That night, July 11, 2022, Nick Bostic was driving down the streets of Lafayette, Indiana, when he found a two-story house was on fire.
Flames (火焰) were climbing up the front porch. Without pausing for a moment to think about the danger, Bostic stopped his car and ran from the back door into the burning building, which belongs to the Barrett family.
Bostic had just started climbing the stairs when he looked up and saw four faces appear from a room at the top of the stairs and look down at him, their eyes wide. "Your house is on fire, you need to go!" Bostic yelled.
Bostic hurried the four girls into the fresh air. "Anybody else in there?" Bostic asked.
"Kaylani is in there! We can't find her!" Seionna, the eldest of the girls, screamed referring to her six-year-old sister. Without hesitating, Bostic ran back inside.
By now, the whole side of the house was in flames. Bostic went upstairs. He searched every bedroom. No kid. The smoke was thick now. He lifted his T-shirt, trying to cover his mouth and nose when he heard the sound of crying, from the dark smoke below.
Bostic felt about in the blackness and heat, moving downstairs toward the sound. Then suddenly Kaylani was in front of him. Bostic quickly lifted the girl into his arms. Where is the front door?! Bostic remembered seeing a window on the side of the house where the fire hadn't reached.
Bostic climbed back up, made it to the room and broke the glass, Kaylani still in his arms.
Bostic and Kaylani looked down at the open grassy space. The girl said, " __________ " He was thinking the exact same thing.
But they had little choice. The flames were inching ever closer. Holding Kaylani tightly in one arm, Bostic ran forward and threw himself out of the window. He managed to land on the other shoulder. Kaylani was almost unhurt.
Days passed. Bostic woke up from first-degree burns to his leg and arm, He felt like he'd just done what anyone would have done in that situation. But outside the hospital, the story of Nick Bostic was already spreading. He was a hero-the pizza man who had run into a burning building not once, but twice.
