Happiness Lost

Happiness can be taken at a moments notice

Contest Entry for "Invalid Item" 

Emily left the laundromat at about ten-thirty that night, once everyone else had left and all of her wash was finished. She liked to come to this laundromat, even though it was quite a distance away from her apartment. The manager was a long time family friend of her parents, she liked Bill. He was retired and opened this laundromat several years ago and had done very well with it. She packed up her clean clothes in her hamper and hauled it out to her car. The small Honda Civic's back seat accommodated her weeks worth of laundry perfectly, keeping it secure with the back rest of the passenger seat that had been pushed back all the way. She closed the back door and walked around to the drivers side and inserted the key and turned.

In the distance, a loud, rumbling sound could be heard, breaking the normal hum of traffic on the nearby freeway. Emily turned to face the direction of the sound but saw nothing out of the ordinary. She looked to sky to see if it was cloudy as the sound was like the low, resonating sound of thunder, but the sky was clear and the stars were out and shining brightly.

She started her car and drove out of the parking lot, heading east towards her apartment. As she turned onto Seventh Street she saw emergency vehicles scrambling to get through the moderate traffic that existed even at this late hour. She started thinking about her little boy, Jimmy, who was at home with the babysitter as he was sleeping. She was fortunate that her neighbor was always willing to watch Jimmy at odd hours. Emily loved being his Mom. He was always polite and kind. He had this little birthmark that he shared with his Father on his lower back in the shape of a duck. When he was a baby she used to call him Ducky, though he didn't like that nickname now, which she respected. She always thought of him when she saw an Ambulance or Fire Engine, concerned but hopeful that he was okay. He was always safe.

She drew closer to her home and realized that the emergency vehicles were turning on her street. She wondered what was happening. Maybe her older neighbor who lived across the street had to go to the hospital again. She dropped that thought quickly though as there were more than ten of the various emergency vehicles on her street as she turned onto Mays Drive and slowed down. There was an oddness to the scene and it took her a while to grasp the situation. The dull orange glow in the distance, beyond the fire trucks, snapped her to reality. Her heart raced and adrenalin coursed her body when she got a bit closer and was horrified to see her apartment building in a blazing inferno of yellows and oranges.

She stopped her car in the middle of the street and jumped out, racing towards her home. She found herself screaming her sons name over and over, “Jimmy!” She could feel the heat grow in intensity as she arrived to the line of fire engines; firemen running about in practiced fashion. She charged towards the conflagration, pushing anyone out of the way who blocked her path to her son. “Jimmy!”

Arms found her waist and held her strong; she struggled and fought to be released, to no avail. She screamed for her son, wanting an answer but hearing nothing over the roar of the pyre that was once her home. Steam and smoke filled the air and she was being pulled back, out of harms way. She heard the crackling of a radio and she saw a large axe in one of her assailants hands and the familiar dull yellow of the canvas-like fireman's jacket.

“You have to get back ma'am. It's going to collapse any second,” the reassuringly deep voice said from behind her.

“My son Jimmy! He's inside! I have to get him!” She continued to fight with renewed vigor but was thwarted with each attempt. The fireman pulled her behind the line of vehicles that made up the perimeter of the scene and transferred her to a waiting police officer who held her tight, trying to comfort her.

Suddenly, and without warning, there was powerful explosion towards the back of the complex. The glow of the fire became a blinding white flash for a brief moment then faded back. Another low rumbling was heard and Emily saw firemen running away from the building. The apartment building collapsed into a growing spire of embers and sparks, the heat becoming almost unbearable as the fire was given new fuel.

Emily's body went limp with the realization that she had just lost her only reason for living. Her happiness. After her husband Jim died, she was left to raise Jimmy alone. She did the best she could, sacrificing many things in life to see that her son, her husbands pride and joy, lived as well as possible. It was, of course, all worth it. He had become quite the young man of the house, even at eight years old. Cub scouts and Karate has been the best investments in her son's future that she could have ever done and the rewards of it were manifesting in Jimmy on a daily basis. She was so proud of him and the man that he was sure to become. But he wouldn't. He wouldn't become anything now.

She sobbed and shook; her eyes closed tight as if trying to force reality away and find the time before she left so she could make different decisions. She saw herself, in her mind's eye, looking from above at her weeping, shaking, sorrowful form. She surveyed the area from above and and she thought of Jimmy... and Jim. She wished she could be with them, wherever they were.

Blackness overtook her as she passed out from the horror of the evening. Her happiness had been lost, taken from her by fate, again.

Word Count: 1020