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Kid Blink is a decent guy. Sure, there’s a warrant out for his arrest after that incident with the curtains, but he’s past that now. They stopped looking for him ages ago. Even Snyder doesn’t bother to follow up on that case at his desk, though that may be because he’s so busy with Jack. Race gives him a look every time he lights a cigarette, even though he knows it’s fine, knows they’re safe.
Sarah—Tom, rather—doesn’t know. He doesn’t flinch away when Blink glares or look for cover when he gears up for a fight. He doesn’t know, and he will never know because Blink can keep it under control. No matter how much the burn itches beneath his skin, he will never let it out. Mush watches him sadly, but Kid moves on. Fire burns bright and fast, and Mush knew that. He’ll hold himself together and they will all be happy.
It only takes two weeks for everything to go wrong. Blink’s out with Tom and he falls off the curb. (Mush would say that this wouldn’t have happened if he were holding someone’s hand.) Tom laughs at him like any good friend, but only for a second, because the pain searing through his leg shows clear on his face. Mam raised a good Catholic boy, so he doesn’t curse out Jesus, but his scream is close enough.
Someone’s left the iron spoke of a new wheel right where he falls. Tom is down at his side, tearing up his trousers, and Blink can’t speak to tell her that they’re the only ones he had left. For a moment, his whole world is the pain in his leg and Tom’s hand on his chest, thumping with his heartbeat. Tom hits at his head, only to pull thons hand away looking like he’s been burned. The ashes seep out of the hole in his skin. He closes his eye and doesn’t open it again.
—
Kid Blink comes back to life in his cot at the lodge. Quiet chatter turns to hushed whispers and someone gasps over him.
"Give the man his space," Jack directs. Blink pries open his eye and moans into the mattress. His breath warms the air into a faint steam.
Dying is painful. It is nothing like falling asleep. It tears at the insides like glass on his feet, shredding him to nothing to build him back up. The fire is always hotter when he breathes for the first time. The black of burnt flesh hangs limply from his mouth. Ash from the cot is rough on his skin. He is alive. He is always alive.
Mush is the first person he sees. He holds out his hand for Kid to take. "We're going outside," he says to Jack, and Kid feels like he's floating. (Tom whispers to Jack that he thinks it's dissociation.)
It's windy outside. Kid can feel the coming storm in the dryness of the air. His skin cracks and shudders. In this kind of weather, he could burn a house down. (Not again. Never again.) Mush pulls his arm close and just holds it tight.
"You have to let it out," he whispers into the wind. "It's killing you."
Kid doesn't bother to respond.
"You've never taken so long to come back."
They stand there in silence. Kid breathes smoke with every exhale.
"I miss you," Mush murmurs, so quietly he might think Kid can't hear.
"I'd burn you," Kid tells him. "You got a cigarette?"
—
Tom needs some reassurances when Blink returns. Thon’s frozen in this open-mouthed, slack position that he knows all too well.
“Hey,” Blink murmurs. “Can you hear me, heart?”
She trembles. Intí reaches his hand out, slowly, and takes hers.
“You were dead,” Sarah says quietly. She doesn’t look at him.
“And now I’m not.” He rubs her knuckles, the same way Mush used to do for him. “I’m not going anywhere.”