Smoke. It engulfed me, enveloped me, it was the only thing I could imagine. I breathed it in, can still feel the burn on my eyes. The heat nudged my skin, the smell overwhelming my sinuses. I was disoriented beyond relief, like an atom of the nonexistant oxygen with no idea where I was bumping around in space. I stumbled repeatedly, short heels tottering and becoming unbalanced. My new dress had caught around the corner of the bed, the light blue silk had tightened around me as I tried to struggle free, until it finally ripped with a sound I might have found satisfying in any other situation. I yearned to call out for somebody, anybody, the earrings I had been gripping tightly falling to the carpet. Pearls fastened around my wrist pinched my skin, and salty tears had fallen out of the creases of my tightly closed eyes. I was going to die here, in the smoke, one with the smoke. My tightly curled hair frizzed unimaginably, light reflecting from the flickering flames, but the only thing I could bring myself to care about was not even the fire. It was the smoke.