Fire on Fire

4. What are you doing to me?

"Awesome." Emma grumbled when, the moment she stepped outside the building, rain started pouring again. Hugging herself to fend off the cold brought by rain – in spite of the warmish Spring that had made an appearance the past couple of weeks –, she contemplated her choices. The next metro stop was 10 minutes away and she had no umbrella. She could wait there until the bad weather relented, but she was fairly certain Daniel was or would be keeping an eye on her from the security cameras at the entrance.

Heaving yet another deep sigh, Emma decided that pouring rain was better than spending one more minute withing her ex-boyfriend's reach. Hence, she took a deep breath and, having hiked her bag over her shoulder, she took off her heels, and started running barefooted towards left. She could hardly see anything, heavy rain and speed fogged her sight, and she was fairly certain she'd stepped her feet on several unpleasant things – ah, the beauty of New York streets.

Halfway through her destination, Emma slipped and crashed against something, which was followed by a cascade of boxes scattering all around her.

"I'm so sorry!" A female voice screeched, immediately grabbing her hand to help her up. "I didn't see you! Are you okay?!"

"It's alright, I'm fine." Emma half smiled.

"But you're soaked!" The young woman gasped in horror, then glanced at Emma's bare feet. "Oh, my God, don't tell me you ran in the rain like that!" She almost made her lose balance by lifting her foot, then she screeched. "Oh! There's a cut! Oh, no!"

Emma slowly retrieved her foot, furrowing her brows. As far as weirdness went, New Yorkers beat every record, sure, but she'd never met someone like this girl. Who grabs a stranger's foot out of the blue? "Don't worry about it," she simply said, wanting to leave – especially because they were still standing in the middle of the sidewalk, in the pouring rain.

The young woman shook her head instead, and pushed Emma to the wall, giving her an open umbrella. "Wait here." She ordered, which the other obeyed mostly out of confusion. The stranger grabbed all of her soaked boxes, grimacing when she noticed at least a couple had broken, and placed them at Emma's feet. Luckily the umbrella was big enough for both of them and the boxes to take cover from the rain.

"I'm fine," Emma said, wanting to get away from this girl that could possibly be a maniac, even though her left foot did hurt a little – maybe she'd stepped on a broken glass.

"No." The other held up a finger. She fished her phone in her purse, and quickly dialed a number. "I'm calling my brother," the girl said, "he's waiting for me nearby."

"I ..."

"You need to get that foot checked out, he can drive us to the nearest hospital."

Emma frowned. Had anyone ever been that kind with her? Nice enough to stop whatever she was doing and decide she ought to help her? Sure, she'd met a lot of 'nice' men, but their gentleness was always aimed at a reward. She pursed her lips, her mind immediately traveling to one man in particular. Truth was, there was one person that had showed her kindness without a secondary reason, someone that, despite her resistances, had tried to be more than just ...

"Alex?"

Emma gulped when she heard the name. No, that couldn't be ...

The other girl sighed, rolling her eyes. "Yeah, yeah, Alexander ..." she corrected, which caused Emma's heart to skip a few beats. "Listen, you need to come pick me up ... yes, I know, you're around the corner, but you need to drive here. There's ..." when she turned to Emma, she saw the umbrella dropping to the floor. In the distance, the soaked silhouette of a girl running away barefooted.