The fire

A sheet of fire extended from the living room of Rock's father's apartment through the kitchen and front wall and across a ridge of tile to the street. Rock didn't know whether he or his cats Pam and Jo would make it out alive.
This circumstance had evolved in mere seconds.
Minutes before the fire started, Rock had found the cats slathered in old, filthy cooking oil. They apparently had waded through a frying pan in the kitchen. Rock used a kitchen rag and water from the sink to clean them and then carried them to the living room where his father—Richard, who was away for the morning—kept a somewhat exotic dryer. It was a shoe-box-sized, hard black plastic machine from which stretched a flexible hose of steel and mesh and a nozzle that combined to look and work exactly like a kitchen-sink sprayer.
Rock sat on a couch and used the device to blow hot air across his now soggy but clean cats, but within seconds, water rather than air began to spray from the hose. Next, the handle became so hot he could no longer hold it. He dropped it on the couch as sheets of water sprayed through the apartment's immaculate front rooms. Just as it occurred to Rock to concern himself with Richard's expensive, suddenly water-damaged stuff, he saw that the sprayer handle had become so hot that it ignited a quilt on the couch, which almost immediately exploded into flames that began to spread everywhere.
No more than a second later, it was clear that the fire was already beyond his ability and resources to stop. He knew they all needed out, but there was no obvious way. The fire had engulfed everything between them and the street. Even the tile-covered lawn was aflame.