You can’t what?” I asked.

I heard her take a breath.

“I just feel like we’ve grown apart,” she said.

Her sentence was straight and to the point, and it completely derailed me.

“What?” I asked.

“I know that sounds really cliché, but I don’t know how else to say it,” she said.

I felt my heart momentarily take a break in my chest. Then, I took in a deep breath and then slowly let out a sigh.

“Jules, I know it’s been hard, but…,” I started to say but then let my words trail off.

“It has,” she said.

There was another moment where there was only silence before she continued. I had no words, so I just listened.

“It’s just that I’ve been busy with track,” she said, “and you’re doing your training, and when we do finally see each other, I feel like you aren’t really even that excited, and…”

“Jules, is this about our anniversary?” I interrupted. “Jules, I’m really sorry, and it wasn’t my intention to have us spend it in a hospital…”

“No, Will,” she said.

Her words were soft and sincere.

“This is not about that,” she said and then paused. “It is, but it’s not.”

My eyebrows darted to the center of my forehead. I could see them staring back at me now in the mirror as I started to take in shorter, shallower breaths.

“What?” I asked.

“It’s nothing,” she said. “It’s just…It seems like it’s a chore for you.”

“What seems like a chore?” I asked.

“Us, Will,” she said.

Her replies were getting shorter and shorter.

“I don’t fit into your life anymore,” she continued.

“Jules,” I softly said and then stopped. “Jules, that’s not true, and I’m always excited to see you. I’m just tired sometimes.”

I took in another deep breath and then let it slowly escape past my lips before I continued.

“You don’t have to answer to fire calls at two in the morning just to go back to bed and answer another one at five,” I said.

“You’re right, I don’t, and I understand that,” she said.

She sounded slightly irritated now.

“But since you’ve been doing that, you’ve never found a way to make it work,” she said. “You’ve never found even the tiniest bit of energy for me. Will, I might not be answering fire calls, but I’m working my butt off up here. Plus, I’m the one driving home to see you every month. You’re never here. I feel like I’m the only one trying anymore.”