Magic Fire

Hotter and drier than ever.

MAGIC FIRE

On the day the ‘Magic Fire’ night-club opened, wasn’t exactly the most prodigious day of the week, month, or year, it was just another grim grey day in another anonymous town in England. The only problem the club had was - fog. For anyone who doesn’t know what fog is, then they would have to take a look at photographs from newspapers or films, where fog is the element around which the story is set. The fact is, that fog is wet and cold, and in a large city it creates an unpleasant stickiness which dirties up just about everything. Many people who live in an area where fog is an autumnal occurrence, tend to wear dark clothes, but even then, eventually clothes begin to smell. Everything suffers: skin, hair and breathing. The night club had been the inspiration of three young out-of-work women: Trudy, Sonia, and Phoebe. Why had they chosen to call their club ‘Magic Fire’? It had come about because of a telluric event that no one had been able to explain.

Phoebe was driving back home with her boyfriend one summer evening. The couple was chatting away quite happily inside the car about nothing in particular, when Phoebe’s boyfriend, Marvin, said to Phoebe, “Take a look at that sun.”

Phoebe sat still inside the car and put on her very dark sunglasses, and said, “Why is it so bright? The sunset isn’t always as bright as this. So what’s going on with the sun?”

“I know as much as you do. We’re always being informed that the sun is sending out bigger and bigger flares, perhaps that’s why it’s so bright today.”

“I think we should stay inside the car and get home as soon as we can without causing an accident,” Phoebe said unconvincingly.

Marvin kept his foot down and they sped along the road to their home. Phoebe tried to stare inside the passing vehicles, but she saw nothing in anyone’s face that gave her any doubt about their being worried.

“It looks just like a gigantic ball of orange and red flames, don’t you think, Marvin?”

Marvin was busy concentrating on the orange coloured road which stretched out ahead of him, and all the other drivers travelling in the same direction.

That night on national television, there was a special report about the strange sunset that had taken place a few hours before. There was a special programme shown later, when the vast majority of the general public would be in bed and fast asleep. As usual in such cases, grey bearded old fogies were dragged out before the television cameras, to provide some kind of explanation that might satisfy anyone watching, and would be the subject of a reasonably sized article in the following day’s newspapers.

Phoebe had two friends, Sonia and Trudy. The three had met when they were studying at the same college. None of them were especially talented, except for the fact that they were not bad business-women. Phoebe had set up a beauty blog, and lived from it, while Trudy had a food blog, and Sonia was into soft furnishings for the home. All in all, they went well together. Phoebe rang them up on the evening of the big sun, and asked them if they had seen it from where they were at that moment.

Sonia and her partner Andy were decorating their new home, and weren’t really aware of the strong sun, only that the sunset lasted longer than it ought to have done. When she went outside, after cleaning up and putting all the decorating materials away, the lawn and the plants felt warm to her touch. Sonia switched on the hosepipe and began watering the entire garden lawn and plants, in order to cool all the plants down. As she sprayed the garden with water she called Andy, “Come and see this Andy.”

He ran outside and saw that as the water left the hosepipe, it was turned into steam when it touched the plants, and then evaporated into the evening air.

“You’d better turn the hosepipe off, or you’ll get a hefty water bill.”

The steam was rather like a fog that can be seen in the summer at the end of a hot day. Andy said to Sonia, “If it weren’t so warm, it would be fog.”

In time, he was to remember his words.

Trudy and Lester hadn’t paid any attention to the sunset, because they were busy preparing the food for a wedding the next day. They were caterers and were quite well-known, due to Trudy’s food blog. Trudy shared all kinds of food tips and recipes. Some of them were titled ‘From my mother’s kitchen’ or ‘From my grandmother’s kitchen’. The main idea behind the blog, was to reach as many people as possible by informing them of tried and tested recipes and menus. The other side of making the blog, was so that whoever looked at YouTube was able to see what kind of menus, she and Lester could carry out. The wedding cakes were left to a baker, and they designed the decoration according to the instructions of the happy couple. Letters and comments received, were taken into account when they offered a different slant on a particular recipe. The colour schemes for the tables were done, following what the bride and groom wanted. When the choice was really quite awful then Trudy called on Sonia to help her out. Phoebe got herself involved too, with the make-up for the bride, her mother, and the bridesmaids, and if she so wanted, the groom’s mother too. As time went by, the catering company became more and more famous, and they were inundated with orders. Trudy and Lester spent most of their time cooking, packaging the goods, and delivering them. They had some friends who set up the tables and decorated the venues. The scandalous sunset had been missed by them, due to their heavy work load. Although their bedroom was warm as a result of the sun, as they had been so exhausted after the heat of the kitchen, they had showered, and tumbled into bed, leaving the rest of the world to wonder and worry.

