Lost In The Fire

                            Lisa awakens to the smell of smoke. She opens her eyes and a cloud of gray surrounds her. Her first instinct is to look for her cat, Socks. Lisa gets out of bed and kneels down on the floor, grabbing Socks by the scruff.

                            She runs to the living room and sustains a nasty burn on her hand opening the door. Lisa enters the hallway of black smog, a dry cough rumbling in her chest as she pushes through the smoke.

                           In the reduced visibility, she sees two figures fighting their way through. It's a man with a mass of dark brown curls, tightly embracing Lisa's neighbor, Jessie. Both have ash across their faces, and they're struggling to catch their breath.

                           "Charlotte." Jessie breathes, gasping for air.

                           "I'll find her. Don't worry." The man promises. He pushes Lisa and Jessie towards the exit and opens the scorching door knob.

                           Lisa grabs Jessie and helps her down the stairs.

                          "Thank you," Jessie struggles to say, once outside.

                         EMTs immediately surround Jessie, taking her into an ambulance. In that moment, a little girl comes running out, crying for her mother and is picked up by another EMT.

                        The man, however, has yet to return. Lisa hears a cracking sound and part of the roof collapses. She finds an EMT standing by.

                        "Can you hold my cat?" She asks, handing her off. Before anyone can stop her, Lisa charges towards the fire, throwing open the door and stumbling her way up the engulfing staircase.

                         In the hallway, which now resembles hellfire, she squints against the dark, an intense heat in her lungs, and there she sees him leaning against a wall, coughing hard.

                        Lisa wraps both arms around him, and together, they walk out into the fresh air of the day, before collapsing in each other's arms.

                        The next time Lisa awakens, it's dark. She hears beeping and immediately winces at the burn on her hand.

                        Her mind flashes back to the last few moments of the fire at her apartment building. Jessie, Charlotte, and...that man. The man who was saving people. The man who almost lost his own life.

                        Then an awful thought occurs to her. Maybe he did. It's at that moment a nurse comes in and snaps her back to the present.

                       "Your cat is fine, Miss Stone. She's with your sister until you recover. You know, that was a crazy thing to do, running back into that fire as the roof was caving in. Both of you could've died."

                      Both. "Where is he?"

                      "Who?"

                     "The man I was with?"

                    "Your boyfriend? Husband?"