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

When summer ended, Stephen went back to mathland. I promised to write, so did he, and for the first week of my junior year of high school I would cry myself to sleep. If I dreamed at all, there were only two things my subconscious would parade through my mind. There was Stephen, and then there were the zombies. Being consumed was either exhilarating or horrifying. Regardless, my sheets were wet when I’d wake up in the morning.

It was after one of the more potent nightmares that I decided to tell my mom that I was in love with Stephen.

As a kid, I hated the sound of footsteps against the wood flooring on the second floor of the house. It usually meant that I was in trouble. My parents rarely bothered to come downstairs for any other reason. It was a custom to walk quietly in the house. Out of sight, out of mind, I suppose.

It was an old place. You could just think about walking around and hear the floors creak and crack. And I was under the belief that my mom could hear a frog fart from a mile radius, so there was no late night runs to the snack cabinet or sneaking out of the house. Hell, I didn’t even like going to the bathroom if they were already in bed. Getting in trouble was something to be avoided, and that old house was designed to give me up at the drop of a hat.

I put on a pair of socks and then stepped into the hall.

I was halfway there when I noticed that the door to my mom’s room was cracked open, just a little, just enough to let a dim slice of light spill into the hallway. I figured my mother was reading something, maybe one of her paperback romance novels she kept under the bed.

Then I heard my stepdad moan. Mother shushed him over and over. I don’t exactly remember pushing the door, but I remember it opening slowly, like a revelation, and like any revelation, once that door went its course, well, there was no going back.

My stepdad, Eddy, was nude and laid on the bed with his legs hiked up into the air. Mother was on her knees at his waist, blasting him in the ass with a dildo and jerking him off. The look in their eyes disgusted me.

It was passionless.

Empty.

What was it that Stephen said?

Like they’re robots. Like they’re going through life with their switch turned off. They may as well be asleep.

No, not asleep, I thought.

Dead.

A bit of dialogue ran through my mind…

What are they doing? Why do they come here? Some kind of instinct. Memory of what they used to do.

I suddenly forgot why I was there.

My mother froze, not in any kind of abject horror, but more like the way one predator might observe another. It was territorial, for sure. She let go of the dildo, but never the cock.

Eddy’s voice broke the pornographic spell, “Jesus Fucking Christ.”

And I stumbled backward into the hallway. I heard the shuffling of a bed sheet, the soft whisper of clothes covering flesh.

I ran to my room.

Minutes later, mother knocked on my door.

“Firecracker?” she said.

The door handle jiggled.

“It’s locked.” I said.

“You just go to bed now. We can talk in the morning.”

“Great.”

“I’m sorry you had to see that.”

“Okay, Mom.”

“I guess now you know how it feels.”

“Yeah, well now we’re even.”

Mom ended the conversation by shuffling away from my room and down the hallway, her heels drumming the wooden floors, echoing through the hallways of our dark house. I heard their bedroom door slam. I knew what that meant. I didn’t know how she’d say it, but she was going to tell Eddy about Stephen and me. I could feel my stomach drop. The nausea kept me awake through the night.

I was afraid of Eddy. Never knew what Mom saw in him. She didn’t cry at his funeral like she did at Dad’s, though, so maybe Eddy wasn’t much more than a warm body to fill the space left by the fire. He was a goddamn nightmare to me.

Eddy poked his head into my room. “You’re gonna be late for school if you don’t get out of bed.”

“Crap.” I kicked at my sheets.

“Chop-chop, mister,” Eddy clapped his hands. “Your mom’s already done left. I gotta get you up or she’ll give me the business. Come on, let’s go.” He clapped again. Eddy was a clapper. He clapped when he wanted something, he clapped when he was mad, and he clapped when Momma made a meal he liked. I even heard him clap in his sleep.

Clap, clap, clap.

“Hey, Eddy,” I said. “Sorry about last night.”

Eddy stepped into my room. He had his hands on his hips.

Hands on hips, balled into fists.

Shaggy hair hung low over his brow, keeping his eyes in the dark. They were spying on me, as if those twists of brown were curtains and those eyes were seeing something that they weren’t supposed to see. He clapped his hands together.

“What I say about the bus now, boy? You got to hurry up and get if I’m gonna take you to school. I got to be on the other side of town, pronto. Let’s go. We got some talking to do, too, you and me. Stuff’s gonna change around here, you get me? Now hurry up.”

Got dressed for school and went upstairs, sat at the kitchen table and tried to prepare myself for whatever was coming. And then I heard the familiar thud of Eddy putting on his shoes, the way he forced his heel down, smacking the floor. I felt every step he took in my chest. The closer he got, the more I began to confuse his steps with my heartbeats. I was welling up before he got to the kitchen door.

“Why are you crying?” he asked.

“I don’t know.”

“I’m going to ask you one more time.” He rolled up his sleeves. “Why are you crying?”

“Because you’re going to hit me.”

“I’m going to beat your ass right here in this kitchen. I’m going to beat the fucking queer right out of you. And then we’re going for a ride to your friend’s house. Have a little talk with his folks. See what they have to say about this. Now get up.”

My legs lost all feeling. “Please—

He slapped me across the face.

“If you don’t get up out of that seat I’m going to lift you up by your damn hair. You hear me?”

…that’s what God must be like.

My cheek stung and felt impossibly warm, like he hit me hard enough to burn the skin. All I could do was cry. And then he reached out and grabbed me by the hair and lifted me up. He smacked me across the face again.

And again.

All this because of love.

I tried to push him away. He punched me in the stomach and I dropped to the floor.

“I’ll be waiting in the car. And you do not want to keep me waiting, you understand? Because I’ll come looking for you, and… ”

Eddy’s lips were moving, but his words trailed off.

Sound had disappeared.

Eddy didn’t know what was coming. But I did. And I smiled.

Every moment slowed down. I could see between the seconds.

Time ceased.

Eddy’s eyes rolled up. His mouth drooped. He stumbled, fell into a heap on the floor.

The curtain of reality rippled and pulled apart. Eyes like dying stars. Shadow and fog.

Death looked at me from the void outside of time and spoke with a voice that was like a shimmer of light in the furthest reaches of memory, like a song you struggle to remember or a name you once knew.

“Do you want to know when I will come for you?”

“Yes,” I said without hesitation.

Death whispered in my mind and I’ve been waiting ever since.

A crossed path is its own intimacy.

When Death found me at the back of The Night Cap, it was as though the whole world went under and swam in the cold black and we were alone upon an island, hearing and seeing nothing because then there was nothing else, except love—that single star revolving—which focused all its light and heat unto me and I knew it was time to burn alive.