By the time the official fire drill day rolled around, the notice on the fridge had gone soft at the corners from being touched too much.
Maya carried a crumpled list in her backpack everywhere she went. She had written it herself in stubborn little letters:
"Cat. Maya's shoes. Mom's phone. Photo album. Medicine. Flashlight."
Every time she changed clothes, the list moved pockets with her.
As if forgetting where the list was might mean forgetting how to get out.
The afternoon of the drill, the building felt restless.
Neighbors stepped out to re-read the posters in the hallway. Doors opened and shut. Someone upstairs kept testing their smoke alarm.
Melissa left the hospital early, trading a later shift with another nurse.
"I promised her I'd be here for this," she'd told the charge nurse.
Only in the car did she realize her hands were shaking on the steering wheel.
In the apartment, Albert lined their four phones and a flashlight up on the kitchen table like he was staging a tiny army.
"Okay," he said when everyone had gathered. "Our drill starts before theirs."
William's eyes lit up instantly. "We get assignments, right?"
"You," Albert said, pointing at him, "are Head Counter. You count how many of us there are every time we go out the door."
William straightened. "Got it."
"What about me?" Maya tightened her grip on the cat.
"You're in charge of the cat," Melissa said. "And reminding me about the meds."
"And you two?" William asked.
"I lock the door," Albert said, jingling the keys. "Melissa checks that everybody has shoes on this time."
It sounded clumsy and informal, but the simple job titles made something inside Melissa unclench a little. Roles meant someone had thought it through.
They lined up at the door like they were back in grade school. Only this line held everything they had left.
"Okay," Albert said quietly. "Let's walk it once."
The hallway lights were on, humming faintly. The chipped paint on the stairwell walls looked dingier than usual. Every step down echoed in that hollow concrete way that made sound feel heavier.
On the second-floor landing, Albert stopped.
"This was about where we were," he said, "when I almost dropped the cat."
Maya's arms tightened around the animal now safe in her hold. The cat gave an indignant mrrow and tried to climb higher.
Albert blew out a breath. "Game time," he said. "If you could freeze the night of the fire right here, and say one thing you didn't get to say… what would it be?"
William stared at a worn patch on the stair, where the gray had been polished shiny by thousands of anxious shoes.
"I wanted to say I was scared," he admitted. "I didn't. 'Cause I thought if I said it, you'd be more scared."
Albert didn't interrupt. He just listened.
Maya swallowed. "I kept thinking you forgot me," she told Melissa. "At school. When they said parents had to come get us."
Her voice shrank. "I thought… maybe you were too busy saving everybody else."
Melissa felt something sharp and cold twist under her ribs.
"I didn't forget you," she said, the words rough. "At the hospital, every time I pushed through a curtain, I was thinking, 'Just one more. Just a few more minutes. Just a little longer.'"
She stared at her own hand on the rail. "I was afraid if I left, somebody would die.
And I was afraid if I stayed, I'd never see you again."
The confession hung in the stairwell, fragile as glass.
Albert ran his thumb along the metal railing. "I spent that whole drive out pretending I wasn't shaking," he said. "Tryin' to keep the wheel steady so you wouldn't see."
He looked at William with a crooked, apologetic smile. "Guess I didn't do such a good job."
"I saw," William said softly. "But you were still driving."
They stood there for a minute, four people on a cheap concrete landing, surrounded by the ghost of a night when none of them had had time for words.
"Okay," Melissa said at last, taking a breath that felt like stepping into cold water. "Let's finish it. This time all the way out, with time to spare."
They walked the rest of the way down and out through the front door into bright afternoon.
Fire trucks were parked at the curb as part of the drill. Kids were already pointing at them, asking a hundred questions. No smoke. No heat. Just the echo of a memory.
Maya checked her watch at the edge of the parking lot. "Three minutes, twenty-four seconds," she declared.
"How long was it last time?" William asked.
"Last time…" Maya squinted at the sky. "…about thirty years."
They all laughed. It came out thin and watery—but it was laughter.
Right then, the building's PA system crackled to life and the official fire alarm blared. Doors banged open above them. People poured down the stairs with strollers and grocery bags and barking dogs.
This time, the four of them weren't stumbling in the middle.
They were standing at the end of the row, already in place, leaving room for an older woman with a cane to pass ahead.
"We don't run," Albert said.
"We walk together," Melissa added.
By the time the drill ended, the parking lot had turned into an impromptu block party. Children chased each other between the fire engines. Someone handed out juice boxes. A firefighter let a toddler try on his helmet.
Back upstairs, Maya's shoulders had dropped a full inch. She dug the crumpled list out of her pocket, smoothed it once, then folded it neatly and slid it into her desk drawer.
"You can keep it," Melissa said. "But you don't have to carry it everywhere."
"I know." Maya closed the drawer gently.
Melissa's phone buzzed on the table.
She glanced down, expecting work. The number on the screen made her stomach dip.
"Mom?" she said when she picked up.
Her mother's voice crackled through, all exasperation and worry. "I saw the news. They showed your town on TV. What is that building you're in? An 'apartment'? I'm coming to see where my granddaughter is sleeping."
Melissa looked around at the room: the mismatched chairs, the folding table, the kids' drawings taped crookedly to the wall.
She looked at Albert in the kitchen, drying a bowl with the one dish towel they owned. At the kids, who were half-listening, half-building a Lego fort on the floor.
"It's… okay," she said. "We're okay."
"I'm staying with an old friend in town tonight," her mother said. "I'll drop by tomorrow. Just for a bit."
After she hung up, Melissa set the phone down and exhaled hard.
"Grandma's coming?" Maya asked, equal parts excited and anxious.
"Yeah." Melissa rubbed the back of her neck. "She… doesn't know yet how we're living."
"Are we gonna have to audition?" William muttered.
No one answered, but the look they shared said:
Maybe, in a way, yes.