Inky Girl

The night went on and the crowd and noise grew. Finally Ted Meisling came through the room making the announcement. “OK, now for the contest. We are going to see who has the best costume. By that I mean, whomever we cannot identify behind the costume wins.” “Wins what?” someone yelled out. “Wins, wins that's all!” Each person got into the middle of a circle and each person was shouting out who they thought it was. When the correct name came up, that person removed their mask or whatever had been their disguise. It went pretty fast since a lot of people did not try to disguise themselves. Lynn was almost up. She was a bit apprehensive, not because of being known, but the crowd had gotten a little unruly. The beer was starting to affect the boys and in one case a fight had broken out for a minute. “OK you're next,” Ted said, pointing to Lynn. For some reason the noise settled down as Lynn came to the center. Walking with her boots and costume, all in black, cast a spell among the crowd. Everyone else had been recognized. Lynn was the only one left. Only Gary knew that she was coming and he was nowhere to be seen. Unfortunately Gary had started drinking early. He felt sick to his stomach and ran for the upstairs bathroom while this was all going on. The crowd shouted name after name and none came up as Lynn. Finally, Ted Meisling walked over to Lynn and told her to remove her mask. She had won the contest. She was just about to take off her mask, when someone shouted out, “Ted, one of your bedrooms is on fire!” One of the candles had started a curtain on fire and the whole side of the west wall was up in flames. Smoke started billowing out of the bedroom filling up the living room, where most of the people were. Panic set in and everyone started to rush to the outside. Lynn being in the middle was knocked over. She fell to the floor but was not hurt. She didn't feel anything. “Call the fire department!” someone yelled. Ted was petrified. It was his parent's house and now it was starting to burn. The fire was spreading. Lynn felt the main thing was to get everyone out safely. The house could not be saved. They would have to leave that to the fire department. As it turned out, no one called. It was the neighbor that saw the flames and ultimately called. Lynn ran outside and the crowd just stood on the lawn watching the flames. “Is everyone out?” Lynn shouted. No one answered. Lynn looked around for Gary. “Where's Gary? Where's Lindstrom?” she shouted. “Oh my God! The last I saw of him, he was in the bathroom,” Ted said. By now the entire house seemed engulfed by flames. On instinct, Lynn ran toward the house. “Hey, where are you going? You're going to get killed. You can't go in there!” Lynn didn't realize what she was doing. She only knew that there was some power possessing her and nothing would do her harm. She ran right into the house. Neither the heat from the flames or the smoke seemed to bother her. She reached the downstairs bathroom and opened the door. Gary wasn't there. She quickly ran up stairs. “There has to be a bathroom up here!” she said to herself. Gary had passed out in the upstairs bathroom. His body fell against the door and since the door opened inward he was holding shut. Lynn first tried to open the door but it did not work. Then, with strength, that she did not realize she had, she placed her fingers through the narrow openings on either side of the door and ripped it off its hinges. The flames had not reached the upstairs bathroom yet, but Gary was suffering from smoke inhalation. She bent down and held open Gary's mouth. Placing her mouth over Gary's, she inhaled drawing most of the smoke from Gary's lungs. She exhaled it out and picked up Gary and carried him out. All the crowd could see was this black silhouette object coming from the flaming house carrying Gary. The crowd cheered and clapped. Ted was thankful. It was one thing to have his parent's house burn, but to have someone die as a result of it would have been disastrous. The firemen had arrived and witnessed Gary being carried out. They could not believe their eyes. They rushed over and gave Gary oxygen. “Let's take a look at the girl,” one of the firemen said. Lynn was nowhere to be seen. She had quietly slipped away and was watching everything from side, away from the light and the people. She just stood there realizing, that something powerful and mysterious had happened to her tonight. She knew exactly what had caused it. She knew, somehow, it was the clothing and the ink that she had spilled on it.