The Man Who Ran Into the Fire

1.

I met Freddy Hollings on the day he died and I didn't learn his name till the ten o'clock news. I met him in a crowd from the corner cafe and the delicatessen down the block while we were standing in the middle of the street and watching as flames and smoke seeped through the windows, climbing up to the dirty tar roof, of a red brick and plaster apartment building on the other side of the square.

It was a building from the thirties or forties with an overhang and stoop, cement steps leading up to the front door. It stood out, the relic of an era already buried but never put to rest, surrounded by new trendy shops like the cafe and the bookstore, and a few other holdovers that were coming back into fashion like the delicatessen and grocer's, but there was an ever present threat of one of them selling out to Starbucks. The old apartment building had been declared historical, otherwise it would have already been knocked down for the type of condo developments that always seem to start springing up when a fresh crop of young professionals and trend setters pick a new 'quaint, little town' to make their own. We watched it burn and the black smoke stream into the sky.

There was a man, a white guy with flaccid skin and a thin mustache, long brown hair that almost down to his ass. He kept trying to run to the building, but the crowd held him back. They were trying to save his life and he was letting them. If he had been determined he could have busted through, but he only put up enough of a fight to make it a good show. To make him feel better, like he'd actually tried.

I was in the back of the crowd watching with everybody else. My eyes moving between the fire and the man-I felt sorrier for his wife crying behind him--collapsed on the street while her husband kept playing at running into the flames--but if I pretended it wasn't just a sham I couldn't tell which of them was more moving. I wanted to shout at the people holding him back to let him go so we could see what he'd do, but I didn't. My father wouldn't have let anybody stop him if it was me. He wouldn't have let anybody stop him even if it wasn't, but then he was a good man and had to be a hero. It's why he died.

I heard a voice behind me, "Jesus Christ. What the hell's happening?" It wasn't a local accent, it didn't have any of that southern twang. It sounded like someone from Chalmet or Boston, certain parts of New York.

I turned and there was a young man with dirty blond hair and a chubby face right behind me. He had thick, wide shoulders but wasn't tall, only about my height, 5'7" or slightly shorter. He was thicker than me though, not really muscled but stout, healthy looking, like someone who liked to eat but moved around a lot, or went running in the evening, trying to get rid of that nervous energy that never seemed to go away. He was wearing a gray NYU pullover; there was a confused look on his face, and a little horror.

"There's a fire up there on the third floor," I told him. I glanced over at the pale guy with brown hair still making a show out of being held back. "Most everybody got out, but his little girl's still in there."

It's odd trying to recall how his face changed when I looked back, but it was different. The confusion had disappeared, his eyebrows had sunk in like he was trying to make some kind of life decision. "Where's the fire department?"

"The operator said they were on their way," I said. "But there was a four alarm over on St. James, and they were already over there. They have to come all the way across town, and we've got busy streets these days."

He didn't say anything else, his jaw jumped like he wanted to, but then it clenched. His face his face went wooden for a second, and then he turned away from me and started pushing his way through the crowd. He didn't look that strong; stout, thick, but soft--a stuffed animal you could throw your arms around. He threw people out of his way like a bear swatting cubs.

2.

I followed in the path he cut through them. I didn't have any reason, I just wanted to see what he'd do, or maybe I knew from the moment I saw his face set. Maybe I knew he'd do what we all wished we could, but only a man like him would try. I don't know.

He pushed and shoved his way to the father who was getting ready to throw himself forward again. The people who were catching him looked like they were getting tired of holding him and were ready to let him go like I had wanted. Freddy grabbed him by the shoulders before he threw himself forward again and twisted him around.

"What floor is she on?" Freddy yelled in the father's face, but he was too far gone.

He didn't even hear Freddy trying to twist out of his hands and throw himself forward again, crying, "My daughter! My daughter!" Freddy's hands held him steady though. Freddy pushed him back, and then and backhanded him across the face, harder than he probably meant to. Blood leaked out of his nose, as his eyes teared up and he swayed, ready to fall but held steady by Freddy's other hand balled up in his shirt. "What floor is she on?" Freddy said one more time. The father looked into Freddy's face, confused and hurt like a dog that doesn't know why it's being beat.

