Summer of Fire - Linda Jacobs [2]
Frank dropped the hose, surged forward and grabbed the woman. “Javier,” he grunted. “Take over.”
Javier Fuentes, lanky, mid-twenties, took the handoff and restrained the woman from rushing into the burning building. Her dark eyes went wide as she screamed and struggled. Her short legs kicked at Javier’s shins.
Adrenaline surging, Clare demanded. “What floor?”
“4-G . . .” the woman managed. “He’s only two. “
“Let’s go,” Clare told Frank without bothering to ask why the child had been left alone. As she bent for the hose, her sense of purpose seemed to lighten the weight of her equipment.
They headed in.
The building’s peeling doorframe had been defaced by purple graffiti and the interior stairwell smelled faintly of mold and urine. New and sparkling in the seventies when oil jobs had enticed northern immigrants to Houston, the housing had fallen into disrepair.
At the second floor landing, Clare and Frank met smoke. She tipped up her helmet, covered her face with the mask, and cranked the tank valve. Beside her, Frank wordlessly did the same.
As they moved up, Clare made sure the hose didn’t snag around corners while Javier and others fed slack. Business as usual, so far, and they would find that young mother’s child.
At the third floor and starting blindly toward four, Clare felt the smoke grow hotter. She crouched below the deadly heat and told herself that she could breathe. Positive pressure prevented fumes from leaking into her mask, and the dehydrated air cooled as it decompressed.
In, out, slow . . .
Isolation pressed in with the superheated atmosphere. She couldn’t shake the feeling that Frank had left her, belied by his tugging on the hose. At times like these, she had to keep her head on straight. No giving in to claustrophobia and no thought of turning back.
If you misguessed the dragon in the darkness, you would pay with your life.
Fourth floor hall, and Clare went onto hands and knees. Darkness and disorientation complete, she concentrated on keeping the hose in line and her breathing steady. The worst humiliation was if she sucked her tank dry and had to make an ignominious exit.
Ahead, Frank cracked the nozzle for a bare second. Heat slammed down as the spray upset the thermocline. He hit the valve again. A glimpse of not quite midnight winked from the shadows, now there and then gone. Clare ground her teeth and her chest tightened as they approached 4-G.
The door stood ajar. A good omen, she hoped, as she and Frank accepted its invitation and crawled inside.
Drapes and couches blazed, giving off toxic gases that made her glad for filtered air. The ceiling sheetrock was burned away, revealing the space beneath the roof where storage boxes blazed. Did they contain old clothes and junk, or precious family heirlooms from Southeast Asia, belonging to the young woman who waited below?
A thousand degrees from above drove Clare and Frank onto their stomachs. While hot water rained onto shag carpet, she inched along, one gloved hand feeling the way and the other on the hose. If you let go of your lifeline, you could lose orientation, the sure first step to a mayday situation.
Through the drop-spattered mask, there was no sign of life in the living room and nothing that looked like a crib or playpen. Clare looked toward a door that must lead to a bedroom, but flames licked at the frame and walls. No haven there. Sick with the possibility of failure, she dragged herself toward Frank. She had not yet told a mother that her child had died in a fire.
If hell existed, this must be its antechamber. Frank lay ahead of her, directing the hose. By the tugs, she felt him move forward, risking the dragon backing around and coming down with searing breath. Clare found herself staring at the constantly changing colors of combustion, unable to resist the inferno’s splendor. Her love-hate relationship with fire hurt most at times like these.
An ominous rumble began, the vibration resonating in her chest as though