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Rachael heard the tell-tale hiccup from upstairs, a precursor to the full-throated cry of discomfort that was imminent. Poor Charlie, his back molars were breaking through and he was miserable. For the second time in a half hour, she placed her calculus textbook aside on the couch and rose to go comfort the nine month old. She checked her watch automatically: seven-thirty. She had given his last dose of baby aspirin only a half-hour before and rocked him back to sleep, but it had only allowed him a few minutes of relief. Teething was brutal. She headed upstairs.
Charlie had pulled himself up in the crib, and was holding on unsteadily, already working up to a full roar. When Rachael turned on the light, she saw that his face was ruddy and wet. Poor thing, she thought again. She picked him up, and he squirmed, wanting to be comforted, but also resisting her touch. She placed a hand on his forehead. Yep, still had a low grade fever. He tugged at his ear as he screamed. She sighed. She loved babysitting, liked this kid, who normally was very cheerful, but he'd been hysterical off and on since his parents had left forty-five minutes ago. She had seen regret and a little relief in Mrs. Gladstone's eyes as the mother had headed out the door. If Charlie had been cranky and inconsolable like this all day, Rachael supposed Mrs. Gladstone had earned a peaceful dinner and movie date with her husband.
She slipped into the rocking chair, fighting to keep hold of the squirmy baby, and reached for the bottle of watered-down apple juice. Maybe swallowing would relieve the earache that accompanied the gum pain. Charlie wasn't having it. He batted the bottle away with angry hands and continued screaming. Rachael sighed again. It was only for a couple of hours; the parents never stayed out later than twelve-thirty, and it wasn't the worst way to earn two dollars an hour every Saturday night.
The baby's eyelids drooped and his cries gradually quieted as she rocked patiently. Her mom always said, "You can't make a baby eat; you can't make a baby sleep; and you can't make a baby stop crying." Her rocking slowed as the baby dropped off into slumber. An experienced babysitter at seventeen, she waited until the heavy sigh that signaled deep sleep–at least for now–and tucked him back into the crib. Maybe he'd stay asleep long enough for her to get her homework done.
As she descended the stairs, she heard the odd thumping noise from the basement. Mr. Gladstone had mentioned it before he left; something about the furnace, or was it the hot water heater, that a repairman was going to come and take a look at it on Monday. She opened the basement door briefly and listened to the sound for a moment, then closed it and returned to the sofa in the family room. They should probably get the guy here tomorrow, she thought, or else they'll be taking cold showers for the next few days. She turned on the TV, volume set low, and went back to her homework.
She was checking her work with the answer key at the back of the textbook an hour later when she noticed a different sound, like cellophane being crunched. She went into the kitchen and checked, nothing. She walked around the whole downstairs level, but there was nothing amiss in the dining room or the laundry alcove. She moved to the basement door with a sinking feeling. As she pulled the door open, she registered, too late, that the metal doorknob seemed oddly warm. A few seconds after that, an explosion rocked her backward, off her feet. The entire basement was engulfed in flames that whooshed upward toward her like a demon, and a tongue of fire caught on the carpeting at the top of the stairs. She stared at the fire for a shocked moment, unable to move, then noticed with panic that it was spreading quickly across the shag. Crawling backward like a crab, she panicked before flipping to her hands and knees and pushing herself to her feet.
She ran to the staircase and hesitated for an instant. She'd never been in the Gladstones' bedroom—was there even a telephone extension in there? She wasn't sure she could reach the one in the kitchen before the fire spread there. She bolted up the stairs.
The beige princess phone rested like a treasure on the bedside table. She snatched it up and dialed the operator, pulling the long cord to the doorway. The operator's voice was unruffled, a little bored, but sharpened as Rachael said, "I'm in a house and it's caught fire. The whole downstairs!"
"What is the address, hon?" the operator said.
Rachael had to think for a second, to make sure she didn't give her own address by mistake. "Five seventy-one Maple Street. It's, um, a couple streets over from the high school." There was smoke crawling through the hallway now. "I'm babysitting—I have to go get the baby!" She dropped the phone on the floor without disconnecting and ran down the hall to the nursery. Charlie was still asleep, but she could smell the smoke even in here. Think, Rachael, she admonished herself. She tried to remember anything she had learned in the church's Youth Ministry babysitting training she had taken two years ago, or one single thing they had covered in Girl Scouts. Her mind was a blank. Finally, she grabbed two baby blankets and rushed to the bathroom next to the nursery. She ran the water, tap wide open, and soaked the fabric, then sprinted back to the baby's room. The fire was inching up the carpeted stairs to the second floor. She wouldn't be able to get out of the house through the front or the back door.
