Short Stories of Richard C. Hayner

The Shanty Fire

A short story by Richard C. Hayner

My dreams were shattered by the loud beeping noise that caused my heart to bounce across my chest. No matter how many times I was brought out of a deep sleep this way, I never accepted it as routine. I raised myself from the warm bed and grabbed my jeans from the table, listening for the beeps to end and the ensuing information as to why I had been roused from such a pleasant night’s sleep.

“This is the Kennedale Fire Department reporting a structure fire on West Mansfield Highway. A fully involved structure fire on West Mansfield Highway. One-seventeen a.m.” The latter part I heard only vaguely as I ran out the door. That was the first I had known what time it was, and as I pulled my shirt on across my face, it was just sinking in that it wasn’t as late as it had felt as I awoke. It was a Friday night, and there might still be drunks on the road.

I hadn’t noticed my hand raking across the bookstand by the door to grab the keys. I just knew they had slid into the ignition and the car was starting. I forced myself to go into awakened driving mode as I backed out of the driveway and spun out on the gravel road, emergency flashers lighting the neighbor’s house. The December night was in a chill and there was no moon to light my way. My heart had settled down, but now it was my mind that was racing.

Being only two blocks away, I was the first to get to the fire hall. I unlocked the door and flipped the lights on. Fred was running up behind me and turned right to start a truck. I headed to my hook and slung my bunker coat over my arms, my stocking feet slipping into my boots. I couldn’t remember putting my socks on.

The gold cross sparkled as I grabbed my hat. I had put crosses on my hat when I was voted in as chaplain of the department. As I stepped onto the back of the truck, it occurred to me that there were others swarming all around. The overhead doors had all opened and we were pulling out. Mary and Buzz jumped on as we took off, and the siren announced itself to the cold night air.

As we turned onto Mansfield Highway, I extracted my gloves from the stiff pockets of my coat and wiggled my fingers into them. The visor was down on my hat, but the air seemed not to notice as it ripped at my tender cheeks. The red, flashing lights were lost into the clear night, only illuminating houses we passed. The engine hummed a constant growl as we slid down the pavement.

I could see the light of the fire ahead, turning trees into glowing witnesses. As we pulled into a long gravel drive that went up a hill to a larger house three hundred yards off the highway, I was amazed to find the huge flames were all about a little two-room shack. It was surrounded by onlookers.

I took the nozzle in one hand and the two loops of the two-and-a-half in the other, jumped off the truck and ran back about ten feet. Then I started toward the burning shack. I could feel the hose come to life as it became charged by the pump on the truck. Fred was no slacker. The fire hadn’t been this big for long. There was too much house left for that, but the front right corner of the house was eaten away by flames. Something had fed the fire in that corner. I knew I had to watch for something unusual in that area. To the right of the building, there was a butane tank. It was relatively small, six feet long. I concentrated my water in a fan across the cavity in the house caused by the fire.

The area to my left was ablaze as well, but I decided to leave that to someone on one of the other trucks that were just pulling into the drive. Jerry, the assistant chief had been in the passenger seat and was now headed for the back of the house to survey it. Jerry owned a gas station in town and spent a lot of time day and night going to fires. I was usually only there from late afternoon through the night and weekends since I worked in Fort Worth. We all had a lot of respect for him. He was always helping people in one capacity or another.

I hadn’t noticed the others disappearing behind the house, but I did begin to notice a lack of firefighters on the front side. Mary came around and asked to take the hose. I knew she could handle it, but had to wonder why she wanted it. She asked me to help in the back.

As I got to the back of the house, I saw legs, rubber boots actually, dangling from the back window. Two firemen stood on either side, hands ready to assist the legs. Then the legs disappeared. As I reached the window, the head that belonged to the legs popped out. “Here he comes,” he choked, and the head sunk back into the house. There was a wall of smoke just inside, swirling but not coming out the window. Then a pair of legs burst through the smoke, a different pair with no shoes. The feet were powder white and not much more than bone. The legs, mere sticks, were clad in loose fitting, cotton pajamas with thin stripes running down them.

I knew then why I was needed and what to do. The three of us caught the legs and pulled a frail, ancient body from the window. To my disappointment, there was no life in the body. We had retrieved a corpse.

We carried him to the front, where there was more light and lowered him gently to the crisp winter grass. Paramedics checked him out immediately, but there was no hope for him. As the others rose to their feet and turned to join the efforts to dowse the fire, I knelt over him, removed my hat and placed it over his heart, crosses shining in the light of the fire and the red, flashing lights. Shouts could just be heard over the roar of the pumps and engines. I muttered a prayer for the old man. He lay below with his mouth gaping, steam rising from within him, the last warmth from a long life.

As I knelt, I felt the presence of a bystander. In the corner of my eye, I could see to my left, small feet in black tennis shoes that were untied. We were far enough from the house that there was no danger from the fire or of getting in the way, but my first thought was to chase the child away, to protect the child from the grim sight before us. Then I had a second thought that the sight had been made and it might be best to speak about it and help the child understand. I turned to behold a boy of about six or seven with eyes as wide as they ever had been staring at the old man. As I looked at the lad, I saw the big house on the hill and thought he must have come from up there. I felt I should talk to him briefly and send him back to the warmth of his house.

I broke his concentration on the body when I spoke, “Did you know him?”

He trembled just this side of tears. “He’s my Paw-Paw,” he cried. Of coarse, I thought. The family lives at the top of the hill and the grandfather was staying in the shack down below. The boy must have been crushed. I figured the parents must be somewhere. Perhaps I could point him in their direction. I had to be sure. As I stood, I asked, “Where do you live, son?”

He just pointed with a blind stare toward the flames and muttered, “There…with my parents and my four sisters…and him!” He looked back down at his grandfather and began to cry. I pulled him to my bunker coat and held him tightly. We stood there for what seemed to be much longer than the moments that passed. Two girls looking to be twelve and fourteen came to us. They took him silently away.

I knew I would see them again. As chaplain, it was my job to provide food, clothing and other needs to fire victims. But I would see him forever as he stood before his grandfather and his home as they both left him.

I had to join the others. There was nothing more I could do here but cover the man with a blanket someone brought me.

When we put the fire out, we went through the house. There was one bedroom, a bath, a cooking area and the living room. The floor was covered in piles of clothes. There was a wood-burning heater made of thin metal in the living room. In the area where the fire had been so intense, we found a heater that had been disconnected from the butane tank outside and hooked up to a four feet tall propane bottle that sat inside the house. The rotten, old house was a death trap.

There were still hoses to be rolled up and the cold ride back.

Later I was to learn that the parents had been out dancing and were still out when the fire started. The oldest girl woke up to find the fire blazing. She had gotten the other kids out, but when she and her sister tried to wake the old man, he didn’t believe them and wouldn’t get out. The smoke finally forced them to leave him.

It was five o’clock when I got home. I didn’t bother turning on a light. The smell of the smoke still hung in my nostrils. There was no time to sleep, but it was too early to dress for work. I sat at the table and thought of the boy. I wondered how he felt about his grandfather. I wondered if he would see the old man’s face for the rest of his life as I would, and as I would see the boy’s face.

In the dark, cold quiet of the house, I pondered the end of life. The night had been so full of it before. Now, I thought of the life that had left, the multitudes that had left in the night, the familiar faces that would not be there tomorrow.

Tomorrow was here. It was time to go to work.

Me in my fireman's bunker- Circa 1983