GenePoool.com Fiction

Burning Desire

I'm in love with fire.

I have been from the first time I saw an open flame, a moment I remember very well; it stands out vividly in the black-and-white photo album of my memory. We had lost power, as had the rest of the city block. I was six and had never experienced such darkness before. I was frightened. And my mother, God rest her soul, lit a small taper for me; one lone candle in the dark. I sat transfixed by the flame. It danced about like a drunken stripper, constantly threatening to extinguish, but never quite doing so. And when mother left us (mother worked nights) we made our peace with the darkness.

When I touched the flame to the wallpaper and watched it grow and creep to the ceiling I knew I'd found that one thing in my life without which I am incomplete. Later, from the street, I witnessed the marvelous realization of my tiny candle flame, as it engulfed an entire neighborhood.

It was exhilarating.

Fire has been my only darling since. My fascination has advanced as steadily as that small flame climbing up the wallpaper.

For the next few years I chased my love by setting small fires-- wooden crates, trash bins, the occasional park bench-- until, at twelve, I had a breakthrough of sorts in the form of a stray cat. I tied him to a pile of newspapers set atop a sewer grate. The grate was important; the air from below was needed to feed the fire. It took seventeeen minutes for the flames to earn the strength to reach the cat. Then all at once, the warm, fuzzy stray exploded in a brilliant cascade of plasma. (Incidentally, rats are not as effective in this exercise. But dogs work remarkably well.) But even though the city provides an endless supply of strays, I still was not entirely content. I didn't understand why until much later.

By the time I reached adulthood I had fully mastered the art of pyrotechnics. I was watching my latest creation from the safety of a nearby building-- an abandoned tenement very much like the one I grew up in-- as the flame made itself known in window after window, when quite suddenly a man burst out of the front door. Understand, it's not at all unusual for "abandoned" buildings to be semi-occupied on occasion, but typically it's a derelict of some kind, and they generally succumb to the smoke while asleep.

This was something new.

The gentle flames licked his body with a rapture of immolation I had never imagined possible. It was more than simply burning; the man and the fire became one right before me. For one eternal second-- before his imminent death-- he stood still, looked to the heavens, and reveled in ecstasy.

I was overwhelmed with envy. I knew what I had to do. I only lacked the courage. Until now.

Now it's time for me to enjoy that one final thrill.

© 2000, Gene Doucette