The window! She yanked the curtain aside and moaned. The giant tree that kept the room in cool shadow all day blocked any exit that way, even if she could figure out how to get down from the second story. The nursery was filling with thick, acrid smoke now, and Charlie was starting to cough and cry. She scooped him up in her arms and wrapped him in one of the sopping wet blankets, which he did not enjoy at all, covering his little face.
Stepping out of the nursery, she felt the heat hit her all at once. The wall of the staircase was burning, all of the carefully posed family pictures providing willing fuel. She couldn't go down, so she dashed to the end of the hall and felt around in the air for the pull rope of the attic hatch. Mrs. Gladstone had sent her up once to retrieve a box of hand-me-down baby clothes for Charlie. She knew there was a dormer window above the sloped roof.
Now it was getting hard to breathe, stiflingly hot, and impossible to see. She placed her feet carefully on the rickety ladder. She could not drop her precious burden. Climbing one-handedly while holding her breath, she pulled herself up through the small opening. There was no way to close the hatch from up here, not that she could see, so she set Charlie down on the floor and tugged a cardboard moving box full of books and magazines to partially cover the opening. She still clutched the other wet blanket, so she laid that across the remaining gap. Tendrils of smoke chased her through the tiny spaces that were left.
Charlie was screaming now, of course, his shuddering shrieks blending with the sirens that were now approaching. Now that the opening was blocked, the attic was nearly pitch black. Weak light from the street made the filthy window glow a little, and she could see the pulsating red lights of the fire trucks. She could barely see Charlie, lying on his back, too distressed to crawl, his arms and legs flailing in the air.
The window itself was small, only about two feet square, and it was stuck tight. It had probably not been opened for a hundred years. She looked around desperately for something to break the glass and wood, anything to let the firemen know she was up here. She couldn't think; the fire was too loud. She sank down to the floor, covering her head with her arms and wanting to scream herself. A fit of coughing shook her.
Pull yourself together, Rachael, she told herself sternly. Think. Charlie is on the floor. That is where the air is, because heat and smoke rise. If it gets too bad, cover his face. Now find something to break that window.
She crawled across the floor on her hands and knees, keeping low just as they'd emphasized in school safety assemblies. Everything stored up here seemed small and fragile and useless: a glass lamp, a discarded set of dishes, a music box. She curled her hand around something solid at last, an old hair dryer, stored in its heavy plastic case. Choking, she crawled back to the window and let it swing.
The glass shattered after two tries, but the wood holding the panes was harder. After a few more thumps with the dryer case, she flung it aside and used her sneakered feet to mule-kick the stubborn sticks. The air that flooded in was cool and sweet as she carefully stuck her head out the window. She could just see the fire engine, mostly blocked by the lip of the roof, but no people. She drew a breath to yell for attention, but triggered a coughing fit instead. Another fire vehicle, this one a small red truck, screamed past her view.
She wanted to weep. Nobody could see her. Nobody could hear her. Who would even know she was in the house? There was no car in the driveway. The Gladstones had left their precious baby in her care, and now she and Charlie were both going to die up here in this attic that was quickly overheating and filling with smoke. Flames already crawled along the wall and across the ceiling. It was only a matter of time before the cardboard box fully ignited, and the fire found them both. She had no breath to yell; she could feel her throat spasming.
Charlie had reached the end of himself, crying now with no noise. Oh, God. . .
On the heels of that thought came the words, as familiar to her as her own name. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. . . She had no rosary, but found her fingers moving against invisible beads as sweat broke out all over her body. The burnt smell of the cardboard box filled her nose as the fire licked around the dusty rim of the attic opening, steam rising from the pathetically inadequate wet towel barrier she had laid there.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and until the hour . . .until the hour . . .
She pulled herself up short. She couldn't finish those next words. She had to keep trying.
She scooped up the baby once again, frightened at how limp he was. Where was that righteous infantile indignation that had shaken his body just moments before? She bent low and, with relief, felt the tiny, weak puff of breath on her cheek before swaddling him up tightly in the still damp blanket and covering his face with the flap.
Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven . . .
She grabbed the delicate glass lamp and placed it underneath the window.
Forgive us our trespasses . . . Forgive me for not protecting Your little one . . .
The kicked-out window was small, and it was a tight squeeze, feet-first onto the roof. She clung to the sill with her left hand, feeling the bite of glass shards, while tucking the baby close to her side, pinned in the crook of her elbow. Bracing herself with her feet against the shingles, she reached back in and pulled out the lamp.
Please deliver us from evil. . .
She threw the lamp as hard and as far as she could, and smiled grimly when she heard it hit and shatter against the fire engine. There were shouts of surprise now, and the sound of people running. Her arms trembled with effort as she positioned herself on the slope of the roof, digging her heels in as hard as she could. In the clear evening air, she found oxygen enough to yell, "Help! Help us! We're up here!" Behind her, the greedy flames had found her hiding spot, and the layers of dust along with the stored papers and magazines and books in the unused room helped it along.
