3

My feet fall evenly on the ground in front of me, four small paws padding alongside me. Small probably isn't the right word. I think I'd go with pretty damn big for a puppy. The sun is yet to brim on the horizon, but the darkness that had consumed the sky for the previous eight hours is gradually clearing. No breeze eases the morning air. The slightest touch of humidity, however, scratches at my cheeks, making way for another inevitably unbearably hot day.

"When the fuck did you get a dog?"

My eyes scrape at the back of my head before I turn my stare on my brother, coming to a halt. "I told you I was adopting her like a year ago," I expel the words in a sigh, glancing down at the blue and tan kelpie at my left foot. "I just picked her up from Em's."

Lilo had been on an indefinite stay in the care of my friend due to her and my father's ever turbulent relationship. He's no fan of hers, and she pretty much prepares herself to attack if he comes within two metres of me.

"At five in the morning?" Charlie presses his lips together, crouching to the floor and extending his arm so that the back of his hand lies in front of Lilo's shiny black nose. "What's her name?"

"Lilo," I tell him, watching as Lilo's tail cracks from side to side, eyes trained on the dirt encased hand at her mercy.

Lilo's toothy jaw drops open as she flops her tongue to one side of her mouth, throwing the lower half of her body into Charlie as a plea for a generous scratch. Charlie's lips twitch upwards as he mutters something quietly to the dog.

"Anyway," I attempt to draw Charlie's attention back to me. "Can I stay with you for a bit?"

Charlie's head snaps up. "With me?"

"No, with Lilo," I deadpan, staring down at my brother.

Lilo, figuring that she's lost my brother's attention, flops onto the asphalt, a huff escaping her mouth.

Charlie slowly brings himself to his feet, wiping his palms on his dirt-ridden jeans. "Why do you have to stay with me?"

I reach down to run my fingers through Lilo's fur, urging the indignation threatening to thwart my tone to retreat. "Charlie, I have nowhere to go."

"Buy your own fucking place," he murmurs, running soiled hands through his unruly sand-coloured hair.

My chest rises naturally as I inhale, but I can't deny the oppressive weight pushing against it, combatted only by my desperate need to dwell in a place in which my father will not look for me for however long it takes me to quell the anger surging inside me. The nagging suspicion that the fire had been directly related to him didn't seem to be regressing into the near future. I let out my breath, allowing my words to flow along it, "you know exactly how that's going to turn out when dad finds me."

Charlie wrings one tattooed hand in the air, his exceedingly blue eyes irate. "Well don't you think there's another solution to that?"

I bite the inside of my cheek, drawing in a shallow breath. "Charlie, he'll get to me."

Charlie's exhale leaks through his nose as he graces his forehead with the leathery back of his hand, devastating the beads of sweat working across his head. His fingers slip down to the collar of his black work shirt, tugging at the material clinging to his neck. The ink beneath it peaks out into the unfolding light. Barely an inch of my brother's body is without his infamous art. "Ari," Charlie begins, his voice losing its crude lining. His thoroughly chapped lips part again to continue his sentence, but with a shake of his head, he seems to decide against the words playing on his tongue. "Fine, stay," he finally grinds out through pinched lips. "But if you fuck either of my housemates in exchange for coke again, I swear to god I will kick your skinny ass out in a heartbeat." His gaze latches onto mine, an emotion I cannot decipher amongst the hesitance held within it. "Got it?"

I can't help the smile that tugs at the corners of my mouth as I nod once, shooting my brother a thumbs up.

"Charlie!" the coarse voice of Charlie's supervisor clatters down from the very top of the preposterously long ladder perched on the weathered wood of the electricity pole. "Get off your ass and do your fucking job!"

Charlie raises his middle finger towards the top of the power pole where his boss is still fiddling with the unreliable electricity lines. "Why the hell did I become an electrician?" he mutters underneath his breath, his hands rifling through the disorderly array of tools, plastic and metal alike, dispersed through the faded red toolbox at his feet.

"Because you're still on probation," I murmur, shooting him a sideways look. Charlie's misses it though, as he's still bent over, his head lowered almost to the thoroughly worn boots clothing his feet, and his broad, well-muscled shoulders absorbing my stare.

He doesn't even try to object as he selects some sort of plier thing and slips it underneath the belt lining his slim waist, drawing his body back to his full towering height. "You'll fit through the dog door if no one's home," he states, looking me over. "Now rack off."

"C'mon Lilo," I say to my dog, picking my previous pace back up again.

+++

I'd never kept many personal belongings. A few clothes here and there, my drawing tools and whatnot, but not much else. Consequently, the fire didn't rob me of many material possessions. Checkered tape surrounds the remains of the twenty-seventh house I've lived in over the course of my existence. Ignoring the signs clearly stating that the wreck is an active crime scene, I step over the police tape as Lilo's nose nudges at the debris, following whatever familiar scents she can find, most of which have probably been tarnished by the smoke. My eyes skirt the blackened and broken elements that once formed an identifiable structure.

"Tilley!" I glance around abruptly to locate the voice that had interrupted the short breath of the reality beginning to dawn on me. "Till, mum made you brekky," Emersyn calls from the road.

My gaze settles on her fast approaching figure. Em's auburn stained hair, tied into two thick braids, beats against her shoulders at each clumsy step taken towards me. Clothes crumpled and face not yet painted in her daily cosmetic artwork, she stamps along the colourless ground, rubble crunching beneath her slipper boots. Em refuses to leave the house in anything other than the threadbare black footwear lined by impossibly soft cotton before eight in the morning.

