*Breath

My heart froze and my breath caught in my throat as a fire truck pulled up with flashing lights and parked right outside my door.  I watched anxiously as I heard chatter over their radios and intercoms and once again I was back at Paddock Place Apartments waiting and watching as my life burned in front of me.  Standing here at the window peeking through the blinds, I don’t see the parked truck or the unhurried movement of the firefighters as they talk in their truck.  Instead I see my old building in front of me.  I see the fire fighters rushing up and down the stairs.  My head spins as it tries once again to grasp the reality of what was going on…what went on.  I am safe, but I don’t feel safe.  I am scared.  I smell the smoke even though there is no smoke to smell anymore.  I feel tears pushing at the corner of my eyes and I feel silly for crying over the same thing all over again.  I try to steel myself against the feeling that still lie deep within my heart as I know I am still not strong enough to deal with them all.

That night I feel like I lost everything in my life except my son.  Even though my husband made it out safely, the façade we were living in burned with that apartment and I feel like I lost the man I knew.  I lost every earthly possession I owned and I lost the baby I carried in my belly.  It hurts to remember the things I have lost and it makes me feel like when I mourn my loss I am ungrateful for my life and that of my son and husband.

The flashing red light swirls into my vision, around and around with my thought and emotions.  They finally leave.  They never had to leave the truck.  I sit down and breathe.  Breathe.