Don't Let Me Fall Again

Chapter Fifteen - The Beginning of the End

As soon as the fire alarm began screaming, everyone was literally shoved roughly out of the building. I didn’t even have a choice: not one person would let me try and save them. Sam dragged me all the way down the stairs, repeating over and over again that the firemen would get them out of there in no time, but he sounded more like he was reassuring himself more than anyone else.

It felt like a million years had passed until the emergency services finally arrived. We all stood out in the bitter cold, shivering with fear and staring up at the black smoke wheezing out of the smashed window of Ryan’s apartment. Soon the fire spread into the apartment next door, causing a couple of windows to shatter with the heat, spraying glass all over the place. Almost everyone gasped, babies began to wail even louder, and a few dogs started whining.

I stayed there, numbly watching the firemen spray tons of water onto the blazing building, my legs frozen even in the heat of the fire. I could barely breathe. I felt like I was suffocating, like a layer of fiery ash had filled my lungs. All I could think about was the worst thing that could happen, that they wouldn’t survive and I’d lose the one person who made my life worth living. Sinead was clearly thinking the same as she sobbed her heart out on my mam’s shoulder.

Some people, the ones who weren’t too distressed by the fire, were being interviewed by cops and ambulance men. A couple minutes later reporters arrived at the scene, hungry for a story to report in the news. Sam came over to me with a blanket and wrapped it around my shoulders to try and stop me from shivering, but a hundred thousand blankets wouldn’t be able to stop me from feeling so empty and cold. I saw Katie and Chelsea getting into the back of an ambulance with some of my other friends from school. Tons of people were coughing, mainly the people who were in Ryan’s apartment when it went on fire.

‘They’ll be fine,’ Sam told me, noticing I was watching them. ‘Everyone who was at the party is getting brought to the hospital for a little check-up to see if they’re okay. That means they’ll be safely out of reach from the gang … I reckon they’ll be there for a long time. Some of them got a really nasty shock, which I suppose is normal when an apartment suddenly goes on fire … Your friend Nicole even had a panic attack,’ he said, nodding in the direction of Pete picking Nicole up off the ground. At least Pete wasn’t in the fire.

‘This is all my fault,’ I cried as the glass of another window shattered to the ground above Ryan’s apartment. ‘I should’ve just gone to that restaurant … I should’ve done what Lewis said … What if they don’t get out? What if they’re already –?’

‘Don’t be so silly, Laura! Nothing’s going to happen. They’re safe. They’ll be out in a minute,’ he said firmly, staring up at Ryan’s apartment. ‘As soon as they get out we’re going to finish this. You can go with Gabby in an ambulance and if they ask where we are you’re going to tell them that we’re gone to the hospital on the other side of town –’

‘No one will believe that, and I am not staying here. I don’t care what you say, I’m not going to stay on a stupid hospital bed while you all go out there and fight. I’m fighting too –’

‘Dream on, Laura –’

Sam was cut off by the sudden cheers of everyone around us, and then out came four young men. There was Kyle, James, Drake and then Scott, but there was no Ryan. I burst into tears. It felt like my heart was dying. Ryan’s mam screamed out in agony, begging the firemen to save her son. I sank to the ground, the pain I was feeling unbearable. Ryan wasn’t coming out. But he had to survive. I needed him to survive. I couldn’t lose him. He was the best thing in my life. If he died, I wanted to go down with him.

‘He’s coming, I know he is,’ Sam whispered, before calling Drake over. ‘Where the hell is Ryan?’

‘He’s really hurt …’ Drake said, trying his best to speak without coughing. ‘He got burnt … and the ceiling collapsed just a second after they got us out … He should be out by now, though … He only has a few more minutes in there before everything collapses. It’s crazy in there –’