It was cold that night. So cold I could barely feel my fingers as I flicked the match across the strike patch on the box. So cold I was almost numb to all the pain that place had brought me. Almost.
Under the porch, were the wood was dry and exposed I couldn't help but think of the rooms above me. The blood was long washed out of the carpet in the sitting room but I still saw it, still smelled it, still felt it slipping underneath my feet. The hallway upstairs had been bleached and the carpet had been replaced but I still saw the body when I was on the top step, still heard my own scream ringing in the air, still heard the wail of sirens in the distance. Those were the latest pieces of tragedy to befall the old house but they were not the only ones. Time was not kind to the house or the inhabitants and I wanted so desperately done with the cursed place. To be done with the pain.
The wood caught quickly and for a second, I fell back on my heels and watched it burn. The fire was hot, bright, brilliant. It warmed me from the cold, dry air. When the blaze was too much, I tossed the match box into the flames and crawled away between the bottom steps of the porch and walked, slow and steady down the gravel drive.
Before me, the barn stood like a sentry at the front gate. In the doorway, Bark was sleeping away yet another night. He opened one eye when I fell into the cold dirt beside him and moved his head into my lap. If he saw the house he'd guarded his whole life burning down before him, he didn't act like it. Instead, he went back to snoring as I stroked his long, soft fur. The grey in his muzzle reminded me that he'd been witness to the dozens of mysterious catastrophes that had befallen us here.
I waited until the house was a giant, blazing inferno before I fumbled my phone out of my pocket. The operator knew my name when I called. So many calamities and the local authorities start to learn your name and address. She was asking me too many questions. Was I safe? Where did the fire start? How long had it been going? Was I hurt? Was anyone else inside? My voice echoed off the beams in the old barn. I was safe. I didn't know anything about the fire; I was taking Bark for a walk when I saw it. I wasn't hurt; for once. No one else was inside; for once. I heard the sirens before I even hung up the phone but a soft feeling of peace fell on me knowing they would be too late. It was finally over.
I didn't have to call my father. He knew when he saw the lights heading up our long, winding road that another tragedy has collapsed on top of our shrinking family. When he found me in the barn, Bark asleep in my lap, he let out a long held breath. He didn't ask any questions. He just sat in the dirt beside me. I think he was just as relieved as me. We watched them point giant hoses at the house but the damage was done. There was no saving it. No point in saving something that had never done its part to save anyone else.
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