Ffolkes,
Bilious clouds of smoke, greenish-yellow in the light of the street lamps, poured from the windows, while screams echoed off the walls across the way. As I stood in a shadowed doorway, I spied a figure in a window of the burning building’s second story, hooded, carrying a small bundle. As I watched the panicky movements, the figure suddenly tossed the bundle out of the window, where it fell softly down, almost seeming to float.

Without a thought, my legs moved, propelling me across the street to a point below the window, just in time to catch the bundle, which plopped into my arms lightly, without harm. As light from a nearby street lamp fell upon the bundle, I moved the covering blanket, to reveal the face of a small female child, with somber dark eyes that looked directly at mine, seemingly reading my innermost thoughts, and finding them…