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‘It’s not safe,’ she said.
I started to cry, couldn’t help it. That bastard. Who leaves a dog to die?
‘Looks like the oven had been left on with the door open,’ a fireman told my mother while the others were inside, making our apartment safe again. ‘The heat must have melted the knobs and temperature dials. Set fire to a tea towel. Frankly, you ladies were lucky. It could have been a lot worse.’
My mother shook her head, confused.
‘But I didn’t use the oven tonight.’
‘Just be careful,’ the fireman replied. ‘There’s nothing wrong with leaving an oven on so long as the door’s shut. Even a crack can cause a fire.’
My mother just nodded, still puzzling out how it could have been left on when we’d only had salad for dinner.
I turned to her.
‘What happened to Matty?’
‘Who’s Matty?’ the fireman asked.
‘My boyfriend.’
‘He’s up there?’
She shook her head.
‘Said he was going to run home for a sweater. But. . .’
‘He didn’t come back?’
‘Got tired I guess.’
The conversation moved on.
‘You said you couldn’t get the windows open?’
‘I must have locked them. I don’t remember.’
I asked why she hadn’t just used the key, a question only now occurring to me. Like the door, she always kept it in the lock.
She rubbed the base of her neck, brows drawn together.
‘It wasn’t there. . .’
‘Did you look behind the radiator? Maybe it fell.’
Outdoors and out of danger, my brain was finally working again.
‘I couldn’t find it. I suppose I was panicking.’
She addressed the fireman rather than me. A child explaining itself to a teacher.
‘It’s understandable,’ he said. ‘Under the circumstances.’
The next day I heard her on the phone to Matty, his voice echoing out of speaker phone while she scrubbed at the soot-stained walls. It’s going to take weeks to get this place back to normal.
‘They said we could have died if she hadn’t woken up.’
‘They’re right. If the fire hadn’t got you, the smoke inhalation would have. Really Ams, leaving the oven on? I have to say, I’m a bit surprised at that.’
