Fire

Fire...

She loved watching the little flame, wavering, curious, peeking its orange head over the top of the clear purple-blue lighter, reflecting off the fingers that gave it life. She killed it quickly with the flick of her thumb, then brought it back a moment later, a phoenix, reincarnated...

She lit leaves, tiny twigs, isolated in shallow pits she scraped in the cool September dirt of the park. It was sandy soil that didn’t grow much but stiff-stemmed grass. Dried rivulets and gullies snaked across the field, steep-carved little canyons downhill. To a mouse, the tiny streams were giant lakes, slim rushing oceans. The girl’s small flames were bonfire signals that flashed against the night.

When gray dark rain made everything too damp, toilet paper burned nicely, cleanly, a sudden bright flare against the dust-streaked sides on the stall before shadows rushed back in. It left a fine gray ash she ground into the concrete with the toe of her sandal. The spider in the corner window huddled in the center of its web.

She hadn't known it was illegal, no, not exactly--though she never checked to make sure. She wouldn't have stopped anyway. She craved the gold-laced adrenaline shiver of doing what she wasn't supposed to, crouched in that sharp-grained sand in the dark.

Flames licked at her fingers, at her face, stretching for life as she fed it carefully, so slowly, building up its heart. Footsteps. A soft vibration coming towards her, towards here, shitshitshit. Her breathing spiked. She kicked dirt across the little pit, stomped its reaching yellow strength into black. Shit. She stayed stone-still, thinking tree thoughts, trying not to breathe too hard, craving invisibility. The footsteps passed, tugging a gray sharp-nosed dog behind them. There was a soft murmur of Japanese. She sagged into the sand as dog and owner moved past.

When she slipped back home, no one mentioned her hair smelled like smoke.