Freddy shook him roughly. "The fourth," he said, and his face cracked. He started to cry and Freddy let him go. "The fourth," he croaked again and collapsed. His wife crawled over and knelt beside him. They hugged each other and cried together while the building burned. Freddy's shoulders slumped watching them, then he turned to stare at the building where the flames where the flames were already jetting out of the third floor windows and playing along the roof.

"Fuck," he said almost breathless.

3.

It was a deathtrap. The father knew that, that's why he had only been pretending. He knew, like I did, that one day there might be other children, but, if he went in there, there wouldn't be any other days. If he went in he'd never come out and neither would his daughter. Was he supposed to go and die? Was he supposed to throw his life away as a gesture, throw it away for nothing? I don't know if I could have. I'd want to, but I don't know if I could have; my father would have done something though. He would have tried, even if he knew it was hopeless. Some people always try, it's what ends up getting them killed, and it's what makes them heroes, taking that futile stand.

Freddy stared at the two of them clinging together for a few more seconds then turned back. "Fuck," he said again, and then he was gone before anyone could stop him, running forward. He reached the steps and bolted up them, through the front door, and into the fire.

One of the men beside me, a black guy in jeans and a sweater vest with well cared for dreds and a goatee who might have lived there, or worked in the cafe or bookstore, asked, "What the fuck is that cracker thinking?"

I knew. "He's thinking he's gonna save the girl. That's all." I said it in almost a whisper but heads around me nodded as if they had all heard, had all understood. I couldn't believe it anymore than Mr. Dreads, I couldn't understand. It's what separated men like him, men like my father, from a man like me--most of the time it was nothing, but in an instance like this it was an invisible, and an uncrossable, gulf.

All of us wished we could save that little girl, but we weren't ready to die for her. We weren't ready to run into the fire. I don't know any other way to explain it. No one tried running in after him. In my mind, and probably all the others', he was already dead with a nice little headstone and epitaph: He Died Doing the Right Thing. That's not what my father's headstone read, my mother wouldn't hear of it, but it would have fit. There was a small part of me, something primal, that didn't give up on him, that kept hoping to see him run out with the little girl in his arms. It was only a corner of my mind though, the rest of me had already accepted, the way you accept a loss when all your holding is a face card but you're to proud to just fold.

4.

The fourth floor. Three flights of burning stairways. The fire was already on the roof; the fourth had to be a furnace, flames eating at the walls, black smoke a noxious fog in the hallway. I wanted to be wrong this time more than any other. I wanted him to come out of there alive. I wanted him to save the girl in the end, but I didn't have any hope, not really.

I had taken a few steps closer to the fire without noticing, but it was getting so hot everybody had to move a few feet further back. I watched two men grab the father and start pulling him back. He didn't fight, but he wasn't helping any. A bald man with a thick white mustache and pot belly hidden behind one of the delicatessen's stained butchers aprons knelt beside the mother. He scooped her up into his heavy arms and hugged her to his chest like she was a child.

She had her hands looped around his neck and her head against his shoulder. I could hear her crying over the snap-crackle of the fire and the murmur of the crowd. The butcher held her like she was a baby and let her cry while he made soft shushing sounds to her and whispered, "Everything's gonna be alright. Everything's gonna be just fine now." His words just made her cry harder. You could see her shuddering in his arms.

He held her and kept saying softly, "Everything's gonna be alright. Shh, girl. Everything's gonna be just fine. You'll see." We knew it was a lie, but we wanted it to be true. We wanted the sun to rise the next morning and no one be hurt, or dead, or alone. But when it came, the dead would still be dead, the hurt would still be there, and so would the emptiness. All this would be a black wound that would never heal right, just scar over and leave us limping.

But we'd live, with this scar like all the others. And if they hurt when it rained, or when we walked through the park and saw a father playing frisbee with his son, or a young mother blond hair and a smiling face pushing a baby carriage down the street, that wouldn't be so bad. It'd get to be familiar. Something we'd get used to. Something we'd miss, and feel guilty about, if we ever noticed it had just disappeared one day, out of the blue, years from now. And we'd wonder why there was this sudden sense of loss and longing.

5.

I heard one of the guys who had dragged the father back, blue eyed Latter-Day Saints missionary, complete with bible thumping action, say, "Sweet Jesus." I stared at him for a second before turning to look. Freddy was coming out of the front door and down the concrete steps. He had a bundle in his arms.

