Burned

Singeing and fleeing. The burns across his face made him hardly recognizable. It was almost in an instant that he was burned. Orlando was working diligently at the factory. He heard a faint, clinging noise across the building, quite unusual, but nonetheless he disregarded it. Cling. Cling. It was getting closer, and he continued to ignore the noise. Orlando looked up and didn’t have more than two seconds to dart away.  The flames rose up in a flash, not knowing exactly what to do, Orlando bolted for freedom. On the way out of the factory’s emergency exit, he tripped incautiously over a pipe and fell face-first into the concrete floor. The flames reached him swiftly, and they seared his face, and he screamed with agony as he tried to get onto his feet. The fire was still rushing, not exactly in his direction anymore, but around the different areas of the building. People were running for their lives toward exits across the concrete, some climbing wall-ladders to upper stories. The closest emergency exit seemed miles away, luckily he quickly spotted a ladder no more than six feet from his. He darted toward the ladder and climbed to the next story. Orlando saw Angelica cowered in the corner adjacent to him, her knees to her chest, and tears streaming down her cheeks. It seemed as if she thought these were her last moments. Lando, a coworker, was running across the room and he also saw Angelica. Before he was able to make his move, a large ball of fire whisked him into the concrete wall and he slid down the ladder-shoot to the numerous stories below, unconscious, and probably dead. She screamed with anxiety and fear that this really was her last moment. Orlando seized his final opportunity, seeing that the shoot and the vents were glowing more orange by the second. He dashed to her side, grabbed her by the waist and took to the nearest door. With relief, the door lead to an empty stairwell. He put her down, and grabbed her hand and together they darted up through the six landings until they at last reached the roof of the factory. They stopped and watched down below. All this time, the fire had rushed out into the streets, people were running for their lives, some unfortunately horribly burned; the fire had reached other buildings as well, cars were on fire, smoke was thick in the air. Orlando turned round to see Angelica: she was weeping. “What are we going to do?” she asked him gloomily. Orlando paused to think. He looked at her. She seemed to not notice his burns. She was so beautiful to him. He looked into her eyes and noticed she was in terrible pain. He took her by the hand, and lowered his head a few inches, and then he kissed her. He told Angelica in his softest and most reassuring voice: “Angelica, do not worry. Everything is going to be just fine.”

12 March 2014