The Fire in Chicago

I wrote this for the Tribune Ghost Story contest. It asked for a 700 word story and after finishing mine, the count was about 972. Spending the next 3 days cutting it down was painful as the story lost alot of descriptions, pacing, well, just about everything.
The soulless entry lies below.
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The Fire in Chicago

At 9pm on Tuesday, October 8th 1996, the building on DeKoven Street burst into flames. In the alley that night Johnny was the first to see it from his bike. He was late for his curfew set by his overprotective, retired Chicago firefighter father. He was also the first to see them.
He smelled the smoke first. It was coming from a house two doors back. He rolled there, watching smoke billow out of the windows and flames shimmer behind the back door.
Suddenly the door ignited and instead of spreading outwards, the flames took the form of a man. Johnny wanted to look around and tell someone in the silent, surreal neighborhood but he was transfixed by the unnatural shape on the door. Surging outwards but not in a way fire is supposed to act, it moved forward, walking step by step across the backyard, dancing like fire but retaining its humanoid shape. Seconds later it was followed by another. They looked like people, marching, moving with a purpose. Soon there were more, moving out from the door and the walls, drifting in multiple directions. Alarmingly some of them straight at Johnny.
He turned his bike again towards home, looked over his shoulder, and saw more of the crackling shapes crossing the alley and sliding into adjacent buildings. As he got to the end of the block, he stopped and tried to breathe. Dozens of them were stalking, floating, filling the alley and spreading outwards. By now at least nine houses were alight and he could hear screams from residents as they ran outside, smoke detectors beeping from their open doorways. He pedaled around the corner, where everything on the next street looked normal at first glance but almost instantly he saw a flicker of light heralding their arrival. They drifted into view, moving through trees, cars and anything else in their way, always in a straight line and igniting everything they touched. If these things kept walking, his house and his father were in their path.
DeKoven Street wasn’t a coincidence he knew, since his father had shared the history of the Chicago Fire with him. That was the street where it had started. Exactly one hundred and twenty five years ago it consumed the city and left the same number of bodies in its wake. A chill went down his spine. Were there that many walking the streets this night? He raced the fire shapes home.
Once there, he jumped off his bike, ghost-riding it, and slammed through the door yelling for his dad. He scrambled through the house as his father came out of the kitchen. Johnny stopped in the hallway and tried to explain everything as his father moved to calm him. But as he approached him, a fire ghost walked out of the wall of the bedroom, crossed the hallway between them and went right into the bathroom wall, leaving both walls ablaze in its wake.
His dad grabbed an extinguisher to spray the walls, mumbling about some illusion of the fire. Johnny said that he saw it too and there were more. His father called 911 then led Johnny out into the street.
As his father banged on doors to people’s houses, Johnny set off car alarms to alert them faster. Then, as Johnny watched, his father pushed past a crying woman, and entered a house already engulfed in flames. Johnny tried to follow but someone in the crowd held him back. In a hush the crowd waited until triumphantly, his father stumbled out carrying a child wrapped in wet blankets. Someone took the child while another caught his father as he fell. Johnny looked on tearfully as his father succumbed to smoke inhalation. He died with a smile on his lips, proud of his son and the good he’d done that night.
The fire ghosts walked four miles on that horrific anniversary before extinguishing themselves. The same distance that the Chicago Fire burned through the Windy City.

Years later, John graduated and walked out of the Chicago Fire Academy. Hearing sirens blocks away, he hoped the next fire he saw would be ghost free.
Except maybe for his father. Watching over him.