At 3:52 am, Giles sat up in bed, hacking and coughing. His eyes watered uncontrollably from dense smoke… suddenly, as if being hit with a sledgehammer, in a nanosecond, sheer terror overtook him… his castle was on fire!! Secondly, he recognized the smell; it was the Christmas tree! He ran from the bedroom to where the flamethrower of a tree was torching the swirled ceiling; he then ran back to the bedroom to wake Jess, who was already at the children’s bedside. Giles grabbed the corner of the comforter, pulling it off, and returned to the tree. He thought of suffocating a portion of the flames so that Jess and the kids could escape down the stairs. But his skin ignited like a grilling steak. Weakened and near death, he collapsed to the floor, subdued… at the same time, Jess dragged Pat and Jen in duress, coughing and wheezing toward the landing, all of them collapsing close to where Giles lay- moaning. Jess caressed Giles'' smoldering face in her lap… and the look she gave him was of disgust, fear, and eternal sorrow for the loss of their family. “But I love you,” she managed to proclaim with a flamed-out larynx.
Suddenly, the second floor gave way, imploding onto the first-floor family room. By that time, the whole castle was nothing more than a blazing furnace, consuming everything. The four family members collapsed with it in one thunderous impact, charred and huddled together.
Elias: I heard faint groans nixed with painful cries, even amongst the rip-roaring fire and crashing timbers. The bodies of the Upton family were covered in ash and red-hot embers, as steam emitted from within…another fat tear welled up in my eye. I fought my way to them, clearing debris, pushing aside anything that would hinder me from holding their hands. But this time I didn’t just hold onto their hands…I encompassed all four Upton’s with my arms and body, as a mother hen, giving of myself to protect them!
I held them tight, with all my strength as if somehow I had the ability to summon life back into their exasperated bodies…but in vain, there was no more life, or breath, only the chill of a tainted finality, yet at the same time, there was peace, even with hell-fire blazing all around us; for I was only partly aware, as I felt a comforting hand staid on my right shoulder, and a soft audible voice spoke, “gather them up and return them home.”
“Giles, Giles, wake up, honey!” Jess frantically cries out. “You''re having a nightmare! Are you alright? You''ll wake the kids!”
“Yeah, I’m ok, I''m awake now. I just had a real-life scare; it must have been that movie we watched last night; it caused me to suffer through a night terror. It was a strange one, for sure! Hey, will you excuse me for a minute? I need to check on something, really quick, be right back…” in one tussled move, Giles laps the comforter off to the side and doesn’t bother to slide into his slippers…in a flash, he runs out to the landing to check on the humongous Christmas tree… ‘the one he has neglected to water for the last two months.’ As he approached, he expelled a hefty sigh of relief infused with a mischievous smirk; he knelt on one knee. “Whew, thank God, it was only a dream!” Giles reached through the brittle limbs and crumbling needles to pull the extension cord plug from the outlet… a spark!!! The end
