Christopher Smith - Bullied

I can’t interfere with everything. If I do, I could create a false world in which nothing is real, a person’s accomplishments mean nothing and all I’m living is an illusion manufactured by my imagination.

It was late when I was awakened by something that sounded like a pop.

My bedroom window was open. I opened my eyes and listened but couldn’t hear anything out of the ordinary. Was I dreaming? Maybe. The pop sounded like one of the guns in ‘Killzone 3.’ It was weird. I also could smell gasoline, but that wasn’t unusual because my father’s junker of a truck was parked outside my window.

I turned onto my side, closed my eyes and started to drift off, but this time I heard a whoosh and the sound of footsteps hurrying away from the house.

This was no dream.

I sat up in bed and pressed my face against the window screen. I tapped into the amulet and allowed my mind to see through the dark.

I could see shapes backing away from the house and moving toward the road. I focused harder and the shapes revealed themselves to be Jake Tyler, Mike Hastings, Ginny Gibson and at least a dozen others, many from the very football team my father wanted me to join.

All were turning now to take a right onto the street. They started running. Meanwhile, outside, at the far end of the trailer where my parents' bedroom was located, there was a sudden burst of orange light.

It was fire. They'd set the trailer on fire.

I got out of bed quickly.

Too quickly.

I tripped on the sheet wrapped around my leg and smashed my head against the side table, which went down with me.

Dazed, I pushed myself up. I could smell smoke. I could feel heat. I went to my door and opened it to a sudden rush of flames that blew into the room and ate the oxygen within it.

Most of the trailer was on fire. They’d just set it, but because the trailer was so old-or because they’d poured so much gas around it-it was going up fast.

Outside, I could hear neighbors rushing toward us. I looked through the door into the living space and saw an inferno. I shouted for my parents but heard nothing.

I could stop this. I pressed my hand against the amulet and was about to imagine the fire ceasing when the gas main feeding the stove ignited and blew.

The explosion sent me back and I tripped over my shoes. A rolling ball of flame entered my bedroom and curled at the ceiling just long enough to set it on fire. It looked demonic.

Outside, people were screaming. I heard people shouting to call 911. Bits of flame were falling down on me. The trailer was starting to yawn in a great twisting of metal warping in the heat.

And then I heard my father shouting. I got up and ran to the doorway. What I saw stopped me.

My father was trying to throw a bucket of water into the living room.

But when he did, the fire reached out, tasted his clothing and turned him into a twisting funnel of flames.