Scars

Escaping

Zachary stumbled from the flames, the light skin on his face slightly singed and his once long, blonde hair quickly turning to black dust. "Cass! Just RUN! Please!" he urged, struggling to stand up. Cringing, he fell to his knees, giving in to the embers surrounding him. Tears he was most likely unaware of fell forth from his droopy eyelids. "Zach, you know darn well I can't do that," I hissed, looking behind me at the safe haven only miles from me in the distance. All I had to do was run. Run. Run. My instincts screamed in my head, causing me to shake it violently to chase away the thoughts. Shut up!  I yelled to my mind, turning back to Zach. I closed my eyes, taking deep gulps of the smoky air to calm myself, which only made me cough more then I was already. I prepared my skin to feel pain as never before, and dove into the burning flames to save my friend. I screamed in agony, the flames licking my arms and burning the skin with pain beyond belief. "Cass... I..." he moaned, before going limp into the ashes accumulating on the ground. I grabbed his blistered arms with my blistered hands and attempted to drag him out, hot tears running down my face all the while. I managed to drag him from the flames, making it only a short distance before I flopped on the dewy grass in the fields nearby. I laid there for awhile, softly whispering his name into his ear in the hopes he would wake up. At last, after about five minutes, his black, soot-clad eyelids fluttered open groggily, a sad smile spreading across his face. "Hey Cass," he muttered, leaning into the hand I had been using to softly stroke his cheek with to wake him. "Hey Zach," I replied, smiling with tears in my eyes. He went into an almost silent fit of laughter, wheezing repeatedly until he stopped. It was that laugh that you utter when things are just so pathetic, so pitifully terrible, that the slightest thing can send you into hysterics. The sun was beginning to set on the horizon. I looked down at my arms, cringing at the blistered, angry skin on them. I held my hands up to my face, gritting my teeth, as my palms burned like the fires in Hell. "Cass... You carried me all this way?" he muttered, looking at my hands as well. "Yeah, well, we need to get further," I hissed, rubbing my temples to relieve the stress piling on my shoulders. I grabbed his hand, and no matter how bad it hurt our scarred and raw palms, we grasped each other like there was no tomorrow - and it might was well have been that way - and ran into the setting sun. I liked to believe that sunsets were a good sign, as there was a new beginning right around the corner, but my wishful thinking was bound to backfire on me before long, I suppose.