Nicholas Day - At the End of the Day I Burst into Flames

“I have the fire inside me,” he said, smoke billowing from the cuffs and collar of his shirt.

He burst into flames.

And he reached for me.

This is the dream, and I have it often.

Emily and I dated at the end of high school and when high school ended we dated in college. I’d lost love twice by then and was bound and determined not to lose it a third time. Ours was a courthouse wedding.

I took a freelance gig for school credit that turned into a full-time illustrating position and I proposed to Emily after graduation. We married the following summer. She landed a teaching position.

Emily educates second graders at Collinsville Middle School, just outside of Edwardsville. A grade school teacher, she’s the yin to my yang. I make more money but she gets better benefits. I know it sounds resentful, but with two kids we could use the extra cash.

Our oldest, Brandon, is in high school. He doesn’t smoke. Brandon plays football. He’s a quarterback at Edwardsville High School. I tried to get him interested in art and even writing but neither stuck. He’s too much like his mother.

Emily and I go to all of Brandon’s games. He plays really well, I think. Emily was a sports fanatic when we were younger. She played softball for Wood River. I would go to see her games, smoking habitually in the stands. Emily says Brandon plays well, and I believe her.

I think Brandon is homosexual. I brought this up to Emily last night. My hope was that Brandon would come out to us, though it didn’t look like that was going to happen. Unfortunately, at this point my time was running short and I felt like I needed to say something before I was gone for, well… forever.

“Honey, you ever think Bran is different?” I lowered my glasses to let her know I was serious.

Emily had just come up from the laundry room; a full basket crammed under one arm. She dumped the clothes on our bed and turned toward me.

“Why in the hell would you of all people worry about him being different?”

“He’s never had a girlfriend, for one.”

“But he’s only—”

“Seventeen, Em. Yes, I am aware of his age.”

“He’s a shy boy.” Emily balled her hands into fists and rested them on her hips. I could see her working the inside of her cheek. She took a defensive stance, though I had no idea at that time what she had to be so defensive about.

“Okay,” I said. “Why does he play sports if he’s so shy?”

“He says it’s out of habit.” She turned away from me and toward the laundry. “He’s not gay, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“You mean you asked him about it?”

“Months ago.”

“So you think he’s gay?”

“No.” She threw a pair of folded socks which smacked me in the chest. “Look, I get it. You didn’t have a good father figure in your life, so you’re trying to fill that hole, but you’re just being paranoid.”

Emily edged close to the truth. Paranoid, yes, but not because I wanted to fill some hole left in my life by my father. I knew my end approached even if Emily did not.

I had seen the fire in all its glory.

Dad died within days of my seventh birthday.

Mom used to wait outside for me when I got home from school. I loved to see her wave from the lawn. I used to think she waited for me outside because she hated me fighting with Stephen but he was gone and she was still there and still waiting. Mom always told me fighting’s no good and that I ought not get into fights with other boys and especially not to fight with girls. She said it wasn’t nice and that it hurt their feelings. Mom once told me how to tell if a girl has been upset.

Look at her fingernails. Happy girls always have long, pretty nails.

Mom had very nice nails that she kept painted red, but they never went past the tip of her finger.

Sometimes I heard her cry.

I had asked my dad what was wrong. He would say that she had fallen down, or that she had burned herself with the curling iron, or that she had bit her lip. Dad slept in the living room some nights.

Sometimes, Dad would come home and say awful things to Mom. He bullied her into their room and I could hear them shouting. I listened to them for a long time. One night, Dad came into my bedroom. The room was dark and he was silhouetted against the hallway light. He crossed his arms and leaned against the door. I smelled something sour in the air. He came over to my bed and sat down. I think he was crying.

He was a big guy, my old man, so when he sat on my bed I rolled right into him. He stroked my hair. I saw his face clearly. He looked at me, his lips quivered. A trickle of snot ran from his nose and he breathed through his mouth. He raised his hand and I thought he would hit me.

“Can’t stop what’s coming, son.” He clenched his fist tight and his arm trembled. He stared up at the ceiling. Don’t know what he saw but I like to think he was angry at God and not me.

Dad put his hand down. He kissed my forehead. I fell asleep shortly after he left the room.

The next morning, we gathered in the kitchen. No snow on the ground outside but I remember frost and it was real heavy, like the Good Lord saw fit to cover the earth in cellophane. Dad wore nothing but a pair of briefs and I am almost dead certain that he complained about the heat, because I remember thinking how strange it was that anybody could complain of heat when their breath hung in the air like tiny clouds.

I mean we weren’t exactly rolling in dough back then. The heat in the house stayed off until the first snowfall of the year. So, even though I could see a breath in the air, well, that still wasn’t snow on the ground.

“Grab a blanket. Sit in the kitchen,” Daddy would say, and he’d turn on the oven, letting the heavy metal door sit open just a hair.

I’ll tell you what, that oven made a pretty swell fireplace.

We had some good times in that kitchen, huddled together and wearing blankets and playing cards or telling stories. Mornings in that kitchen, like we were at camp. Hell, that was some thirty-odd years ago, but even now I am inclined to go into my own kitchen and turn on the oven before I even think of running up the thermostat.

I remember Daddy saying something like, “It’s hotter than blue blazes in here.”

Momma and I sat at the kitchen table already bundled up in our blankets and when he said that, well, I had to look at him to see if he was joking around.

That’s when I realized he was steaming. Not the angry kind—mind you—but really steaming, like a pot left to boil too long.

Momma said, “Maybe you ought to sit down, baby.”

I don’t recall Dad walking over to the table as much as I can remember the sound of his feet on the linoleum floor. Every step made an ugly little sucking sound, like his feet were sticking to the ground.

He looked wet, like slick plastic, like a Halloween costume. And he still steamed after he sat, but he wasn’t sweating. I guess, in retrospect, it must have been too damn hot to sweat.

Our last exchange went a little something like this:

I said, “Dad, you feeling bad?

“I feel a might bit funny,” he said, and then his eyes burst out of his head. “Oh shit.”

Daddy burst into flames.

Momma started screaming, “Baby, baby, baby,” over and over and louder and louder.

I sat there like a bump on a log.

Momma beat and whipped Daddy with her blanket but the blanket offered no help. That fire wasn’t going out. Daddy finally got up and pushed her away from him.

He ran through the house all ablaze, running into walls and doors and furniture. I figured he must have been looking for a way out. Momma couldn’t do much more than sit on the floor and scream every time he hit something, so I started yelling out directions for him.