"Jesus H., it's him. It's him and he got the girl." The crowd started breaking out in whoops and spontaneous cheers. People were clapping. The mother stopped crying and looked up. The butcher let her down gently and she broke into a run almost before her feet hit the ground.

About five of us ran forward beside her. The butcher was there, almost next to me. Freddy was down the steps and trotting to meet us. He had a broad, friendly grin on that tried to include everybody in the celebration. His bundle was wrapped in one of those cheap indian horse blankets you could get in a gas station gift mart. Thin pale arms and a few strands of black hair poked out of the blanket and were wrapped around his neck.

We met halfway between the crowd and the fire, the heat coating our faces with sweat that evaporated right away and made our skin look like wax. Freddy was covered in soot and his gray pullover was singed. He was breathing hard and wheezing. He put the girl down and let the blanket fall off her. She was a beautiful girl, maybe six; she must have been playing ballerina before the fire because she was wearing a ruined tutu stained black by the smoke.

She started to cry the minute he let go of her and grabbed his left leg and held on. Freddy reached into his pocket and pulled out an asthma inhaler, Primatine Mist. He took a puff and smiled at us, but he was still having trouble. The mother crouched down by his leg and was trying to pull the little girl off him. He looked like he had walked through hell untouched. He took another two puffs off the inhaler, his breathing started sounding better.

He was grinning like it was all a joke. One of the men who had run up shook his hand and another one slapped on the back like they were old buddies, saying, "That was amazing. I never thought you'd get out alive." Freddy laughed. He was going to say something, but the mother spoke before he could.

"This isn't my little girl."

She was still kneeling beside Freddy, holding the girl's chin in one hand and staring into her face. She looked up at Freddy. The little girl wouldn't stop crying. "This isn't my little girl," she said, louder this time. Her voice was accusing, but her face was just empty, worn-out. Freddy wasn't grinning anymore.

He backed away from her a step and was shaking his head no. "Are you sure?" he asked, hoping for a second it wouldn't be true. The mother started crying and let the girl he'd brought out of the fire go. She whispered almost under her breath, but loud enough for us to hear, "This isn't my little girl." Freddy squeezed his eyes shut and turned his head away; he took a deep breath. The cheers were dying down as the word spread and a hush seemed to gather.

"It isn't my little girl!" she screamed, and Freddy flinched, almost jumped at the sound. The woman fell forward on her knees and hands crying and started pounding against the asphalt with her open palms and then balled fists. The little girl stood off to one side crying. No one moved to pick her up.

Freddy looked back and watched the mother for a few seconds. She cried out again, "This isn't my little girl." He kept watching for a few more seconds, totally silent, then he turned away and stared at the fire. It looked even worse now. He stared at it and started to take a step forward. He took another step. I ran in front of him and put my arms out against his chest and it was like trying to keep a boulder from rolling down hill. He started pushing me back. The butcher moved up behind him and grabbed him in a Nelson hold.

He fought against us like the father hadn't fought against the people who held him back, like I wouldn't have fought back. He kept trying to slip out of our hands, but we had him. He stopped struggling and stared at me. His eyes had that determined look I had seen right before he cut the path through the crowd and ran into the fire.

"Let me go," he said, and his voice almost compelled me, but I didn't move out of his way and the butcher kept a hold of his arms.

"You can't go back in there," I said. "You'll die. Do you want to die? You did your best, you got one girl out but you're only human, man. No one can ask you to go back into that. You've already done enough."

I wish my father could have followed that advice, that he didn't have to solve every problem, or save every person, that what he could do was enough. Maybe I'd still have him then, maybe everything would have been different. Freddy didn't answer but tried to push forward again, and even got a few steps before we stopped him.

"You got one girl out. That's all anybody can ask. That's all anybody can ask," I yelled in his face, but he kept trying to shake us loose.
"That's not all I can ask," he said. "That's not all I can ask. Now, let me go. Or go yourself." He had that determined look that told me I'd never be able to keep him from walking back in there, so I stepped back and let my hands fall. I stared at him for a second. My father would have made that same choice, maybe used those same words. He would have tried, even if he knew it was the last thing he would ever do. There was something special about him that wouldn't let him step aside, not even for his six year old son. Freddy had that too. You can't stand in the way of someone with that kind of conviction, and what's more, you just don't have any right to.

