The therapist had told me the dreams would go away as time passed, but it had been a year since my dad disappeared, and they were still pretty constant. The therapist now claims it’s because of the uncertainty. If I knew what happened, if there were any answers …
But there aren’t. So my mind fills in the blanks with every horrible thing I’ve ever heard, read about, or seen. And since I’ve had the amazing opportunity to work as a photojournalist, I’ve seen all kinds of things.
In other words, my brain has a lot of great nightmare fodder.
I chastised myself over this last one, though. It was ridiculous. If I knew anything, I knew my father didn’t die in a hotel fire. He hadn’t been staying at a hotel; he’d been at a GloboReach outpost. So why would I dream about that?
My eyes drifted to the television, and it all made sense. There was a fire on the screen. I must have heard it in my sleep and incorporated it into my dream. I made a mental note not to watch the news when I fell asleep. The last thing I needed was help with my nightmares.
I winced, watching the fire. It was huge, devouring a large, beautiful apartment building that had to have been around since the 1800s. It made me sad to think something could have the fortitude to last over two hundred years, only to be destroyed in no time at all.
I turned the volume up, wanting to know more about the building and the people who were inside. My French was only okay, but it sounded like the fire had broken out somewhere on the upper floors of a building that was much coveted for its views of the Eiffel Tower.
My blood ran cold.
I had heard something about views of the Eiffel Tower tonight.
No … I was jumping to conclusions … there was no way …
I heard Rayna’s voice in my head. Je vais aller chez Pierre! He has a penthouse with a view of the Eiffel Tower. C’est très bon, non?
Still, there were a lot of apartments in Paris with views of the Eiffel Tower. The chances that this building was the same one …
I grabbed my phone and scrolled to where Rayna had written Pierre’s address, then glared at the TV anchors.
“Come on, come on,” I urged them. “Tell me where it is! What’s the address?”
“Le feu est a vingt-quatre rue des Soeurs,” the female anchor finally said.
The world stopped.
The addresses were the same.
“No!” I cried out. “Please, no. No, no, no …”
I pounded out Rayna’s number and waited forever for the phone to ring. “Pick up, Rayna, please pick up.”
Nothing. No answer.
“Shit!” I hung up, yanked on my clothes, and raced out of the room, doubling back for only a second to grab my camera. It was sheer instinct. Whatever panic I was feeling about Rayna, the fire was a news story, and I take pictures of news stories.
“J’ai besoin d’un taxi maintenant!” I snapped to the doorman as I ran outside, then followed it up with a perfunctory, “S’il vous plaît.” But the doorman had heard the desperation in my voice and had already darted into the street to flag one down.
This was taking far too long. Could I run the two miles faster? No, better to wait, but standing there was making me insane. I had to do something. I checked my watch: nine a.m. Three a.m. in New London, Connecticut. It didn’t matter. I called his number.
He answered on the third ring, sounding completely awake and alert, though I knew he had been asleep for hours.
“Clea? Are you okay?”
Thank God for caller ID. Ben knew I wouldn’t call in the middle of the night unless it was absolutely vital.
“Ben! Ben, it’s about Rayna. There’s a fire—a huge fire!”
My voice broke, and I started to sob. I couldn’t keep it together, not if something happened to Rayna. I couldn’t.
“Take a deep breath and tell me. Tell me everything.” Ben’s voice was calm and steady now. I loved that about him; the more difficult and emotional a situation, the more he’d step back and handle it logically and methodically. His voice had been my security blanket a lot this past year.
“I don’t know,” I said. The doorman had finally found a cab and I raced inside, shouting Pierre’s address to the driver. “Vite, s’il vous plaît—vite!” I curled into the backseat of the car, hugging myself as I told Ben what I’d seen.
“Okay.” Ben’s voice soothed me from nearly four thousand miles away. “Don’t panic. You don’t know anything yet. You’re going there now, right?”
“As fast as I can,” I said, reaching into my purse and pulling out a handful of euros, which I held out to the driver. “Plus vite, s’il vous plaît,” I urged.
“Great,” Ben said. “Just talk to me until you get there.”
I have no idea what I would do without Ben. My circle of trusted friends comes to exactly two: Ben and Rayna. Not even enough to make a circle—a line segment of trusted friends.
I spoke to Ben every second of the ten-minute ride. I had to. The sound of my own voice reaching out to him was the only thing that kept my entire body from flying apart and scattering into molecules of panic.
“Arrêtez! Arrêtez!!!” I shouted to the cab driver. Not that it was necessary; road blockades prevented us from going any farther. “I’m here!” I told Ben. “I’m getting out; I’ll call you back the minute I know anything.”
“I’ll wait,” Ben said, and I knew he would.
I shoved another handful of euros at the taxi driver, then ran out and immediately shut my eyes against the acrid air. I yanked my turtleneck collar over my nose and mouth to filter the smoke and ash as I ran the last block to the blazing building, pushing through gawkers at every step. Fire trucks were on the scene, but the water from their hoses seemed like an insignificant trickle, a child’s water pistol in the face of an inferno.
“RAYNA!” I screamed up to the wall of flames. “RAYNA!!!!”
“Clea!”
I spun around wildly, needing to see her face like I needed air, needing to make sure she was okay, that she wasn’t calling to me from a stretcher, gasping out her last-“Clea … Clea, it’s okay. I’m okay … I’m right here.”
There she was, bundled into sweats and a long wool coat five sizes too large for her, her curls hidden by a massive gray hat with earflaps—a look that could have been pulled off effectively only by someone in 1930s Siberia … or a supremely angular male model.
“Oh my God, Rayna!” I cried, pulling her into my arms and squeezing too hard. I couldn’t help it. I needed proof that she was really there.
“I’m fine. Pierre and I went out for coffee. We weren’t even here when the fire started.” She pulled back just enough to press her forehead into mine and look into my eyes. “I told you you’ll never lose me, remember?”
“Don’t,” I warned, but the panic had already drained enough that I could smile. I hugged her again, and even when we pulled away we kept our arms wrapped around each other.
“Have you ever seen anything like it?” she asked solemnly, and I followed her gaze to the apartment building, its entire midsection now engulfed in leaping flames.
I had seen things like it, but that didn’t lessen the impact. Fire is magnetic—an almost illicit combination of destructive force and awe-inspiring beauty. With an effort, I turned away from the dancing slashes of flame to the scene on the street. I saw the grim determination of the firefighters, their faces betraying no emotion. I saw the onlookers, split between the curious and the personally affected—the former gaping upward in a state of exalted wonder, the latter huddled together in frightened groups, or chain-smoking and pacing like Pierre. I saw the dissonance of rainbows as the sun glinted off the water from the fire hoses.
“Itchy trigger finger?” Rayna asked, smiling. I followed her gaze to my right hand, which had already removed my camera from its bag. “You should,” she said. “I’m going to check on Pierre. And if you give me your phone, I’ll call Ben back and let him know everything’s okay. Assuming you called him,” she added with a grin.
Rayna knew me far too well. I gave her one last squeeze, then handed her the phone and disappeared behind my camera, blending seamlessly into the scene. It was where I belonged. It felt right.