"My Mom's Fire"

In the 8th grade, my family moved to a different state. We left the city for the state's rural region, where my older sister was going to college. I was having a hard time adjusting to the prospect of moving because I had been close to my friends in the city.<br>I decided to spend my last few days hanging out with my close friends. I was invited to one of their houses to have a bonfire in their backyard. We still had a few weeks before we left, so my parents agreed to let me go. I had to arrive home by 11 pm, but my friends convinced me to stay longer and try to convince my parents to let me stay over. So I gave my parents a call and asked them if I could stay the night, but they told me to come straight home, as they didn't want to be up all night waiting for me.<br>I said my goodbyes to everyone and thanked my friend for allowing me to stay at their house. As I walked outside, I saw my dad's car parked across the street. I took my phone out and dialed my mom's number, thinking that maybe she could convince my dad to let me stay over. As I brought the phone to my ear, I heard my mom's voice telling me to hang up. My parents were sitting in the car, and my mom was speaking to me through the Bluetooth speaker. She told me to get in the car because they had to tell me something. I thought maybe they had changed their minds and were going to let me stay over, so I walked to the car and got in. But as I looked in the backseat, everything my sister had packed for the move was still there. I felt a surge of excitement thinking we weren't going to move after all. But my parents were acting strange and seemed worried. They looked in the rearview mirror and asked me to look back, and that's when I noticed that our house was engulfed in flames. The entire house had caught fire and burned down. They told me they had received a call from one of our neighbors that our house was burning. They said they had thought about calling me earlier and telling me to come home right away, but they didn't want to ruin the night for me. They explained that they had called the fire department and that the fire had been extinguished, but they weren't sure how much of the house had been destroyed. They said they would have to go back to the house and see the extent of the damage.<br>I didn't know what to say, all I could do was stare at the car's ceiling. They drove me back home in complete silence. As we turned the corner, I saw the house. It was still standing, but it was badly damaged. The roof was mostly gone, and the windows had been shattered by the explosion from the gas that had accumulated inside. The entire front yard was littered with debris from the house. I got out of the car and as I walked closer to the house, I smelled something strange, like burnt fabric. My mom said it was probably my clothes. I had just gotten a bunch of new clothes and shoes from my friends the day before we left. They told me to wait outside while they went to inspect the house. After a while, they came back outside, and my mom was holding a picture frame that hadn't been burned. She told me to go to sleep in the car, and that we'd figure it out in the morning. I don't know how I was able to fall asleep so easily, but the next thing I knew it was daylight. I got out of the car and saw my parents talking to some people. They told me it was the insurance agents and that they were assessing the damage to the house. They had already determined that it wasn't safe for anyone to be inside. I kept looking at the house, remembering all the memories I had made there.<br>As the day went on, the neighbors started to show up, and everyone was talking about what they had seen the night before. They all said they had smelled the smoke and seen the huge blaze of fire, and some of them said they had even called the fire department themselves. They told my parents that they were sorry for our loss and that we could come to their house if we needed anything. They even invited us to stay over and have dinner. My parents thanked everyone and told them that we still had to figure everything out. They asked me if I wanted to stay with my sister for the time being until they figured out where we were going to stay. I agreed to leave the city for good and go live with my sister.<br>It's been two years since my family's house caught fire. We never went back to live there, and my parents ended up buying a different house in the same neighborhood where my sister lives. I still have some friends in the city that I keep in touch with, but I still think about the people who chose not to call the fire department that night, the people who chose to let our house burn down to nothing. **Let's not meet.**