Fires had been erupting all across the city. Not spreading, just then, though soon. Not being set, they said on the radio that afternoon, just happening. Not just buildings. Stretches of main streets, asphalt suddenly a logjam of burning red fabric; a circle of flames brought to life at Generation Ballpark, just left of center field; signposts, traffic lights, even the rooftop pool of the newly opened Marriott Hotel and Convention Center had somehow set itself to just what the present held in store for all of us. Verona FD was close to tapped, resources worn down to the point where the radio called for all able-bodied individuals to report to anywhere, anyhow, just wherever they could, because there were fires erupting all across the city, and they said on the radio that afternoon that nobody had any idea why.

We had been hasty with the handcuffs some several hours earlier. Ended up with either wrist seized, both of us chained to the bare-iron bed frame. Snap decision to just keep going. Keys under the bed, nothing else to do but take the occasional break, master those in between moments. Breathing face to face against spread lips. Skin smeared in a wet collage, hair plastered to the point where it appeared someone had marked us with 3D graffiti. No way to turn the radio off. Our final pillow wasted some time ago, no luck, bringing a potted daisy to an untimely end, down from a naked window sill. Cracked clay and soil spread out along the paradise of a square-foot sunbeam.

No room for the world in that bed, and each time, within minutes, there was another each time.

“Try this,” Jamie breathed against my forehead.

“Which way?” I asked, tongue out for a run along clavicle tracks.

“Push me this way.”

“Just under?”

“Yeah. Just.”

“There?”

“Don’t slow. Make it move, grab.”

“Neck.”

“Yes.” Then asked, “Okay?”

“Yes. Nails is good, you don’t have to worry.”

“We’re going to burn alive just like this.”

I said yes, and another spontaneous burst brought another one to life, this time across the block. A trail of headstones joining in, set ablaze as we switched, just seeing which one of us could fill our mouths with more. Words muffled, gladly choking on the obvious, the length of an entire summer day dedicated to us. Hands clutching for blind friction. Hardwood floor catching on, flames licking. Bare walls buckling. Hips taking all initiative. Salt melting into open scratches, willing welts, blistering, entire room coming into collapse, fires finding their point of origin, leaving the town to lose its mind, broadcast replaced with the vibrating cry of an emergency broadcast because the heat was too much for this planet to handle, and what if it had actually rained that day, just like they said it was supposed to on the radio that morning?

###

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