The Burning Man

"Aaaaaah!"

I startle awake, sit up too fast and smack my head on the upper bunk. Wood smoke claws at my throat and chest, and the skin on my legs sizzles from hot flames. I yank back the blankets to make sure I'm okay. Two legs, flannel pajamas. Everything's normal. It was just a dream, just a dream, just a stupid dream, I think, as my eyes adjust to the dark. My room takes shape. Posters on the wall. Dirty clothes across the floor. Stacks of comics on the nightstand. My cellphone reads, 3:00am, the witching hour.

The image of the burning man flashes through my head and my gut twists. I stood useless and watched his hair turn to ash and his skin melt like wax, again. And like all the other times before, he was eaten by angry orange flames and I was too late to save him.

I wipe away a mix of sweat and tears from my cheeks with the palm of my hand and my skin sears with hot pain. I hold my hands up to the weak light of my phone screen and find tiny half-moons carved into them. Blood, too. Oh, God. Did I cut myself with my own fingernails?

I tried to keep the man from walking into the fire. I grabbed his arm as hard as I could and yanked backwards, but his shirt fell away in my fingertips, burnt bits of flannel. As his house throbbed with flames, he stepped closer and closer to the heat and I screamed, "Move away! Get away from there! Please!" Then the glass windows of the little shack exploded. Shards flew at us, but he didn't seem to notice. In a strange, scratchy voice he said, "Stay with me, Sarah. It'll be nice. I don't wanna be alone no more. Please, Sarah," he begged.

I shiver in my bed and wrap my arms around my knees, hugging myself. How did he know my name? Why did I listen to him? Why in God's name did I step closer to the fire? Why couldn't I save him? I jab my fingers into my eyes to stop a stream of tears. Get ahold of yourself, Sarah. "You're just a dream. You're not real!" I shout into the dark corners of my room.

The cat answers back with a throaty growl. Romeo, my well fed Maine coon sits beneath the record player, his eyes glow like a jack-o-lantern. His gaze flits back and forth as he seems to watch something behind me. I slip out of bed and cross the room. I look to the corner where he stares, but all I see are shadows and little stars, plastic stars I taped to the ceiling when I was a little kid. They glow when the room is pitch dark, which used to make me feel safe at night. Now nothing keeps the spooks away.

"Romeo, come here, boy." My voice comes out sounding like someone else's, deep and coarse. I clear my throat, "Come on, sweetie." I stretch out a hand and scoop him up, desperate to feel his warm furry body in my arms. The smoke from the dream tickles my throat and I cough, double over and hack until the taste of irony blood floods my mouth. Romeo hisses and vaults off my lap, then skitters out the door. I follow him down the hall.

"Blat! Blat! Blat! Blat! Blat!"

The smoke alarm erupts down the hall. It's going off right outside of my parents' room. "Please! Not again." I race to it and stand on tippy toes to try and push the button that quiets the thing, but it's too high.

The door to Mom's room slams open. "Sarah! It's three in the morning! What did I say about candles?" She waves her hands beneath the smoke alarm, but it continues to screech, almost as loudly as her. "No candles in your room! How many times do I have to tell you?"

I blink back tears. "I didn't light any, Mom. I swear." She doesn't believe me. She didn't last night, either. Or the nights before that.

Mom grabs a chair and sets it beneath the alarm. She climbs up and pushes the red button whish shushes the awful noise. She climbs down and pushes past me to my room. She reaches my nightstand and pokes a finger into the top of the apple-scented candle there. I know for a fact it's cold, the wax still solid and smooth. She scowls at me sideways, her forehead wrinkles with frustration. "Why do you smell like smoke then, Sarah?" She reaches out and grabs a handful of my hair and sniffs, then shakes her head. "Smells like smoke. Five nights in a row you've left a candle burning and set off that goddamn alarm. One of these times you're going to set this house on fire and kill us all!"