"Let him go," I told the butcher.

"What?"

"I said, let him go." My voice sounded defeated. I don't know what the butcher saw in my face that made him do it, but he let Freddy go and backed up a pace. Freddy gave me a slight nod, but I had to look away. I wouldn't be going. Nothing could have made me go. Maybe not even a kid of my own up on the forth floor.

Freddy started forward again; slow at first, then a trot, and finally a dash up the steps and through the burning doorway. The little girl tried to run after him and grab his leg, crying out no, but I caught her in my arms and held her against my chest making sure she couldn't watch as I did, hoping any minute he would run back out, hoping any minute he would see reason, but knowing he wouldn't. I closed my eyes and let the heat bake my face, and dry what might have been tears I didn't want anyone to see, before I turned back and carried the girl away.

6.

The other men had already pulled the mother back into the crowd and she stood there watching as I walked up. "He's gonna save her," she said. "He gonna save her," she repeated, louder. She was looking at me and I could tell she wanted hope, but I couldn't give her any. I just walked past her. I couldn't look her in the face. I don't know whether it was because I was ashamed or disgusted.

"Does anybody know where this little girl's mother is? Does anybody know where this little girl's mother is?" I carried the little girl into the crowd, over a hundred people now; it felt like a thousand in the press of bodies. Nobody knew. I kept walking through the crowd calling out and people moved to get out of my way. I was at the very end when I saw a woman in a waitress uniform running down the street.

She had black hair like the girl's. She was small and lithe like a dancer, like a ballerina. She saw me with the girl in my arms from the end of the street and stopped in her tracks. Her hands jumped to her mouth and then she let them drop and broke out in a run toward us.

When she got closer I held out the little girl and she took her from me. "Chrissy," she cried. "Oh my God. Chrissy, you're alright." She clutched the girl to her chest like if she pressed hard enough they'd never come apart.

She was crying, and Chrissy was crying again too. I could hear the sirens for the first time now, but they'd be too late. I knew they'd be too late to save anybody. The waitress was looking at me, her eyes red, her face blotchy and beautiful. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you."

I smiled at her, but it felt weak. I wanted to say 'I'm not the one you should thank,' but I didn't say anything. I couldn't with the way her eyes were on me. I managed a nod and took a step back into the crowd. She looked down at the girl again and once her eye were off me I walked away, trying to find some anonymity in the crowd, but everybody wanted to shake my hand, or squeeze my shoulder, give me a slap on the back. I pushed through them trying to get away. I wanted to scream, 'I'm no, goddamn, hero. I would have let her burn just like any of you.' But I didn't say that. They wouldn't have believed it, they didn't want to.

The explosion saved me.

7.

The fire must have reached the boiler or some gas pipes because the first floor windows exploded out, showering the street with glass, a six foot jet of fire shot out the door. You could see the flames through the windows and front door. The air seemed to be on fire; everything was an angry orange and red. No one was coming out that door again. The mother of the little girl Freddy was trying to save started screaming. She had been quiet the whole time since Freddy went back in, but now she wailed.

She collapsed. Her husband tried to go to her, but she pushed him away. He took a few steps back and stared at her, then he turned around and walked away. The crowd let him through. As the butcher knelt beside her and folded a hand over her shoulder, she stopped for a second leaned forward to catch her breath. She turned and wrapped her arms around him and started crying into his chest. He held her and let her cry as the crowd seemed to take a step back and give them room to breathe.

I heard one of the windows break, and turned to see the back of a wooden chair hit the ground. Freddy had thrown it out. I could see movement through the smoke inside one of the second story windows. The sirens sounded like they were only a couple of blocks away.

I was moving before I made any decision to move, running toward the building. As I got closer I could feel myself start to sweat and the heat evaporate it as fast as it formed. My skin felt like it was stretching, or melting, in the heat as I got closer, making little tears in the fabric.

I kept going till I could almost reach out a hand and touch the hot bricks. Smoke poured out the windows. It wasn't so bad on the ground, but I couldn't even see the ledge of the second floor windows above me. I could hear coughing over the flames. I called out, "Did you get the girl?"

There was no answer besides coughing.

"Did you get the girl?" I shouted again. Each heartbeat seemingly endless until he called back down to me.

