False Memory

Martie was being carried through a raging fire, and the strong arms cradling her were those of her father, Smilin’ Bob Woodhouse. He was dressed in working gear: helmet with unit and badge numbers on the front-piece, turnout coat with reflective safety stripes, fireproof gloves. His fire-boots crunched through smoldering rubble as he bore her purposefully toward safety.

“But, Daddy, you’re dead,“Martie said, and Smilin’ Bob said, “Well, I’m dead and I’m not, Miss M., but since when does being dead mean I wouldn’t be there for you?”

Flames encircled them, sometimes lambent and transparent, other times seeming to be as solid as stone, as though this were not merely a place being destroyed by fire, but a place constructed of fire, the Parthenon of the fire god himself massive columns and lintels and archways of fire, mosaic floors of intricate flame patterns, vaulted ceilings of fire, room after room of eternal conflagrations, through which they passed in search of an exit that seemed not to exist.

Yet Martie felt safe in the cradle other father’s arms, holding on to him, with her left arm around his shoulders, certain he would carry her out of this place sooner or later — until, glancing behind them, she saw their pursuer. The Leaf Man followed, and though the very substance of him was ablaze, he wasn’t diminished by the flames that fed on him. If anything, he appeared to grow both larger and stronger, because the fire wasn’t his enemy; it was the source of his strength. As he drew closer to them, shedding sparkling leaves and veils of ashes, he reached out with both hands for Smilin ‘Bob and for the firefighter’s daughter, clawing the hot air before her face. She began to shake and to sob with terror even in her father’s arms, sobbing, sobbing. Closer, closer, the dark eyeholes and the hungry black maw, ragged-leaf lips and teeth of fire, closer, closer, and now she could hear the Leaf Man's autumn voice, as cold and prickly as a field of thistles under a full October moon: “I want to taste. I want to taste your tears —”

She was out of sleep in an instant and up from the bed, awake and alert, yet her face was as hot as if she were still surrounded by fire, and she could smell the faint scent of smoke.

They had left a light on in the bath and left the door ajar, so the claustrophobic hotel room would not be blind-dark. Martie could see well enough to know that the air was clear; there was no haze of smoke.

The faint but pungent smell was still with her, however, and she began to fear that the hotel was on fire, the scent — if not the smoke itself — seeping under the door from the hallway.

Dusty was asleep, and she was about to wake him, when she became aware of the man standing in the gloom. He was at the farthest remove from the pale wedge of bathroom light.

Martie couldn’t see his face clearly, but there was no mistaking the shape of his fire helmet. Or the luminous safety stripes on his turnout coat.