1145 words (4 minute read)

Excerpt of letter from Gail Ehrlich to Vanessa Ehrlich, dated August 8, 1974:

…It’s not my fault!  I swear it!  I don’t smoke. I’ve never even tried a joint before.  I don’t know what happened but everybody’s mad at me and Piers is even saying he might have to send me home, but none of it is my fault. I didn’t do anything wrong!

I was reading in bed last night.  Since Tammy’s been away, it’s been hard to fall asleep.  I’m used to having her nearby and knowing if I need anything, I can holler.  When I’m on my own, the room feels bigger and a little spooky.  That’s silly because I’m not a little girl anymore. I’m almost twenty.  But that’s the way it is. 

Because I can’t sleep as good anymore, I’ve been reading a lot more.  Last night I had this big book on the anthropology of language that Wanda wanted me to read.  I don’t know why cause Smithy can’t talk and this book is about the sounds people make when they first start learning to talk but Wanda wanted me to learn all this stuff anyway because she says Smithy’s aquizzition of words follows the same process as a kid who’s first learning to talk.  She said it would help me with my work. The book is huge with this teeny tiny writing in two columns going up and down the page and it’s super boring so I figured it would be perfect for putting me to sleep.  And it was. 

I was reading and re-reading this one page about generalization (Tammy is always talking about that but it makes more sense when she says it then when it’s in this book) and I just drifted off.  I left the lamp on because I was reading.  I know that.

I woke up a little while later feeling sick to my stomach and it was hard to breathe.  It smelled really bad in the room and it was dark.  Except for some candles at the foot of the bed.  I thought they were candles at first anyway cause I was still half asleep.  Then I realized the bed was on fire!

I jumped out of bed and started screaming.  I didn’t know what to do!  I wanted water but I didn’t have a glass by my bed or anything like that.  I grabbed Wanda’s book and hit the flames to put them out, but they were too hot and my hand got burned.  I tried folding over the blankets to smother the flame but I could still feel the heat through the comforter.  I screamed and screamed but I was coughing real hard too.  The fire had made my room fill with smoke!  I kept wondering why someone didn’t come and I remembered Tammy was gone away and I felt totally abandoned.

 Then I heard Maisie barking and someone knocking on the door.  I yelled at them to come in and Ruby did.  She saw what I was doing and helped me pull the blankets off the bed.  She rolled them on the floor and she told me to help push the mattress off the bed. She threw it on top of the blankets and sat on it to squish the flames.  Then she opened the windows to get the smoke out.

Then Wanda came in with Eric.  He’d been waiting in the hall because he wasn’t sure if he should come in or not.  Ruby told them about the fire and Eric filled Tammy’s rinsing glass from the bathroom and poured water over the mattress and blankets, even though they were already out.  I forgot she had that. 

Ruby checked me out to see if I was hurt.  The back of my hand was blistering from trying to put the fire out so she put some cream on it.  Luckily, the fire was on the very corner of the bed away from where I was sleeping.  My nightgown wasn’t burned and I wasn’t burned either.

Wanda wanted to know how the fire started. She accused me of smoking in bed and dropping a cigarette in my sleep but I don’t smoke. I don’t even own a pack of cigarettes. I tried emptying my purse to prove it but she didn’t care.  She told me she was going to tell Piers all about it and get me kicked out of the study for being irresponsible. She yelled at me that I could have burned the whole house down and killed everybody, even Smithy. 

Ruby tried to help me out. She said it couldn’t have been a big fire because the alarm didn’t go off but Wanda said that didn’t matter because the wiring is screwy anyway and the alarm doesn’t always work.  That’s a scary thought!  What if I didn’t wake up in time to put the fire out?  It could have spread and no one would have known until it was too late.

Eric said he would check the wiring in the morning and he’d get Jeff to help.  He thought maybe something shorted out in the room and a spark jumped on the blankets.  I wish Wanda would listen to him. I told them how I left the lamp on because I was reading. But the lamp was out when the fire started.  Maybe the lamp’s what shorted out.

Ruby told me I could sleep in her room for the rest of the night because my bedroom had to air out and they would have to find me a new mattress and bedclothes anyway.  It was a small bed but we both squeezed into it.  I still couldn’t fall asleep though.  I was lying awake all night thinking What caused the fire? What happened?

It’s a good thing I kept the connecting door to our rooms closed.  Tammy would have killed me if I’d burned up her room while she was gone.  That’s if I somehow started the fire.  And I know I didn’t! I have no idea how it started and I’m scared.  What if it happens again?

Piers came back today and met with me privately.  He scolded me and said I should know better than to take chances in an old house especially one with lots of other people in it.  He thinks I was smoking too or playing with candles or something because the fire definitely started in the bed. It wasn’t a wire or the lamp. I cried and told him all the same things I’d said before but he said he didn’t want to hear any excuses.  He said he was giving me a warning and if I do anything else wrong, I’m out.

It’s not fair!  None of this is my fault.  I almost died and nobody even cares!

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Next Chapter: Archival film footage dated June 25, 1974