In a flash of blue and tan, Lilo is at Emersyn's feet, tail whipping from side to side and nose trained on whatever hides beneath the foil in Em's hands. "Not for you, baby," Em tells my dog, leaning down to scratch her behind her intently perked ears. "For Tilley."

I return my attention to where my house once stood, listening as Em's footsteps advance towards me. Em's usual mouthy attitude seems to have deserted her this morning, for which I am grateful. Indolently, she comes to a standstill beside me, brushing her bare arm against my own covered one. Her presence eases the weight constricting my lungs slightly, but not enough for my breathing to become any less strained.

"It's Tyler and Alyssa's room," I'm finally able to produce words, but my voice scrapes against the back of my throat, escaping in a strangled string that's almost indecipherable. I lay one hand on the fallen metal frame that once held the bunk bed in which the twins slept each night, my heartbeat echoing through my eardrums. The smoke had killed both my younger siblings, yet barely had an effect on the inanimate bed frame. "Fuck me," I say, the volume of my voice reaching no higher than a whisper.

"You know it's not your fault, don't you Tills?" Em says quietly, her lean body stiller than death itself beside me.

Words evade me as I lower myself into a crouch, my fingers outstretched in front of me. I allow them to wonder through the rubble left to decay. Each breath is tougher to execute than the last, and each heartbeat gains more weight than the former. I allow my eyes to flicker shut, rebuilding the fallen structure inside my mind. Seven o'clock is almost upon us, and the sun's rays have already begun to melt any remaining leaves off the surrounding trees. I should be returning from my morning run, slamming open the screeching door in my first phase of readying the twins for school. Alyssa's groan as she realises what would soon befall her would be audible from the narrow hallway that had separated the room I shared with the two from the kitchen and front door. Tyler would already be in the rundown bathroom, vigorously demolishing the plaque plaguing his only recently attained adult teeth crowding his upper jaw.

"What's this?" Em's voice tears me from the memory so vividly burned into my mind. It was a scene that performed like clockwork each and every morning. A panorama I'd never play witness to again. I push the thought further towards the cavity in the back of my head kept behind a strict lock and chain, diverting my focus to where Em is knelt, a silver chain filtering between her fingers. "Dude, how did this survive?"

I pick myself back up, my bones cracking as I do so. "No shit," I breathe as I take the slightly charred chain from Em. It should've melted in the heat of the fire, but nonetheless, the small lowercase 'a' pendant has escaped with nothing but a mere singe.

Alyssa's care routine for the necklace given to her by our mother has finally paid off. We'd both been gifted a necklace each years ago by our mother, the only difference between the two pieces of jewellery being that mine had a capital 'A' pendant. Mum had meant it to be a sentimental piece to remind us of her. At the time, however, I'd been unaware that her time with us was briskly burning to an end, and my necklace had soon met its demise. Lyss, on the other hand, treasured the gift as if it were a fruit of her own labour. Each night, she'd unclasp it from her neck and delicately lay it to rest in the small heart shaped glass box that had been passed down from our mother to her. It'd return to her neck each morning once her outfit had come to completion. It was the cherry on top of the cake.

Alyssa's prudence regarding each and every task, no matter the size, drove me round the bend. I could never understand her need to maintain perfection in all her ways. I fold my fingertips over the pendent, the sharp chill of the metal sending an unwanted shiver trickling down my spine. Never again would she reprimand me for my widespread recklessness and inattention to tasks at hand.

"Want me to put it on you?"

Em's question only adds to the pressure layered on my chest. It wouldn't feel right to wear it and not grant it the same attention that Alyssa had embellished upon it. Her tiny jewellery box is nowhere to be seen. I feel my throat constrict as my mouth runs dry. My fingers unfurl from around the thawed metal as I hand it to Emersyn. It's all that is left of my little sister.

Em bunches my hair in one hand, moving it so that it hangs over my shoulder. She then slings the chain gently around my neck, fiddling for a brief moment before dropping away from me.

"All done."

Instinctively, my hand reaches towards the dip between my collarbones that now houses what my sister cherished so fondly. It will remain in situ if it's the death of me.

Below me, my legs seem to give way and I fall, my knees crashing to the ground. Around me lies a life once lived, fragmented on the floor, pieces of history burnt beyond recognition, along with the souls that had once belonged to that life. Forever those souls will remain ten. I let my head fall to my hands, my shoulders slumping over my body. I can feel my body tremble as each and every emotion I've stifled into the pit of my stomach swarms through my lungs, apprehending my chest and spilling from my lips in strangled sobs. I couldn't save them. No — I didn't save them.

Em's hand on my shoulder as she lowers herself to the ground only fuels the tears streaking from my eyes. "Come on Tills," she mutters gently. "Let's get you someplace else."

She holds her arms underneath mine as she assists me in standing before sending a whistle piercing through the early morning. Lilo's paws hammering against the fractured foundations of the house are at us in a heartbeat.

"Emmy, you're a really great friend." All control over my words has deserted me as Em takes my hand in hers, leading my away from the place in which I'd failed my siblings for the very last time. "I love you."

Exhaustion finds me like the tallest tree in a lightning storm, electrifying my insides with defeat. Lilo's nose nudges at the hand hanging limply by my side as we walk, warmth emanating from her body to mine as she brushes against me.

"Love you too, Tills," Em whispers, reaching to brush several stray strands of hair from my wet cheeks. "It's gonna be okay."

The words turn the weight against my chest into crushing gravity, all of my fears embracing me at once. If there is one thing that I know for certain, it's that it's not going to be okay. It wasn't okay when Mum died. It's not okay now. I'm not sure that it ever will be.