The fiery sunset had taken place in the summer, and had been called by many names. One reporter had called it ‘Magic Fire’ because the flairs being sent off by the sun didn’t set fire to anything. At times, photos of the sun with the incredibly long orange red tongues of flame, leaping out and away. It could be seen by everyone on the planet with even a modest telescope. Scaremongers were seen carrying boards claiming, ‘The end is nigh’, No one was a hundred per cent certain about what was going on.

Then summer gave way to autumn. Even so, the sunset was still far too strong, and everyone was getting upset by so much dryness. The air was thick with dust, making it difficult to breath, and people wore masks to help make walking in the streets more comfortable. The members of society who were either under five years old or over sixty, were advised to remain indoors, in case of breathing difficulties. As it was, the A&E departments at hospitals were overflowing with many patients all over the country. Phoebe, Trudy, and Sonia, continued working as well as they could.

Meanwhile the rivers and lakes were drying up, and water had to be rationed. The water companies sent out leaflets informing then general public the timetable when water would be available. Clouds appeared in the sky and hid the fiery sun, but they didn’t contain any water. The prophets of doom were having a field-day and saying nature was having its revenge on humanity. Most of that talk was ignored by television viewers and radio listeners.

The most amazing thing of all was, that nothing caught fire although, as time passed, everything was becoming drier and drier. The nocturnal display of flames was not seen everywhere, but the heat was felt. The air was stifling at times, and made sleep extremely difficult. As the days drifted slowly by, it was easier to manage, because nobody in authority was willing enough to say what the sun was doing.

October, which was traditionally a wet and windy month arrived and with it the hope of rain. Nothing, of course, happened until Phoebe went on YouTube with her new make-up designs for autumn and winter. The bright reds and oranges were most unusual, but taking into consideration the state of the sun’s flares, anything less would have been seen as weird. So everyone began to have a rethink about the events going on high above their heads. The first question everyone asked was, how had the sun got so hot? The second question was why was it so full of flares? The third question was where would it be safer to live, if the sun stayed as hot as it was, and getting hotter? The fourth question was when would all the chaos with the sun stop?

The entire world was asking those questions without getting any answers. Ideas were ten-a-penny as to guess what would be next on the agenda with the weather. The flares were still functioning, but there were still no answers about their origin, the commonest response was that the sun was creating the flares. But that didn’t answer the question - why? Where and when it would all end, was not given a thought by the ones who should have helped everyone to understand.

One night when everyone was in bed it started raining. At first very gently, but as the hours passed, the rain steadily increased until it was a downpour. The earth and plants had been so long without rain and only receiving the heat from an overheated sun and its flares that, as soon as the cooling rain hit them all the built up dryness turned into steam and then made the atmosphere as if a great fog was overtaking the countryside.

October finished, and November entered, which is a foggy month. Phoebe, Sonia, and Trudy, had decided to set up a night-club and call it ‘Magic Fire’, after the boiling hot months they and every one else had gone through. Why did they call it ‘Magic Fire’? Well it was because nothing ever got burnt.

On the opening night of the club, anyone who attended was keen to find out what kind of novelty was going to be found inside. As the clients entered and left their coats, they then walked into a darkened room. “Now, everyone. Does this remind you of anything?”

Two heavy doors slid open, and to everyone’s surprise, they saw the very thing they had thought had gone out of their lives. The sun with its flares, just the same as if they were travelling along a country road. For some unknown reason, those present moved closer to the sun to try and discover what it was they were actually staring at. As they neared, the fake sun spun faster and faster, and sucked all of them inside it. All those present had gone through the ‘Magic Fire’, it was totally another experience. The group was pushed through a small tunnel and when it stopped moving they found themselves in a fake ski resort, where they could dance to keep warm.

“How do we return to the club?” they asked.

The manager who was in charge replied, “You can’t go back. You might tell everyone the trick, and we wouldn’t like that - would we.”