Cinder, Ash, and Black Charcoal Feathers

A man embraces the flames and throws his bad life into them, one piece at a time.

 

I rearranged a room full of furniture today; empty shells of wood that don’t really hold much of anything anymore.  This room was a part of my mother’s house, and my mother had died, you see, three years ago and it has been quiet and lovely and dismal and gloomy all the same without her. I hated her, you see, and she hated me too and in my heart I feel I willed her to die of something nasty and she did.

 

So, uncomfortable cushions that my mother stapled to the dusty wood frame of the couch, which were worn down to springs (and I hated them for years and she loved them because I hated them), were the first things I threw into the great fire out back. The flames licked at the fabric and ripped though in gaping holes, and singed my pupils with the growing intensity of heat.

 

Soon the flames grew weak and begged for more things to eat, and I felt in my heart I wanted to oblige. The chairs were caked in dirt and deserved a right good cleaning, but in the midst of the dying flames I didn’t have the time to fuss with the wet rag and dish soap. I dragged each chair out the door one by one, like the wooden death row, the seats glowing orange and yellow from the begging fire.

 

Tossed one to the flames, and she picked up a little, but she didn’t bite the way I thought she would. The fire faded a bit and my heart pumped faster; felt for the fire in some sympathetic way. The chair rolled off the pile of logs and onto the grass, practically untouched by the heat. Anger swelled in my gut as the life of the fire faded faster, the wood of the chair ugly and dusty and needing a right good cleaning.

 

CRACK! I slammed that chair so hard into the ground, I thought the soil would crater. The legs departed sweetly and most violently from the seat, the splinters flaking in the air and down into the soft grass. CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! The dust flew in puffs, bits of the chair looking cleaner than they had in years.

 

Tossed them into the flames, and she picked up strong. Crackling and radiating some of the most refreshing warmth you can get for free, she sang for more to engulf wildly, and I was a wild man too, breaking my mother’s dining chairs one by one against the earth; one by one they break and burn and she sang and sang and sang for me. 

 

Then all too soon, the chairs were gone and the fire moaned and creaked for more to eat and I felt in my heart I must oblige. I ran inside through the rickety old door and my eyes met the empty desk and dresser drawers and end tables and picture frames. My heart swelled up with love and affection and I dragged the desk and dresser through the room and out the door, leaving long deep scrapes in the old wooden floor.

 

The axe hung proudly on the wall just before my feet could reach the back door and I grabbed it firmly in one hand as I dragged the desk out to the lonely fire and the dresser quickly after it, not wanting to waste any valuable time. As I pulled the desk over the grass and dirt, my back suddenly burned with an angry warmth too close to be warranted. I spun around to see her burning across the lawn, ever closer the house, but she waited for me still, wanting to be closer to me and to be near me and only me.

 

I smiled brightly at her licking flames, desperately reaching for the fresh wood of the desk. The axe grew warm in my hand  and I gripped it tightly in both and drew it back long and slow.

 

CRACK! Slash, crunch, bits and pieces and slivers in my fingers, she picked up strong just from the scent of the wood, like a predator that sensed blood the moment its scent pricked the air. God, she was beautiful when she devoured it whole, and my body filled up with trembles and shakes that couldn’t be controlled.

 

Old things that were dead and gone, she burned them up for me, and we loved it together. She licked the grass, the earth, the walls, the windows, the shingles. She swallowed the house, and my wide eyes glowed with warmth and happiness, and loneliness and fears burned to cinder and ash and black charcoal feathers.

 

She started to whimper as the house collapsed within her, her heat cooling down and my eyes turning back to icy gray. She called me closer and in my heart I knew I must oblige. Closer and closer and closer, her golden tongue licking my shoes and she was crying for me and reaching for me and I was doing the same for her.

 

She swallowed me up and her heat was intense but I knew I belonged inside her forever, and she inside me. She licked my bones clean and sent me up into the wind, rules and secrets and prison and house burned to cinder and ash and black charcoal feathers.

Reviews

[bluejohn]

The descriptions are wonderful. I love how the character speaks of the fire as a person. I would like to see the story fleshed out a bit more. It leaves me wondering why the character is doing this 3 years after their mothers death, what brought them to this?