Was it Bobby? Or Sarah? Or Michelle, Jason, or Terry?
Did they work with my dad and Liam?
Who would do this…
I try to push the thought away by looking around the room. I think I’m in the living room if the derelict staircase is any indication, but I can’t really tell. This could be the kitchen. Or my father's room, or mine.
Fuck. This could even be the bathroom.
Impossible to say since the second story is gone. Everything in my home is here, at my feet, burnt into a pile of ash.
“There, splinters are out,” Roman says, giving my wounds a kiss before dropping my hand in my lap. He takes in our surroundings, a low whistle ringing from his lips as he brings a fallen pipe up to our eyes.
I wobble on my feet as I stand from the floor, carefully walking over the rubble as I make my way to where our fireplace still stands. It’s crumbling, covered in soot and ash, but it’s still here, and so are all its tools.
Except one.
“The fire iron.”
“What?” Roman asks from the other side of the room, hands running up and down the bits of wall standing upright.
“The fire iron. It’s gone.”
“It’s probably here somewhere. Underneath all… this.”
What was destroyed? What was left behind?
Stepping away from the gritty bricks, I travel along the floor and start overturning random pieces of wood, searching for any part of my life still hiding in the rubble.
Roman helps, too, flipping the larger, heavier pieces, so I don’t hurt myself further.
My fingers hook onto something softer than everything else as soon as I move what I believe to be my bedframe out of the way. I recognize it as fabric, smooth cotton underneath a layer of char.
I feel my breath stutter in my chest, eyes bulging out of my head as I give it a firm tug. Whatever it is doesn’t budge, but a tiny piece of it does come away in my hand.
Stumbling away from the area, I hold the cloth up to the light. Tears get caught in my throat as I run my finger over the silky material of one of my old nightgowns.
I don’t need more than an inch of this fabric to know which one I’m holding.
It was my father’s favorite. A velvet, midnight blue teddy with lace trim that ran along the hem. It was torn to shit because my father was an impatient man who dug his fingers into the delicate pattern whenever he ripped it off me. But it was his favorite. He was gentler with me when I had it on… never made it hurt too much.
Those were the moments I could almost believe he loved me.
It was sick and twisted, but I felt loved.
“Amira… come here...”
The urgency in Roman’s voice stirs me out of my trance, making me drop the bit of fabric as I shuffle over the broken pieces to get to him.
I see him crouched down, kneeling beside the dilapidated stairs over a pile of wreckage. In his hands is something I can’t make out, but the devastated look on his face is one that has me dropping to my knees before him.
“What’s wrong?”
Solemnly, Roman hands over the item in his hands, placing it tenderly down in front of my knees. “I found some things.”
Drawing in a shaky breath, I look downward at my lap and turn to stone. Tears cascade down my face, drowning me in sorrow as I glare at my singed backpack. Clasping my hands over my mouth, I release a choked sob, muscles trembling while I work up the courage to reach out for it.
“Where did you find this?” I ask quietly, my fingers trembling over the burnt straps as I reach for them.
