I was dreaming about the New York Yankees, that night.
I was pitching to Reggie Jackson, a big wad of chew in my mouth (because mom said I wasn’t ever using that “dirt shit”) and a roaring crowd of adoring fans chanting “MIL-TY MIL-TY” while swilling Old Style Lite. I clutched the baseball in my hand, palming and kneading the ball like I assumed you would grope a tit. (Awkwardly.) I lined the stitches up against my fingers, gripping them tightly, waited for my best friend Jamison to hold up a single finger, the middle finger, and I wound up, twisting my left leg back towards the outfield, then uncurled and fired a fastball in the upper right corner of the plate, the ball whooshing just an inch from Mr. October’s bat. The satisfying thwock of the ball into the leather mitt was enough to make me grin, a knowing nod to Jamison as the ump emphatically declared “STEERIIIKE” to the delight of no one in Yankee Stadium.
I wiped my brow, and was surprised to see my sleeve completely saturated in sweat. It was October in New York; it was normally almost freezing when I had this dream. What the hell is goi-
I snapped back into consciousness. The world looked orange, waxy. My bed faced my bedroom door, and the orange haze came into focus.
The door was aflame.
I sprang up from the bed, and ran towards my window, gripping the brass handle and yanking upwards. The window stood firm. I ran to my bookshelf, looking for anything I could use to break out the window and escape. I found an Pee Wee Baseball trophy (Participation, nothing special) and grabbed it. I hurried back to the window and wound up, then slammed the trophy into the glass.
It didn’t crack.
I tried again, after looking back and seeing the flames beginning to quickly consume the door and begin to enter the room.
It didn’t crack.
I slammed my fists into the window.
It didn’t. Crack.
I turned back to the door. The flames were feet away. But at a glance, the flames hadn’t spread through the entire hallway yet, as the end of the upstairs hallway was a circle of marble.
OhmyGodIhavetorunthroughthefirenopleasenoGodno
I looked back outside one more time, pleading with (at the time) God to have some meteor come and shatter the window. I would welcome slicing my arms and legs and breaking my legs jumping out of the window over literally running through fire.
The uncracked window showed me nothing but inky black sky and the smoke from mom and dad’s room hazing the stars.
I turned back around. The fire was licking at my bedposts.
I instinctively stripped naked, in hopes that I wouldn’t catch aflame as I ran through the fire. I took one last heat-choked breath, hoping that I could hold enough air in to make it through Hell.
I wound up, twisting my leg back towards the last of my normal childhood, then uncurled and fired myself into the fire.
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