The Fire of the Mind

         The glowing smoke spiraled into the night's sky. The blight on the land showed high contrast to the shadowed houses surrounding it. This house was singled out from the surrounding homes for it was filled with leaping flames that continually grew as did the crowd around the bright spectacle. Like a disturbed backyard bonfire, the neighbors circled the once-inhabited establishment for their perverse warmth and entertainment. Their forked tongues whispered viciously of everything known about the Peters family. The family that once stood out on the block that now had a flaming house which did the same.

         The only remaining member of the Peters family sat uncomfortably on the lawn beside the glowing pit which used to constitute his home, his room, his family, his life. He listened patiently and carefully to the contemptuous voices which encircled his thoughts. The whispered secrets and rumors now filling his mind, unable to ignore the poisonous coments he sat in the surprisingly cool, dark grass. The ash-covered child looked around at them hurtfully, and as they caught his glance, they looked away ashamedly, suddenly finding anything but his gaze fascinating. He stalked into a nearby playground within the view of the glowing air, of the sparks which playfully twirled into the night.

         The swings were eerily wavering with the wind's blow. He inhabited one to stop the movement, the endless motion like a jungle-gym pendulum. He reflected on the day and night, on his life, on his parents, and on how he had killed them.

         He was lost in thought, memory overtaking his present consciousness as he reflected on the life he had lived and the family which was now missing from it. It was a week ago, when he had walked into the small community library, a usual haunt for the diligent student, the librarians glanced over him; the shock that the bruise over his left eye should have elicited was absent. They had become used to the bruises and injuries which riddled his face and tiny frame. He quietly worked his routine, all the while his thoughts showing a mile-a-minute through his eyes; the window to the soul. He walked through the the towering shelves, like vigilant, silent giants they stood alert of his every move. He picked out his new interest and walked toward the librarian. His mental checklist in front of him, as if plastered on his eyelids, of what to do and say to get as quickly away from this protector of the books as possible.

         The librarian always started the conversation, "What's the book about today, Simon?" she would ask politely.

         "I don't know, I haven't read it yet," he would always reply.

         "Be sure to let me know tomorrow, okay?"

         He never would, and she never probed him about it, thankfully. The shock of an elementary school student reading a book in a day had worn off as quickly as the shock of the sight of his beatings. He would take his new treasure over to the table in the corner and complete his school assignments, then read until the small library closed for the day. Then he would take up his book and grasp his steadfastly between his branch-like arms; shielding his tiny body from the world, as if the brave characters within would embolden him toward the very real nightmare which he returned to daily.

         As he walked down the neighborhood street, he averted the glance of other children. He knew why they stared, as his unintentionally long and somewhat greasy hair blew in the wind behind him. His torn clothes were noticeably dirty and he knew it. Simon wasn't at all bothered by his appearance, but he knew how other children were; his appearance was all that mattered. His battered shoes flopped pitifully on the ground, and he walked toward the house that was undoubtedly his. The lawn a miniature jungle, of which the indigenous creatures consisted of abundant grasshoppers, ticks, and pools of mosquito-spawn. Somewhat decomposing garbage was scattered about, as if there were a different sort of peculiar lawn decorations and the rust-enriched vehicle stood in the driveway.

         He would run into the house, up the stairs and into his bedroom as quickly as possible. If his parents were too incapacitated from drunkenness or strung out from the latest dosage of whatever they could find then he would rifle quickly and efficiently through the kitchen for whatever scraps were present, usually avoiding a beating as he had had years of practice at escaping the man's whippings. He would then spend the rest of the night secluded in his room, reading voraciously. It was all he could do. The odd hobby had turned into as much of an obsession as what the incapacitated grown beings below him had toward drugs or alcohol. It had turned into an escape from his life, from his existence.

         Over time, he had begun to respect the books, their ideas, the knowledge they gave and began to regard them as friends with their own personalities; however this only made it worse for Simon as he would cry for himself and for the poor books being brought into this terrible environment. He would read until he passed out from exhaustion, and would clutch it in his sleep as protection for the yelling matches that occurred through the paper-thin walls in the night. Then in the morning he would climb out of his window to escape any and all interaction with his adults. Not parents, just adults that happened to live near him, in fact they lived so near that they were in the same house: they were disgusting roommates.

         The day of the fire, the day which led to this night, however, was not the average day for Simon Peters. As he came home from the library in the early twilight, the young boy stumbled toward his dwelling and heard that the shouting competition had begun early. Simon attempted to climb the giant tree, maybe skipping out on the ensuing beating, but his weak muscles couldn't lift even the lightest person, his emaciated self included.

         Simon was forced to enter the house to face his sickening roomies. His father began the incoherent yelling at him by mumbling loudly about "responsibility..." and "pulling your weight..." then lunged at the adolescent. The boy instinctively lurched away, avoiding the strong fingers from gripping his nimble body, keeping sure there were no injuries for him to awkwardly explain in the morning. His father wasn't aiming for his son, however, but for the book. Each one his most prized possession, the monster of a man then began to stomp and defile the boy's relic in front of him. Simon couldn't keep it in; he hated him and yelled with the same incoherency as the raging brute of a man. Tear-stained and burning, the hatred spewed uncontrollably as he resorted to the only defense he knew, shelter.

         He boiled and brooded int he dark of his room, rocking back and forth and weeping as his psyche broke into shards of glass, incompatible and irreparable. The hatred stung as the realization was met that he had always hated their neglect, their beatings, their monthly check for his existence, their hateful words and unforgiving actions. As the boy drifted into a searing unconsciousness, the parents did so as well with the help of the wood alcohol.

         The lit cigarettes in the hands of the terrifying roommates fell toward the alcohol-enriched carpets and began and terrible fire which licked and spat across the lower level of the ramshackle abode. Fire moved without rebuke or question, everything being lapped up, and nothing showing any restraint or rebuke, even the smoke detectors were broken and melted along silently accepting their fate. Simon smelled the acrid stench and was awoken by the burning smoke in his eyes; fire. He bolted to his bedroom door and grabbed with his hand, immediately pulling back from the blistering doorknob, as he learned in school, the fire must be right outside, knocking for entrance. He mechanically ran to his normal escape route and rested in the tree for a long while. As the house became brighter, the sky darkened from deeper shades of violet into a danker, inky void of absence.

         He willed himself back into the present, and went over the details. Somehow in his rage, Simon had sparked the flames that engulfed his parents. He remembered myths of fire-starters, and the fiction around telepathy. He knew that in his smoldering anger, he had burnt his parents to death.

         A noise came from his left. Out of the shadows stepped an ash-smudged fireman. He looked softly at the boy as he took off his helmet and motioned toward the swing rocking erratically next to him. The young boy resignedly nodded, afraid of the fireman's rage when he found out what he had done. Would he go to jail? Be put to death?

         "I'm told you're Simon," the man began, and saw the immediate recognition and nod. "I'm sorry to have to tell you, but your parents didn't make it out of the fire." He let the news sit with the boy, and saw the expected fear and tremors running through the boy's body. He didn't understand that Simon wasn't fearful as much as a guilt-ridden heart. "We think it was a cigarette that caught fire to your home The substances that we found around the remains didn't seem to help. Do you have any relatives we can call for you?"

         The boy jumped from the swings at the words "cigarette." The fireman had thought he had seen everything, but the tears of relief and joy coming from Simon were unique. He hugged the man around the waist and was free. Simon reflected that where he went now didn't matter, he would never be hurt by his parents again. They were gone from his life forever, and the only remnant of their black existence was the rotted stump of a tooth among the pearly white suburban houses surrounding them.