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Michael’s constant devoured his mind in blinding heat, a writhing creature trapped inside his skull. Michael’s constant was, and is, fire.
He figures it out when he’s six and his mother leaves tinfoil in the microwave. He is transfixed, standing on a chair, and he watches the sparks dart and flurry. But there is a layer of paper under the foil and it bursts into flames. The orange laps at the glass containing it and Michael can not look away. His mother yells and puts out the fire, but it has branded itself onto his mind. There is no saving him now.
He sees it everywhere. It’s burning in the barrels under the overpass that he walks by and the embers and glowing ash float upward, and they look like fireflies. Michael thinks that it’s beautiful.
It is the matches struck by his school friends, burning quickly and killing themselves in a puff of smoke. Michael steals matchbooks from drug stores and he sits on the roof, striking one after the other and feeding off their warmth.
He drops a match and his fire flares. He has drenched a building, an old, uninhabited building, in gasoline. He watches it burn and embers spray as it falls slowly to the ground. He flees when the sirens meet his ears, but he knows that they won’t catch him.
He burns things, so many things, feeding the fire burning in his heart and mind, but nothing can quench his thirst.
He moves when he’s old enough, to a city on the opposite coast. Fire is no longer enough, he needs something that packs a punch. So, he starts learning about demolition.
His first few attempts are failures, but he gets the hang of it quickly. He learns how to shoot a gun, he needs to if he’s going to survive, and he’s a natural at it. That night, he spray paints his name on the ‘for hire’ wall in the sub-city. He gets job offers flooding in.
He performs well, blowing up what he needs to, and he watches his flames scale building walls like a ravenous beast. He loves it.
He is in a bar, drinking, when he gets an offer. A man with a lazy smile and a waxed moustache slides into the booth across from him.
“Would you like a job?” Michael sets down his glass.
“How much?” The man’s smile widens into a Cheshire cat grin.
“We were thinking something more permanent.”
“How much?” Michael says again and the man slides him a piece of paper. The numbers are good, so Michael moves his things into Geoff’s penthouse apartment the following week.
Money was what got him into the crew, but it’s not what keeps him there. What keeps him there is the easy camaraderie between Jack, Geoff, and himself. It’s how easy the nights feel and how the heists go off without a hitch and the flame in Michael’s mind burns him.
Jack finds him lighting matches on the roof one night.
“I didn’t think you smoked.” She says.
“I don’t.” Michael says as another match burns itself to death.
The next morning, Jack gives him a good pocket lighter and he knows that she understands.
Not long after that, Geoff announces that they’re getting a new member.
“A hacker.” He tells them and Michael flicks the lighter. He has the beginnings of a callous on his thumb.
They pull off one more heist, just the three of them, and the money sits in his bank account while he sits with Jack and Geoff and they scream at video games.
Michael sits in the back of the car when they go to pick up the hacker, and he flicks the lighter repeatedly.
“His name is Gavin.” Geoff supplies and Michael can hear his laugh before he sees him. And when Gavin climbs into the car next to Michael, the fire in his mind surges with heat and his vision blacks for a few moments, but Michael has found him.
They sit on the roof that night and Gavin speaks to Michael.
“I looked you guys up when Geoff offered me the spot.” He says. “I saw you in the pictures and you looked at fire the same way I do. I didn’t know for sure, but I hoped.” Michael stands and offers Gavin his hand.
“Let’s go light up the world.” Gavin laughs as Michael pulls him up.
“That was cheesy, Michael.”
“I know, Gav, but just think! If we were in a movie, that would’ve been a great place to end.”
They find an old house on the outskirts of town. It’s old and ready to collapse, but it will serve their purpose well. They douse it generously with gasoline and Michael lets Gavin do the honours and the flame ignites the house. The fire licks their shoes, but does not burn them.
“There’s someone watching us.” Gavin murmurs. Michael turns to see, but the shadowy figure is already walking away. The flames curl around them like a cat.
“I’m glad we’re not in a movie, Michael.”
Geoff brings someone home, he’s tall and face paint is smeared across his cheeks. His name is Ryan, he says, and he fits into the scene without much effort. He reads as Michael screams at games and Gavin laughs at him.
“We need a sniper.” Geoff declares one day. Michael clears his throat.
“I’ve got a friend.” He does have a friend, a friend from the beginning of his days in the city. He calls Ray, gives him the offer, and Ray accepts.
Michael finds Gavin in the kitchen, drinking coffee. Michael leans against the doorway, crossing his arms over his chest.
“You want to go out?” Gavin grins.
“The world is our barrel of gunpowder.” Michael cringes.
“At least mine was movie-worthy. Yours is just horrible.”
The fire is cracklin around them when Gavin tells him.
“He’s hack. He’s just watching us, like it’s a show.” Michael takes Gavin’s hand.
“Let’s give him a show, then.” Michael whirls Gavin around and Gavin laughs. They dance through their flames, spinning and stepping and kicking up ash. The fire trails behind them. When the flames begin to die out, he is no longer there.
“I bet he’s Ryan’s soulmate.” Michael whispers to Gavin. They can hear Ray and Geoff talking in the hallway.
“Twenty and you’re on.” They shake hands and walk into the kitchen. Ryan and Ray’s hands are clasped together, eyes linked, and Michael woops. Gavin presses a twenty into his hand.
Ray does join the crew and he fits in perfectly, another oddly shaped piece in an atypical puzzle.
The calluses on Michael’s thumbs start to soften because he doesn’t need the constant reassurance of fire because Gavin is there now.
The fire in Michael’s heart and mind no longer rages and tries to escape, it is no longer ravenous and trying to consume everything. It is no longer a blazing inferno, killing everything in it’s path.
It is quiet and soft, radiating warmth and love. Its sits contentedly in Michael’s chest and head.
This isn’t to say that he no longer likes raging fire, he does, he loves it.
But he also likes the campfire version. This is Gavin, funny and sociable and warm. He loves this version. He loves Gavin.