I felt like I was floating among the clouds above a tall mountain. I remembered that time I went on a trip with a few friends, and we drove all the way to the top of a hill. The neighbouring hills faded the higher we drove, like someone was erasing their edges to blend them better with the clouds. The artist was doing a great job; I could barely see the edges anymore when we reached the top. Cool mist surrounded us on all sides, and I felt weightless. The pleasant memory made me smile, and I rested my heavy eyelids. All was peaceful, and all was well. I would just take a nice little nap and wake up feeling rested.

I had almost drifted into dreamland when I caught a whiff of a strong smell. Something was burning. Maybe it was the chef at the cute little cafe we stopped at on the way down from the hill. He probably accidentally burnt some food. But I knew something was wrong. I didn't have the comfy beanie on that I had on the trip. I couldn't hear my friends' voices. The pleasant aroma of brewing tea and hot noodles was missing. And it certainly wasn't cool. It was too hot, and getting hotter by the minute.

Something lapped the bottom of my feet. It wasn't a cool wave at the beach. It stung. I yelped and sat up. I opened my eyes only to barely be able to see anything. There was smoke all around, and my eyes were tearing up. My throat was starting to close up, and I could barely breathe. It was like the artist who was erasing the mountain edges wound up erasing too harshly and tore open the canvas. The peaceful and mist-lined hilly atmosphere was instantly replaced by a suffocating and hot smoke-filled room.

The stinging sensation reached my calf, and I was finally pulled back to reality. Something was on fire, and I had to get out of the room. Unfortunately, my path to the door was blocked by a line of fire. I could reach my bathroom, so I went in and filled a bucket with water to put out the fire. I ran out and threw the water on the fire that was blocking my way out of the room. That turned out to be a huge mistake, one that I didn't realise until I was writhing on the floor in pain. By the time the pain had subsided enough for me to even begin to think, the air was too thick to breathe. I couldn't do much. I couldn't even lift my arms or try to crawl out. I could only lay down and close my eyes.

I felt like I was floating again. The clouds were now dark and uncomfortable. They were no longer like airy cotton candy; they were rumbling and colliding. I couldn't smell the smoke anymore. I couldn't smell anything. My body felt weightless, but too weightless. The colliding clouds kept pushing me around, and I couldn't stay stable in any spot. I kept being dragged around. I couldn't breathe. Maybe I didn't need to breathe there. I was still conscious, right? I was still conscious that time I had a panic attack in college, in front of my whole class. The memory was so embarrassing; I knew there was nothing wrong with getting a panic attack, and it wasn't my fault. Yet I was embarrassed that everybody saw. At that moment, I wished I could disappear into thin air. And now it seems I had disappeared into thin air, being tossed around by these clouds.

The air suddenly started clearing up. Within a minute, the smoke had cleared up enough for me to open my eyes without them stinging. It was still difficult to breathe, but I could. As the smoke got lighter, I could see more of my room. I could see the scorched pile of clothes I had strewn on the ground while searching for my replacement outfit. In fact, these were what had blocked my exit from the room. I traced the line of scorched clothes all the way to the ironing board. The worst damage was there. The dress had become an unrecognisable pile of dark material. I saw the source of the fire: the iron box. Now it made sense why water was not the best choice to put out the fire.

Strangely, I remembered having disconnected it before I left. Even though I was rushing, I did always check that everything was disconnected or switched off before leaving the house. There was no way my paranoid mind would have forgotten to switch off something like an iron box, which I was always so wary of. Regardless, I had to disconnect it immediately before it made it worse. I grabbed the thickest cloth I could find in my closet and cautiously approached the ironing board. My still foggy brain couldn't remember what I had in the room that would insulate me sufficiently. I had no idea where my phone was, so I couldn't even look it up.

As I went near the ironing board, the air cleared up enough for me to see the switchboard. The iron box was disconnected. The connecting wires hadn't burnt out or anything; in fact, the plug wasn't even in the socket. The plug was intact and was dangling a few millimetres away from the ground by the ironing board. I couldn't believe my eyes and went closer to check that I wasn't hallucinating from the smoke. I really wasn't seeing things; it looked like someone had pulled out the plug and stopped the fire. Who had done that? If the plug had been out of the socket in the first place, then what sparked the fire? The scorch marks on the clothes and the burns on my feet were still there. So the fire was real. But where did it come from? The more I looked around for the source, the less I understood anything.

I thought that maybe my brain was still foggy, and so I couldn't make sense of it. So I called my neighbours. The nice couple next door came over and checked everything. They helped me treat the burns, clean the debris, and even clear out the air to get rid of all smoky residue. They couldn't find anything either. They were convinced that I had disconnected the plug after it sparked the fire but couldn't remember in the heat of the moment. They re-checked three times upon my insistence but couldn't find anything. They concluded that I was in too much shock and couldn't be left alone, so they took me to stay at their house for the night. They were too nice to me; they even called an electrician and checked all the wiring in my house while I was asleep the next morning. They offered to let me borrow some clothes, but we found out that half of my clothes survived the fire; I had only dumped half of my wardrobe on the floor before the fire. They would bring me meals every now and then. They checked in on me every single day for an entire month, until they were sure I was okay.

They didn't believe my suspicions about the fire. To their credit, they did take good care of me that night. They gave me food and let me stay in their comfortable guest room. They even offered to check up on me from time to time if I was scared. I assured them I was fine, and they said that the offer was still open, and I could knock on their door anytime if I wanted their help or even just company. I was fine staying there, but my thoughts kept drifting back to the fire. The visual of the intact plug dangling near the iron board played repetitively in my mind.

When I tried to sleep, the image would flash in front of my eyes and jolt me awake. I was tired and groggy and quickly got very annoyed. I didn't want to impose on the couple who was so nice to me. I didn't want to embarrass them or myself in the middle of the night. The irritation was heating up my face, and the snug blanket now felt stifling. The room suddenly got cooler, but the windows weren't open and the fan wasn't on. There was no air conditioner in the room either. I couldn't question it for much longer though; I was comfortable, and my eyes quickly shut. I dozed off within seconds. I slipped into a deep and dreamless sleep. I slept so heavily that I didn't notice the many times they came in to the room to check up on me. I didn't notice the sound of the blender that normally annoyed me every morning. I didn't notice the horrible throat-clearing sound that made me want to strangle another neighbour multiple times a day. I didn't even notice the dim nightlight in the room flickering every time I snored.