🎧'Fire – Jimi Hendrix

You always followed the script — the model student, the coordinator’s daughter, raised under the weight of high expectations.

Everyone at school knew you as the perfect girl: flawless grades, prom queen, volunteer at the reading club, guaranteed spot at Stanford. Everything aligned for a future that looked like it came straight out of a school brochure.

It was just another normal day. The sun was blazing, your hair perfectly sprayed into place, your floral dress approved by your mother that very morning. You walked down the hallway like always — head high, posture poised. Nothing seemed out of place. Nothing hinted that things were about to spiral.

You were just leaving the teachers’ lounge when you saw her messy black hair — Joan Jett, the girl who didn’t fit into anything this school stood for.

Leaning against the wall in the empty hallway, one foot propped up against the tiles, she was dragging on a cigarette like it was the most natural thing in the world — right under a sign that read NO SMOKING. The lighter was still trembling between her fingers. Her uniform barely obeyed the dress code: a black Ramones t-shirt, chopped up with scissors, ripped jeans at the knees, filthy Converse. And worst of all — she was wearing a leather jacket in that heat.

You stopped, stunned. Part of you wanted to keep walking, pretend you hadn’t seen her. But the sense of responsibility — the one your mother had cultivated like a greenhouse flower — kicked in.

“You’re supposed to be in class,” You said, voice firm, arms crossed.

She didn’t move. Just turned her face toward you, slowly, blowing out a stream of smoke with a smirk that bordered on mocking.

You were about to reply. Maybe even threaten to report her. But you didn’t get the chance.

A loud bang erupted from the far end of the hallway. Then smoke — thick and gray — began to creep along the ceiling. The fire alarm shrieked so loud it rattled the windows. Students began pouring out of classrooms. Screaming. Running. Chaos.

You took a step back, startled, your heart pounding. Everything was happening too fast — the smoke swallowing the hallway, the red alarm lights flashing like a doomsday signal, the rising heat making the floor feel like it was about to boil.

Suddenly, someone slammed into you.

Your body twisted with the impact, and the papers you were holding flew into the air like dead leaves. The attendance sheet for the next meeting, library announcements, forms your mother had asked you to revise — all scattered across the corridor floor.

But you didn’t run.

Instead, you dropped to your knees, coughing through the smoke, trying to gather the papers with trembling hands.

That’s what you were taught to do: maintain order. Control the situation. Save what you can.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Her raspy voice sounded above you, equal parts disbelief and exasperation.

“I—”

You couldn’t finish. You coughed. The smoke burned your eyes. The siren felt like a jackhammer in your skull.

She grabbed your hand and she ran.

You stumbled — on your heels, on your dress, on everything that had ever restrained you — but she didn’t let go. You sprinted past the janitor’s closet, the trophy hallway. The main exit was blocked, students pushing, shoving, screaming like a panicked swarm of bees.

Joan pulled you aside, took a sharp turn, and opened a narrow door — the maintenance closet by the theater wing. She dragged you in behind her, and before you could say a word, the door slammed shut with a metallic click.

Silence and darkness.

Only the muffled wail of the alarm outside, the sound of both your breaths, harsh and unsteady, filling the tiny space between you.