Where There's Smoke

The grating voice wasn’t hers. It echoed, hollow and distant, through the ringing in her ears. His eyes fixed on the sound of it. She could feel quivers running through him. His mouth opened slightly, and with a sure intuition Kate knew what he wanted. “I’ve still got the baby,” she croaked in a whisper.

He continued to stare towards her, his sightless eyes looking slightly to one side. But he didn’t move again.

After a while she knew he was dead. She set his hand down and stood up. The house was blazing fiercely now. Smoke gouted through the doorway and windows. She became aware that the pain from her burns was growing. She went over to where Lucy and Jack were standing with the children.

Lucy’s hands and mouth were free from the tape now. She was still crying. She and Kate looked at each other, then stumbled into a hug. Kate felt her own tears begin to rack her, and the two of them clung to each other and sobbed as the house burned, and sirens began to sound in the distance.

Epilogue

The hospital smell is hot radiators and antiseptic. She cries out as the pain clubs at her. It seems as if it will never stop. Then, at last, it does. She sinks back.

Her short hair, still growing back, is plastered to her head.

Below one sleeve of the white cotton gown, the pink line of a newly healed scar shows. As the pain ebbs, she raises her head as a white-smocked woman approaches, holding something wriggling feebly in her arms.

The woman smiles. “It’s a boy.”