The Third Great Prophecy

Chapter Four: I Learn To Appreciate My Closet Even More

I started freaking out. I'd always had an irrational fear of fire, even more after meeting Miss-my-hair's-on-fire-and-I'm-gonna-eat-you. It looked like she'd been bored while I was in the office and decided to spread her flames all around. I looked around, hopelessly.

"Seriously, Dad?! You own a monster-slaying weapon but can't be bothered to buy a fire-extinguisher?!" Right away, I found it absolutely ridiculous. Was the smoke already taking effect? I was talking to myself like a two-year old.

I looked at the doorway to the kitchen, but I knew there was no way I could get through those flames. There was no way I was going to get out, unless-I turned around just in time to see the office door take fire. I took a shaky breath. Calm down. Take in your surroundings. Then, I saw something that made absolutely no sense. While everything around it was burning, the door to my personal bathroom was intact. Not even a scratch. It wasn't much of a choice, but it was all I had, so I started running towards it. I almost got impaled by a burning piece of wood on the way, but I dodged and kept running.

When I got to the door, it was blocked. I pushed the it with all my might but it just wouldn't buldge. I decided to use my knife to dislodge it from the burning doorway. Finally, it swung open, revealing my livingroom-sized bathroom with all the emergency lights on.

I closed the door behind me and felt my HDAD or something take over. I was on the verge of being a human torch, yet I absolutely had to know why the door wasn't burning and how long I had before the fire got through. I could wait for the police and firemen to come, but something told me they weren't coming. I looked at myself in the mirror. I looked terrible. I took some water out of the sink to wash my face, tried to untangle my hair with my fingers and straightened out my cardigan. Then I hurried over to the door, inspecting it. I ran my hand over the wood and paused. How had I never noticed before? The door was five times more polished than any other door in the house. Fireproof!

Suddenly, my inner Doctor Who kicked in. Brilliant! But out of all the rooms in the house, my dad made this one fireproof! There has to be a reason! I started running around the room, touching every drawer, every notch in the wall, nothing. Suddenly, I stopped in front of the door leading to my closet -yes, my access to my bathroom was through my walk-in closet, okay? - I rushed into my closet and tried to reach the other side, where there would be a door leading to my room. Before I could get there, I walked into a rack of clothes - it was dark, remember? - making the whole thing collapse. I tried to continue forward, but I tripped on some of the clothes that had just fallen and hit my shoulder hard. Hard? My closet's floor was supposed to be completely covered by an extra-soft carpet! I felt the ground under me. Definitely not a carpet, but what? Metal? Metal! Of course! My dad made the bathroom waterproof so that if we ever got stuck in the apartment while it was on fire, we could access to my closet and escape through a secret trapdoor! I felt the square of metal. Sure enough, there was a handle. I pulled it with all my might and the trapdoor opened, leading to a shallow tunnel with a crummy ladder.

As I made my way down the ladder, I tried to be careful not to slip and had to concentrate really hard to ignore the horrible stench of sulphur. Sure enough, when I got to the bottom, I was knee-deep in monster dust, thus the horrible smell. There was a small door opposite to the ladder. I'm not sure how old it was, but it looked like it was falling apart and was locked only with a rusty metal chain. Instinctively, I took out the knife I had found in my dad's office and tried to cut through the chain. It sliced through it like melted butter, and the door creaked open. I found myself back in the street, on the other side of my apartment building.

Great. My home is on fire, I have no way of reaching my dad, its getting dark and there may be other she-demons on the loose trying to kill me. Why, oh why won't Dad let me own a cell phone? I walked around the building and sat on the same park bench where I had sat a few hours before and sighed. Happy birthday to me. Suddenly, my thoughts drifted towards my pocket.

Don't hesitate to find me if something's wrong. Justin's voice said inside my head.

I couldn't, I thought. I just met him. Plus, he'd think I'm crazy if I told him about Ms. Addison. Yet, I found myself hailing a cab.

When a taxi finally pulled over, the driver asked, "Where to?"

I was about to answer, when I realized my throat hurt from the smoke, so I simply handed him the card. He took one look at the card and grunted. I think I heard him mutter something about not again and annoying teenagers and also there being nothing there. I was too tired, so I simply shrugged it off.