Flash Fiction - Memento

Trying something a little different

The heat is overwhelming, threatening to blister and melt my exposed skin. The pain is bearable, but the smoke is impossible to avoid. It cannot be stuffed into the same mental locker as the tortured flesh, for that space is much too full. Every cough, every wheeze, makes me inhale more of the black stuff. The smoke reaches down my throat and touches my lungs, tickling them to the point where I can feel that they want to give up the fight.

Everyone but me is out and safe, but I could not go without the family cat. I don’t care what anyone else thinks, Ellie is family, and she has every right to make it out alive as myself, my wife and kids.

I hold her tightly as I bound down the stairs, dodging the flames that lick the walls and reach out to touch me as I pass. I smell singed hair and I pat my head wildly with one hand while the other clings for dear life to the mewling, trembling cat.

I can see the front door through the swirling smoke, and just as I think I am going to make it, something behind me erupts, the shockwave lifting me off my feet and through the air. I smash through the living room window in what feels like slow motion. I can see the horrified faces of the onlookers as I fly through the air, my clothes alight and giving me the appearance of a phoenix rising from the ashes.

I fall to the ground and land on something soft, my body jerking me awake. I panic, looking for smoke and flames, but then I remember I am safe. Sweat stings the raw patches of skin that are still healing, that time will mend. I reach out and touch my wife, thankful we all survived.

Ellie raises her head and mewls softly, her slow blink telling me that she loves me for keeping her safe, too. I don’t know how long the nightmares will haunt me, but with my family by my side, I will survive.