The Witness

The Fire

After she tried to kill me is when things really started to shift and change between us. I think she must have felt guilty or something because she became even nicer to me than she was before. She even let me walk around the rest of the house, supervised of course. But there was a day when I think we truly became friends.

The Fire

"Like I never understood potlucks, everyone just brings a side dish and we all just eat a bunch of sides anyway," Dakota said as she stirred the cookie dough and I sat on the other side of the kitchen island.

Her house is very nice. Super clean, super fancy. She has this huge kitchen, her living room is nice and homey. The downstairs bathroom is small but nice. She covered all the windows in the house with thick curtains. My favorite room so far is the living room, she just has this amazing couch that I'm in love with. It's so comfortable.

"Well, you're making dessert, straying from the path."

"Am I though?"

I giggle.

She hands me the cookie dough-covered spatula while she moves to get an ice cream scooper. I smile and begin to lick it clean.

She pulled out a cookie sheet pan and then put parchment paper on it. The oven was preheating behind her. She started to scoop cookie globs onto the tray.

Turns out Dakota is part of several school organizations, she's vice president for the mental health awareness club and they decided to have a potluck to try and recruit new members. She said I could help. But the only help I've done is eat up the mess.

She won't let me too deep into the kitchen, where all the knives are. Though she won't say it, I think she's scared I'll get the bright idea to grab a knife and try and make a run for it. The trust between us is still shaky. Not that I blame her, I am one to get some hair-brained idea and get myself killed.

"I never got into the whole student organization thing, like I already have so much on my plate with classes and my job and the girlfriend thing, just wasn't my jam," I say.

"You had a girlfriend?"

"Emphasis on the word had. You met her, BB, that night... anyway she broke up with me because I kind of broke her heart."

"Oh, heart breaker? I never pictured you as the type." She smirks.

"It was stupid, I regret it." I lay my head down, shoving the whole spatula in my mouth.

"What did you do? Cheat on her?"

"Worse, I said it was just a phase."

"Oh, damn, yeah that is worse."

"We had been dating for three years."

"Ouch."

"I know! Ugh, I mean I think I love her. But like, I just got scared. She wanted to get serious, like a promise ring, maybe a wedding in the future serious. I just totally freaked out. She dumped me, then she got with his other girl like 2 weeks later."

"Sounds rough." She says.

"The shitty thing is," I sat up and pop the spatula out of my mouth. "The only reason I was out that night was that I was too chicken to tell her the truth and I wanted to hook up with some guy to try and prove a point, but I couldn't even do it and I left early. Which is where you come into the story and how I ended up here."

"So you're saying if even one thing would have been different you and I wouldn't be here?"

"You know if that guy wasn't such a total douche I might have actually done it too." I shake my head.

She laughs.

"Cookie me," I hold out my spatula.

She plops a glob of dough on it.

"Emm," I shove the spatula into my mouth.

"You're going to get sick," she laughs.

"Mind ya business," I say.

That makes her laugh harder.

My eyes go wide as behind her the over starts to leak smoke.

"Emm!" I point.

She turns.

"Shit!" she says.

The fire alarm starts going off.

She runs over to the oven and opens it and flames shoot out, she falls on the floor to avoid getting burned. Black smoke starts to fill the house. I cough and get up to go help her. She crawls over to the sink and grabs the fire hydrant under it.

I grab a rag and fan the smoke away but it's too much so I run to the front door and open it up.

That's when I realize.

Now is my chance.

I can run.

She can't stop me.

I eye the front yard.

The green grass, blue skies, birds chirping. It's all right there, freedom.

I flinch when I hear her coughing and a loud bang. I turn back into the house and see the fire hydrant roll away from the kitchen.

Two choices.

Go back and help her.

Run and escape.

I could hear my heart in my ears, the sweat beading on my palms.

I heard her scream out in pain.

I grabbed my head and whined shaking it back and forth before running back in. I grabbed the hydrant and pointed it at the fire. Dakota was trapped by the sink, the kitchen rug had caught fire.

She looked up at me through the flames, almost as if she couldn't believe it either.

I sprayed the white foam everywhere, putting the fire out.

The fire alarm finally shuts off as all the smoke goes out the front door.

"Are you okay?" I run over to her.

"W-what are you doing?" she asked.

"What?"

"Why didn't you run away? That was your chance."

"And let you die!?"

I help her up off the floor.

I dust her off before looking at the charred oven and saying,

"What the heck happened?"

"I totally forgot about the pizza I left in there," she sighs.

"Why did it catch fire?"

"I wrapped it in a paper towel."

I facepalm.

She sighs.

Half her kitchen is totally ruined.

"At least the cookies survived," I say.

She laughs.

I smile.

She just laughs, she laughs so hard she tears up and then I start laughing because she's laughing.

And though I missed my chance again, I think I made the right choice.