Saviour

• Eloise Flynn, Grade 7
• Short Story
• 2018

‘Beep... Beep…’
Noises stirred Skye from an endless sleep.
Her subconscious absorbed another sound, two female voices murmuring, at first just meaningless words, muffled by the beeping. Skye’s eyelids were thin paper, as she tried to blink them open. Her vision filled with blinding light, so she snapped them closed again.
The voices were clearer now, like her ears had suddenly been cleared out.
‘Poor things.’
‘I know…Only survivors…’
‘Her arm…Grandparents…’
‘Terrible news…’
A cat-like sound emerged from Skye’s mouth, she again opened her eyes, squinting. She heard footsteps rushing towards her as her vision cleared.
Skye glanced down, irritated by her scratchy, white, linen nightgown and the lumpy bed which she was lying on. She smelt soap and air-freshener, before she noticed two unfamiliar faces peering anxiously down at her. The ceiling above displayed delicately drawn murals of mermaids and pirates, next to her was a carved chest of draws and a pungent floral array. It dawned on her – this was a hospital.
Suddenly a recent memory burst into her head, the smell of smoke and the shrieks of people. The sheer sting of fumes and wail of alarms… sobs of a small person, whom she was holding.
A house fire.
Dizziness hit her like a wave. She imagined her home now, with the smell of brimstone and bare-brick foundations showing.
‘My…my’ she gasped; it felt like she’d swallowed sandpaper.
The two nurses looked down at her with pity. One had a nice plump face while the other’s blonde hair was so tightly tied back it looked as though it would rip.
The one with the blonde hair was the first to speak.
‘Sweetie, I don’t know how to explain…they’re gone...’
Skye felt a numb stinging in her ears and a lump formed in her throat.
‘Your mum, dad, brother… they-they didn’t make it’ the other added.
‘Oakley…’ Skye murmured.
The nurses looked slightly relieved.
‘Oh honey, she’s fine… I thought you’d remember…?’ They looked at her expectantly, when she said nothing, the blonde continued. ‘Honey, you saved her, when you stumbled out, you were holding her - little one didn’t have a scratch on her…there was a-a lump of wood sticking out of your fore-arm…nothing we could do…’
Skye slowly reached her shaking arm over to her left one, realising it felt numb.
She felt her shoulder, elbow then a stump…nothing.
The buzzing came back, filling her head; she barely heard the rushed words of the nurses that followed.
‘Your grandparents are coming soon, they’ll look after you and you’ll get a mechanical hand.’
The next day was a blur.
Skye barely remembered being bustled into another ward.
But, when she saw her two-year-old sister, Oakley; her little face with teary, hazel eyes, carrot hair and rose-petal cheeks, relief enveloped her; she cradled her with one arm and cried.
For the first time since the tragedy, Skye cried, racking, terrible sobs, as she stared past her beautiful sister’s head at the painted rainbow on the wall.