Smoke
By Terrence Oblong
- 849 reads
It was the smell of the fire Danny liked, the smoky tingle up his nostrils as the fire took hold.
Sometimes he’d light a cigarette as he stood watching, savouring the double whammy of burning tobacco and burning building, until the fire triggered the mechanical sensory system of whichever building he was in and he was forced to leg it at speed to the safety of the network of alleys and sidestreets he knew so well. Usually he managed to keep the cigarette with him and alight, ready to take a drag on as soon as he was far enough away from blame. By which time he needed the feel of smoke across his lungs again.
It started with his school. The woodwork classroom to be precise, a petty revenge for being kept behind for “being careless with wood.” ‘I’ll show them careless with wood,’ he thought to himself, and, creeping back to school at midnight and nervously clawing open one of the windows, which were never locked, he crawled though, onto the hard oaken bench, and across the floor to the timber box. He smelt the woods, several kinds, though he didn’t know their names, savouring the smell of timber in its pre-burnt state. Its soon to be burnt state.
He surprised himself by being too nervous to light a match at first attempt, all clumsy fingers, but by second strike, watching the flame flicker over the kindling offerings that Danny dangled, his nerves were gone. Eventually the fire took, first to one piece of wood then another, spreading like lies through the minds of the ignorant: fast and unchecked. First the flame, then the smell, then the heat, the trinity of sensations that gave Danny delight.
Then, the immediate aftermath of his pyromanic high, Danny was suddenly wrought with nerves again, clambered clumsily back through the window, running home in blank panic as the school enflamed behind him. In the comfort of his bedroom, as he recovered his breath and his heart slowed to a normal human count of beats per minute, he smelt the smoke lingering on his body, and sniffed himself with genuine delight. On his clothes too the smell remained for hours and he lay awake all night, silently savouring his odours.
Though it was his first time, his fire virginity, Danny knew from that day on. All he wanted to do was make fire. He was a pyromaniac. Worth a sentence of its own that word. Pyromaniac. To Danny even the word itself sounded divine. He could create fire; he had the power to burn, to destroy. He gave life to fire. He gave life to destruction.
So Danny’s sleepy town suddenly woke to a new fear. At first Danny played it safe, disused buildings, schools and libraries at midnight, empty and no real harm done. Disused cowsheds and barns, even Mr Jenkin’s birdbox. But he soon tired of easy targets, and besides, there was a shortage of such properties, it was a one-birdbox town.
Danny grew more ambitious, creeping his way into office complexes, sneaking past
security guards, on duty throughout the night, eyes peeled for the famous fire-starter. Avoiding the gaze of CCTV, fighting off marauding guard-dogs, and then woof, the flame would take and the office would start to burn.
The target tonight was a warehouse. A large eclectic warehouse, storage for industrial equipment, tyres, boxes, bags and tittle-tattle. And paper, cardboard, a veritable treasure-trove of all things flammable.
The security guard was asleep, oblivious to the world - a student working nights to pay the rent, working days on the overdue dissertation he was working to fund and unable ultimately to resist the pull of sleep, a body can't survive without the healing power of dreams.
Danny lay a paper trail across the floor, making a pattern, to please the eye as the fire spread, which it did, with a generous burst of fiery light, to the four corners of the warehouse floor.
He'd marked his exit, plus an emergency retreat if things went wrong: preparation, preparation, preparation. But he didn't expect that bloody bang. Whizz-bang, fucking boom, crackle, fizz, what the fuck? Zeeeewhheezzbang, boom, zedam! A crack, a cracker, an explosion, fucking fireworks. Fireworks. He'd set fire to a fucking fire-work store.
Flames all around, smoke everywhere he could see, except he couldn't see, all he could feel was the sting in his eyes where the smoke played. Heat. So hot he couldn't think to move. The door was somewhere near, but where? But too late anyway, objects fell, machinery, metal, timber planks, something heavy on his leg, fuck it's broken. The pain of the leg he couldn't feel, because of the pain of everywhere else. Danny realised he was on fire, he could tell from the smell - he was something of an expert.
Danny lay on the floor, enflamed in foetal position. Outside alarms were ringing, the sleeping student had finally rejoined the world and decide to alert it. Soon the fire brigade would be here, but too late for Danny. He knew enough about smoke to know he had less than a minute to live if he couldn't get fresh air. Never mind the burning, never mind the broken bits, never mind the exhaustion, asphyxiation would be the death of him. His would be the charcoaled remains the firestaff retrieved the next day.
Danny's eyes slowly lost the power to open. His ears too lacked the will to hear the crackle of his funeral pyre. His body was overcome with pain and no longer retained any sense of touch or taste, but he still had his sense of smell. Danny's last experience was the brutish eek of his own burning body, like a roast pork joint. Oh, the smell of fire, the smell of toasting flesh, the smell of death, oh how Danny relished these experiences more than any that had come before. This is why he was here, why he was on this earth, to smell the burning death of it all.
Danny died with a smile on what remained of his face.
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