Smoke started to creep under the door. It was clouding my vision and my mind. I felt helpless, there was nothing I could do being trapped inside my room. Claustrophobia was sinking in; was this really the end? Was I about to succumb to the flames and let them engulf me? No; I was about to fight for my life.

I looked around, my only choices of escaping were the door and the window. Why did I have to be on the 3rd floor? The door had to be the safest option, as I couldn’t risk breaking any bones from the jump down.

I stood in front of the door, coughing, wheezing, gasping for any clean air that I could find. I glanced at it, heat radiating off of the door knob. I wouldn’t dare touch it with my bare hands. My mind started racing again. Was I ever going to make it out of this room alive? I looked around again, and grabbed my quilt to help me twist the door handle without burning the entire palm of my hand. This task was impossible; the heat from the doorknob had roasted the surface of my quilt, and I couldn’t bare to hold onto the doorknob much longer.

I dropped the quilt and immediately ran to the window. I could see the fire department below, several men were rushing into the apartment building trying to save anyone they could. Would they make it up to me in time? I couldn’t risk being left behind, I grabbed my bedside lamp and started hitting the window with it, watching glass shatter and fall to the ground below me.

The rush of crisp air hit my skin and enveloped me. “Help! I’m up here!” I shouted, tears welling from my eyes. More smoke started to find its way into my room, and I was struggling to find clean air to replace the smoke that was feeding into my lungs.

I watched down below, the fire truck placing itself near my window. This was it! I was going to make it out of this alive!

I spoke far too soon. A loud boom encompassed the whole building, and the floor to my room was slowly disappearing. Another glance down below and the fire marshal was leading everyone out of the building.

This was it. The floor beneath me caved in, and the ceiling was starting to sink above me. The tears were rolling down my cheeks, and I felt a sense of defeat, I was giving up.

My legs felt wobbly, I couldn’t help but fall to my knees. The weight of my body became too much for the floor to handle, and it seemed as if the whole complex caved in the moment I collapsed.

I started falling through the remaining floors, my body feeling like a rag-doll a child didn’t want anything to do with anymore. The rest of the building was deteriorating, burning, and falling around me.

I felt like I never reached the bottom of the apartment building. My soul left my body the minute I started falling through the floors, as if it knew this was the end.

This was it.