Through The Fire

I woke up today around 5.30 AM with my brother Danny tugging my feet simultaneously. I was about to snap but then I realized his eyes were red and his voice was pretty shaky as he said this :

"Melina died... Fire...Her house burned down to the ground..."

I felt like cold hands gripping my inside and I went speechless until my maid peeked into my room and told me to go get ready because my driver was waiting to take me there. A bit of background info for you, she's one of my favorite cousins. We may not meet up a lot these days but we grew up and took a lot of family vacations together. We come from a really big family ( my dad is the 15th out of 16 children ) and I can't easily get along with everyone. Her presence was always a comfort during family gatherings. She's only two years older than me, very nice and friendly, which really help me at my totally awkward moments.

Anyway, I got dressed and arrived there a few hours later still not able to talk, people gathered at this house only 5 houses away from where it happened. A lot of them were crying, reporters and cameras were everywhere as well. I tried hugging her teary-eyed dad, her siblings, and when I saw her mom in some sort of a trance state unconscious and crying for her kind of way, it's like the reality started to sink in and I couldn't help crying my eyeballs out. I walked to the remains and saw that there's nothing left from the fire with the exception of the gate. And the second floor, where she died, is tumbling down to the ground. Nothing left.

Don't get me started on how her body looked like when they opened the coffin. I couldn't handle seeing it but some of my family did and told me. The body was completely burned / fried in charcoal-like color and there's a big chunk of her nose missing. Her blood's basically dried up.

The tragedy happened last night around 2 AM, fire was caused by electrical shortage or some other sort of electrical failure. All the people in the house were sleeping so it's already too late when they realized their house almost torn apart and smokes were everywhere. In the panic state, her siblings ran out of the house trying to get pass the fire. They had her sister's baby with them as well, unconscious and need to be taken to hospital immediately. Her parents tried to help her but it's just way too late and they had no options either to stay and unable to help but burned alive or ran. Melina was sleeping in the second floor along with 3 other relatives of hers, they couldn't come down and smokes invaded their lungs. They ran to the bathroom and tried to keep themselves wet but the fire was too big, it's a lost cause. She died in crouching position, I could not imagine her thoughts, fears, and prayers at the time. Just thinking about it giving me sharp pain somehow.

I was spending my day with the big family as we prayed for her then we all went to the graveyard for the funeral but I couldn't stay until they finished burying her. I was so light headed and dizzy, my dad took one look at me and told me to stay and wait at the car. It was so much tears as I began crying again. We went home later in the afternoon and I felt so tired, I slept until shortly after 6.30 PM. As I'm typing these, I'm watching the news still played on every TV station ( She's pretty known for being a model of several products ) and reading a lot of articles about it in the internet.

If you wanna watch one of them, here's a link :

Satu Korban Kebakaran di Tebet

Thank you for everyone's sympathy and kind words responding to these updates earlier today. It means a lot to all of our families.

Rest in peace, Mina, we miss you already!