"I got her," he said.

"Lower her down and I'll catch her. Then try to lower yourself." It was hard to breathe, and harder to talk; my tongue and throat were both baked. It had to be worse for him.

"I got the girl. I'm gonna lower her," he said.

I waited. I could hear the girl crying now, but I couldn't see her in the smoke. After a second I could see tiny yellow tennis shoes kicking in the air above me. I was off by three feet. I moved. "Alright. Drop her down."

"Do you got her?" he asked and started coughing. The little girl screamed because he couldn't hold her steady coughing.

"I got her. Drop her down, man. Drop her down." He let go. The girl dropped, screaming as she fell. I managed to catch her and hold on. I took a couple of steps back to make room for him and called back up, "Now lower yourself down. We're out of the way."

I listened to him coughing. He choked out, "I don't think I can."

"You're going to lower yourself or I'm coming in to get you. Now get out that goddamn window." I actually felt like I might run in there and lower him myself but he saved me from having to find out whether I had it in me. I was grateful for that, but I think I hated him for it too.

I had pictured him holding on to the ledge and lowering himself down to drop the last six or seven feet, but he fell like he just walked out of the window and landed hard. I heard a crack and his legs buckled. His pullover was burnt through on the left arm, the forearm beneath it was burnt black and I could see bone. There was no way he could have lowered himself on that arm. He must have been holding the girl with just his right. He was struggling hard to breathe, taking the deep breaths a swimmer makes after swallowing water.

He wasn't getting his breath back. He tried to get up, but his legs wouldn't let him. For some reason I felt like if someone told him there was another little girl in there he'd find a way to stand, he'd crawl back in if he had to and pull her out, but he was helpless trying to save himself. I grabbed his right arm with my left and started towing him back one handed, still carrying the girl. Five feet later someone grabbed her from me and I used my free arm to grab a hold and started dragging him back even faster. The butcher helped me drag him the last few feet through the crowd. The sirens were loud now. We stopped.

Freddy's face was pale and his lips were going blue. There was an angry red welt over his right eye. He looked panicked and kept gasping for air like a goldfish on the ground. I dropped next to him and started pumping at his chest. "Don't die.

"Don't you die, you bastard," I screamed at him, begging. I took a deep breath and leaned in to give him mouth to mouth. I pulled back and kept pumping. I wanted to help him, I wanted to save him, because heroes shouldn't have to die. Heroes shouldn't have to die.

I could feel a crowd gathering around us like mourners around a coffin. The sirens were getting loud. They weren't very far off, but I knew they'd be too late. Freddy was crying breathlessly as he stared at me, leaking tears out of the side of his eyes as he tried to drag in another breath, but couldn't. I leaned in again and tried to give him one of mine.

I pulled away and kept pumping, but I knew it wasn't helping. I leaned in again. When I pulled away he didn't look panicked anymore. His face was calm. He blinked and looked at me. He wasn't crying. He smiled and raised his hand like he was going to pat me on the cheek, but his hand never reached. His last breath was one of mine. His eyes stared at me as I kept pumping and leaned in to try and give him another. I was crying so hard I could barely see, pumping until the paramedics pulled me away. I couldn't stand so I had to watch them put him on a gurney and wheel him to an ambulance. Somebody wrapped me in a blanket and they let me cry.

Another group of paramedics came and got me. They gave me a breathing treatment out the back of their ambulance. Someone put a cup of coffee in my hand. Reporters were there snapping pictures of us and the fire. Everyone wanted to shake my hand, but nobody was taking a picture of Freddy beneath that white sheet, or offering to shake his hand.

He had run into that burning building, twice, to save a little girl and no one would remember in a month; only me and two little girls, the mothers, maybe the butcher, and the family he left behind. For a few minutes it seemed like he was more than human, from the time he heard there was a little girl inside to the time he got her out, but he wasn't. He was only human like everybody else, like my father, like me. He just wouldn't let that stop him.

I met Freddy Rollings on the day he died, and I didn't even know his name until I saw it on the ten o'clock news, but he was my hero. And I only wonder if, when it's my turn, I'll walk through that fire just as bravely, that I won't make someone else be the hero and show me the way. Once, I wouldn't have even had the hope, because I was only human, like that was some excuse.