An eternity later, Rachael heard a solid thunk and saw the tip of a ladder now resting at the edge of the roof. She couldn't move any closer to it, for fear of sliding down the pitch to the ground below. She couldn't move at all. She stared at that ladder, because it held all the hope she had.
A black helmet appeared, a large green "51" emblazoned on the front, and underneath the helmet, two light blue eyes in a calm, but surprised, face. "Hey," the fireman said, his voice just loud enough to carry across the short distance between them. She realized, as she watched him settle his expression, that her position on the roof was exactly as precarious as she'd thought it was. He moved slowly, carefully, not stepping off the ladder, but stretching his body up toward her. "You're gonna be fine, we're gonna get you down from here."
She could feel the heat on her back, the fire now engulfing the attic. "Please," she begged, "please take the baby . . ."
The fireman's eyes flicked down to the unmoving bundle in her arms. "You've got a baby there?" he asked.
Rachael nodded. "Please save him." She could feel a violent cough rising in her chest and held her breath to keep it from escaping. She wasn't sure she could cough and keep her fragile balance. There were about six feet between her and the fireman's outstretched hand, but that distance felt like forever. Her vision began to grey out, and her limbs felt numb.
He started to say, "Okay, take it easy," when her arms let the baby go. Still wrapped in the blanket, Charlie rolled down the slope of the roof, and the fireman turned his body abruptly to the left and caught him. That was enough to start the baby screaming again, arms and legs once again flailing against the tight swaddle. The fireman looked down at it, nonplussed, then turned and yelled down to the ground, "Johnny!" before all of him disappeared back down the ladder.
Rachael pressed herself back against the wall of the house, feeling the heat on the side of her face and the backs of her arms. She was ready to go now, ready to finish the lines. They had Charlie, and he was safe. Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. . .
Another, different helmeted face appeared within seconds, this time, a dark-haired man. His face wasn't calm at all—it was intense and focused, all narrowed brown eyes and downturned mouth. "I want you to scoot toward me," he said, beckoning with gloved fingers.
But Rachael couldn't move. Her whole body was frozen. Now that the firemen had Charlie, now that he was safe, she didn't have any control over her body anymore. The enormity of her situation hit her all at once, and she choked back a sob. "I–I can't move," she whispered forlornly. "I can't make myself move."
The change in the fireman's face was like night to day. The intensity softened and disappeared, and in its place appeared sympathy. "A'ight, now," he said, in the voice Rachael used to coax Charlie to do something he had set his mind against doing, "a'ight, I'll come a little closer to you, and you scootch a little closer to me, and we'll meet in the middle, okay?"
Rachael didn't bother nodding in agreement; she just inched her bottom forward once, then again, and again, her hands sliding over the bits of glass from the window. True to his word, the fireman placed a knee on the edge of the roof and stretched his arm toward her. She kept her eyes pinned on his; she didn't want to see the flames framed by the window behind her, or the dark empty nothingness beyond the roof. The fireman's fingertips touched the toe of her sneaker, then grasped her ankle. He stepped down a rung and said, "It's okay, I'm not gonna let you fall. Just a little more now, and then you can put your arm over my shoulder."
None of the words made any sense to her; she couldn't quite work out the physics of it, but she moved as she was guided. She found herself hanging over his shoulder and sensed careful, downward movement.
A melody floated in her head, also familiar and sacred, her mom's clear soprano in a hushed sanctuary. And He will raise you up on eagles' wings, Bear you on the breath of dawn, Make you to shine like the sun, And hold you in the palm of His hand.
Once on the ground, the fireman did not place her on her own feet, but rather carried her to the cool grass of a neighbor's lawn and laid her down. Behind him, the house was an inferno. She couldn't even make out the shape of it, and her little bit of roof was now engulfed.
"How you doing?" the fireman said, crouching beside her, and those words unlocked the dam inside her. She burst into tears, feeling all at once relief and terror and the scorching pain of her sliced hands and burnt arms. But the only words she could get out were, "Where's Charlie?" The fireman made soothing, calming sounds, and looked around for someone. And then, there he was, the blue-eyed one, placid as a lake, holding the baby securely against his heavy beige coat. Charlie was hiccupping, recovering from his ordeal.
The fireman knelt and held the baby close enough so she could see him—the dark-haired one was examining her hands and arms, so she couldn't touch him or hold him—see that he was whole and healthy and unharmed. "See," he said, his face lighting with a smile, "he's okay, you're okay. You're both gonna be fine."
The other fireman nodded in agreement as he baptized her blistered skin with blessed, cool, holy water.
THE END