41
Lottie is standing well back from the roadside, watching the fire slowly die, the water jets streaming like hissing serpents in the dark, the smoke and steam rising.
She is mesmerised by it all. The renovation is now a blackened skull; dark recesses within a broken face.
The roof has all but disappeared, the original door and window frames are non-existent.
If you listen hard enough, you can almost hear the timbers of the house singing as they cool.
Burned debris litters the back garden but the fire has not reached much further.
The scaffolding has fallen down in places – the wooden boardwalks disintegrated – but not everywhere.
Some of it is still erect like a strange metal plant climbing up the facade of the building.
But the fire must have weakened it and its collapse was the almighty bang they heard.
Thank goodness they were still inside at the time, and she feels herself tremble anew.
Josh clings to her like a limpet. They are both shivering despite the heat from the fire and the warm, close night.
She tries to turn his head away, bury his face into her shoulder in spite of his curiosity.
This is not a sight she wishes him to remember, to be burned on his retinas for the rest of his life.
And yet, Lottie finds she cannot look away herself.
She forces her eyes down to the ground and realises she has lost her flip-flops somehow.
The soles of her feet are sore but she can’t understand why, her chest aching even when she is still.
Her throat feels scoured as if she has been shouting, though all she has been able to do is quietly murmur into Josh’s ear.
Her eyes too are scratchy, her vision blurred.
She wishes she could close them and wake up to find this was all a horrible nightmare, instead of a bad dream made real.
How could this be? What might have happened if she hadn’t woken up in time?
It is unthinkable and she clutches Josh’s clammy, plump body to hers, like a childhood teddy that will comfort and restore.
Tim is talking to a paramedic, over by the ambulance.
There were two more, their sirens blaring, acidic colours a hazard warning.
But they have both already left, taking two people, two bodies, alive or dead she’s not sure.
No one will disclose this information yet although there is a rumour going round amongst the other bystanders that it was a man and a woman.
She absorbed this news mutely as a neighbour had pressed a mug of hot, sweet tea into her hand.
Her husband has swung into responsible teacher mode, managing the situation, checking on others, gathering information.
Lottie should be appreciative. It is an aspect of his personality for which she is usually so grateful.
His reassuring presence, a constant in her life since they met.
But as she watches him now, walking back towards them, she wonders if and when he will ever fall apart.
Panic, crumble or go to pieces. Or is he infallible? Unshakable to his roots.
‘They want to check us over,’ he says. ‘In the ambulance. Just for any signs of smoke inhalation, injury, cuts and burns, that sort of thing. See if we need to go to hospital.’
‘I’m fine. We’re fine,’ she answers.
‘I know but it’s just a formality, Lottie. And what about Josh? His little lungs …’ He trails off.
‘I just need a hot shower and some sleep. Tim, where are we going to stay? What’ll we do now? Josh needs his bed, clean clothes. What about all our stuff in the apartment?’
‘Probably contaminated,’ he confirms. ‘We might have to forget about it for now. Perhaps entirely. And anyway, the fire crew said the whole place will have to be properly risk-assessed before the building can be entered again, let alone cleaned and refurbished. Same for the folks on the other side. All three buildings might be condemned, who knows?’
‘But our apartment is fine. The fire didn’t get chance to spread next door.’
‘I know but there will have to be an investigation, for insurance purposes. And the police say they’d like to speak to us.’
‘What?’
She spins around to look him directly in the eyes.
‘Again, just protocol. See if we noticed anything suspicious, heard anything.’
‘Right,’ she says, her voice distant, her head nodding.
‘They said they would help us find a room in a local hotel or another Airbnb for a few days while we get sorted.’
Lottie gives a low moan.
‘I just want to go home, Tim. To get away from it all. I can’t stand it anymore.’
‘I know, I know,’ he says moving to put his arm around her.
She can still feel the odd tremor in his body, the residue of fear or adrenaline still moving around his limbs.
He isn’t as cool, calm and collected as he would appear and it is a relief somehow.
To know this quiet oak of a man can be felled, though he remains strong and faithful for now.
‘But it’s just for a couple of days while they interview any key witnesses, take statements and collate evidence I guess.
The local press is even here.’ He takes an inward breath at this and lets it out slowly.
‘Okay,’ she says despondently.
‘It sounds like they might suspect arson,’ he adds, turning to look into her face, eyes searching hers with that sad, pleading look she has seen before.
‘Really? Surely not. It must be an accident. I told you that site wasn’t safe,’ she says. But then she remembers the two ambulances that have already left. Who was in them? What on earth were they doing at the building site next door?
‘God, do you think it was any of the Woolfs?’ she says, turning her face into Tim’s neck as the tears finally come. It is a delayed reaction, but she is glad of it now; the wetness sluicing out her gritty eyes, washing her dusty cheeks.
Tim shrugs. ‘I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Could have been anyone really.’
She nods again, the tears silently tracking down her face until she covers them with her hands, as though she can barely look this reality in the eye.
‘Come on,’ he says. ‘This is why we need to get seen to. You’ve suffered a shock.
We all have.’ He leans and runs a hand over her and Josh’s hair.
And then he leads them towards the ambulance where a woman in a dark green uniform is talking into a radio.
Next to her are a couple of police officers, their high-vis jackets startling against their dark uniforms. Dawn finally breaks and the cold light of day creeps over them all.