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House Burning Down


     It was in the middle of winter on a dark smoggy night, chills were
running through the house in and out of my room like a quiet ghost silently
coming and silently going. As I lie awake in my bed thinking of what the
next day should bring, my eye's start to grow heavy as I doze off. In the
distance I hear a faint booming sound, soon it starts getting louder and
louder and still louder until I could hear nothing but the noise. I was
unpleasantly startled and hurried over to my window. As I look out I could
see nothing but smoke and fire, catching this by surprised I ran to my
little brother's room, finding no one. Then in the distance I could hear
faint voices of terror calling my name. It sounded as if it was coming from
out side, so I ran as fast as my Nike slippers could carry me down the
stairs and outside into my front yard. I find the rest of my family there,
along with my neighbors and their son, my best friend. I just stood there
in horror with the rest of my family and friends. We had no idea what had
happened.  The next morning I really don't remember very clearly, but what
I did was reading the news paper and coming across an article about a house
burning down not to far from mine. I really didn't know what exactly to
think at that time until it all clicked upstairs. The noise the night
before had been the house burning down and the natural gas line exploding.
Later in the article it said that our block of houses wouldn't have any
natural gas heating until the line was repaired.  The first thing I did was
run to the kitchen, finding my Mother and Father there fixing breakfast. I
started talking so fast I really don't even know what came out. My Mom told
me to calm down and sit at the table. Doing so she gave me a glass of milk,
and seeing that I was distressed sat down next to me and asked me what was
on my mind.  Taking full advantage of her attention I told her as slowly
and detailed as possible at the time being. As soon as I had finished my
frantic attempt to sler all that out, she didn't laugh at me but just got
that look in her eyes where you know that she didn't believe a word of it.
The fist thing she said in response was "Where did you hear about this?" I
answered her as fast as possible "In the news paper" Stunned at my at my
quick answer she told me to bring her the article. So I ran back up the
stairs and snatched the paper from my red race car shaped bed. When I got
down stairs I laid the article out flat in front of my mom's face.  A
subtle but shocked look arose on my mother's face, as she sank deeper into
her chair. Shutting off the radio, I sat down next to my dad asking him
what we were going to do for heat, he just answered "I don't know I just
don't know." shaking his head in resistance.  Later that day I was over at
a friend's house who had heat. We were playing a video game and eating
chips in his living room. The walls had many game heads on them, one of the
nicer ones was a whole stuffed mountain lion that his dad once had a
special tag to hunt. The whole time I was there I was brainstorming on how
to get heat in our house.  Soon I was in the back seat of our extended cab
black GMC pickup. My little brother was on my mom's lap and my dad was just
starting to drive onto the onramp. Which is not an easy task on a daily
basis, when you live in New York. As soon as we started getting close to
the freeway there was a huge traffic jam. I think we must have been there
for about and hour and a half. I don't really remember because I was trying
to go to sleep.  When I woke up we were on the freeway driving about 40
m.p.h. because there were so many cars. But soon we were back in my
neighborhood. We stopped at the local McDonald's to get some lunch. Luckily
my dad had gotten his pay check cashed and in the bank the night before. So
as we walk into the McDonald's we find surprisingly small lines. I ordered
what I always order at McDonald's, a number 7 value meal. This contains two
cheese burgers, large fries, and a large drink. After we all had ordered
and finished eating, we drove back to my house. A two story medium sized
house with hunter green trim.  I walked up to the door and opened it with
the key I wear around my neck I walked in finding it no warmer than outside.
I walked over to the bathroom, still thinking of how to warm the place up,
while I relieved myself from the super sized Mountain Dew I had just
finished drinking. Then it came to me, I could warm up the house by leaving
our electric oven open on about 350o.  So I took this idea to my mom, I
approached her with a look of genius on my face. Seeing me looking like
that my mom started cracking up as soon as I walked into the room. Guessing
that this was not the greatest time to talk to my mom about a silly idea
like mine. But what better time is then from now? I am, correction, WE are
all cold it is in the middle of winter, and there is no heat. So I walked
up to my mom as smoothly as a pair of old worn out Airwalks are capable of,
and had already gained her attention by the cheesy but smart look on my
face.  Telling her about my idea actually went a lot smoother than I would
have guessed it to have. She thought it was a good idea but had to make
sure about a hundred other times that I was talking about the electric oven
and not the gas one. Of course I was talking about the electric oven, what
did she assume I had a death wish or something? I was about to come back
with the smart comment "don't assume Mom, do you know what assuming makes
out of us?" But then I thought that it would probably be better to just
keep my mouth shut, than to get in trouble for talking back to my Mom. 
Well we did that for about a week or so, and then the gas line was fixed.
FINALLY, heat!!! Boy was I happy to be back living with the fake fire place
working again, those corny looking logs with a flame coming out of the
middle of them. Well I guess I can't complain, I never had to chop wood,
unlike some of my other friends.