I couldn’t think. I couldn’t process what she was saying. I was too worried and scared about getting out of there with her, especially when she couldn’t walk fast. I forgot about my hand as I undid the lock and opened the front door, so relieved to be almost out of there.
We made it passed the lawn as we both hacked up our lungs. My back, neck, and cheeks burned and itched. But we kept going across the street where I could spot both boys standing at the doorway with Josh holding the phone to his face.
They ran out as I helped Miss Pearl onto the grass. I’d told Louie not to leave the house, but I wasn’t about to remind him he had ignored me.
“Are you okay?” Josh asked as he and Louie barreled into me, throwing their arms around me like spider monkeys, oblivious to the woman by their feet.
“The firefighters are coming,” Louie said quickly.
“Diana, my cat is in the house,” Miss Pearl’s voice pleaded, as something I could only assume was her hand landed on my thigh.
I was coughing, hugging the boys back as her words finally sank in.
“Diana, Mildred is still in there,” she repeated herself. “She has bad eyes and can’t see good.”
I eyed the house over the top of the boys’ heads, noticing that it wasn’t engulfed in flames yet, despite how smoky everything inside had been.
“Please,” Miss Pearl pleaded.
Honestly, I wanted to cry as I got up, disentangling the boys from around me. Did I want to go save her cat? No. But how could I let it die? If it was Mac…
I met Josh’s eyes because there was no way I could look at Lou right then. “I’ll be right back. I’ll be right, right back. Don’t go anywhere.”
And I ran again, not waiting for either of them to comment or beg me. My burned hand was against my chest as I crossed the street, through the white picket fence that I would forever associate with almost dying. The front door was open as I ducked in, trying to keep closer to the floor because I’d already learned my lesson about the smoke that had gotten worse over the last few minutes it had taken me to get Miss Pearl out of there.
“Mildred!” I yelled, squinting and trying to look around the floor of the living room. “Mildred!” The smoke was horrible, and I coughed up what felt like one of my lungs as I shoved at furniture, trying to find the damn old cat.
I wasn’t going to die for it. I couldn’t do that to the boys, but I also couldn’t live with Miss Pearl’s face if I didn’t at least try to get her pet back.
“Mildred!” I shrieked with my raw throat.
I barely heard the low meow. Barely. It was a miracle I did. With my eyes burning, my skin burning, my hand burning, I couldn’t believe I found the old, nearly blind calico hidden in a corner by the door, shaking. I scooped her up, wheezing, crying because my eyes stung so badly. The heat was horrible, and I didn’t know then that it would be a long time before I ever took a steaming hot shower again.
I ran out of the front door, coughing, coughing, coughing. I could barely see as I tried to make it down the steps, tripping and missing the bottom one, which sent me flying down the sidewalk, landing hard on my knees. The cat went running away from me and the fire as I hacked up a lung, panicking, knowing I needed to get away. Knowing the neighbors on either side of Miss Pearl needed to get away too.
But my legs weren’t working. Neither was my brain. I was too busy trying to get my lungs to breathe.
“You fucking idiot,” a voice exploded—angry, so angry—from somewhere nearby.
A split second later, two arms were around me, one under my knees, the other across my shoulders, and then I was up in the air, cradled against a chest as I hacked up coughs so strong my stomach hurt.
“You stupid, stupid idiot,” the voice hissed as I felt us moving.
I couldn’t even muster up the energy to figure out who the hell was carrying me, much less tell them I wasn’t an idiot.
My lungs wouldn’t work, and I only coughed harder, my entire body into it.
The male voice right by my head cursed and cursed again, “fuck” and “shit” and “goddammit.” The tone as bitter and harsh as the smoke had been. But I couldn’t concentrate. I didn’t care. My hand was starting to throb unbearably, and I still couldn’t catch my breath. There were other things to worry about.
I felt myself being lowered instead of actually seeing it. I felt the grass under my legs and bare feet—when the hell I lost my shoes, I had no idea. I heard Josh and Louie’s voices mixed in with other unfamiliar ones. I heard the wail of a fire truck’s siren most importantly, and maybe I heard the ambulance too.
But I was coughing too hard, trying to shield my hand.
Something soft swept over my eyes and mouth—a T-shirt. And still I coughed.
“Josh, get a glass of water,” the male voice ordered, low and grumbling against my ear. It was Dallas. It took me a second, but I knew it was him crouched by me, a weight around my back as a supporting gesture. He was the one who had carried me. Of course it was him. Who else would it be?
“Can you tell…” I couldn’t catch my breath. The side of my face was pressed against something hard and warm and steady. I closed my eyes, trying to catch my breath. “Miss Pearl… I got her cat, but… she jumped out of my arms?”
“Fuck the fucking cat,” the voice by my ear spat out. What had to be his arm around my back moved lower, slinging around my hips. I was pulled in closer to what had to be his body at my side. Something pressed against my cheek, his words almost muffled. “You stupid little idiot. You stupid fucking idiot—”
“I had to,” I whispered to him, lifting my head. Had his lips been on my cheek?
“Had to? Had to?”
It was Louie, my poor wonderful Louie that explained it to him. “Daddy fell and hit his head, and nobody stopped to see him,” he told him, word for word in the same way I’d relayed the story to him in the past, minus a few details. “That’s why you gotta help people who need it,” he ended, his little chest shaking with emotion at the memories I was sure he was living through right now because of me.
Dallas glanced back and forth between Louie and me, his own body continuing with the tremors I’d originally felt. I was pretty sure he muttered, “Jesus fucking Christ,” but I couldn’t be positive.
“Dallas?” Miss Pearl’s soft, creaky voice managed to tear through my coughs.
“Don’t move, Diana,” Dallas barked. Something tender pressed against my temple and cheek. Somewhere in the back of my head, I guessed it was his nose to the side of my eye, his mouth at my cheek. “The ambulance will be here in a second. Don’t fucking move,” he told me one last time before his support left me.
In less than two seconds after he moved, he was replaced by a much smaller body. One that was as familiar to me as my own. One that crawled onto my lap and pressed itself against me, whimpering and shivering just like poor Mildred the cat had been when I found her.
“Are you dying?” Louie asked against my ear as he tried to bury himself inside of me, squishing my hand against my stomach, making it hurt even more.