The Laboratory of Love, page 16
There are a dozen years of frozen winters and fiery summers in the small town split by a river that runs swiftly, icily, dangerously in every season. From the bank I toss marbles; liquid mouths gulp greedily. An empty can floats from sight. I’m free to twirl and spin across the world, though the scent of smoke clings to me always. I chip and crack. I’m easily lost and sometimes found. Indifferent hands heat me, roll me away. My cooling skin awaits the next warm touch. I never dreamed it would be like this, the other Donald murmurs from my unkissed mouth. Smoke from strangers’ cigarettes curls into the corners of my cold, hard eyes. I drown again and again with desire for incinerating flame. On the river bottom, marbles turn to stone.
The Sacred Flame
A first flicker appears in the upper east window of the house. This is the room where the two girls sleep. Francie and Grace must be around eleven or twelve—I’m not certain—they aren’t the object of my focus. The fire spreads quickly, like alcohol through blood. Long months of cold darkness are blotted out here and now; for the first time since last summer’s blaze, I cease shivering. Smoke puffs languidly into the calm night. From my hiding place, I’m currently the only witness to this vision, though a dozen glass eyes in my pockets are eager to share what I see. They become hot to my touch, they begin to whisper: Yes, yes. My Father, who hovers nearby whether I’m aware of Him or not, murmurs His approval too. Yes, yes. It’s not panic that prevents me from calling out an alarm; my senses are at their most lucid right now. I study how flames soar thrillingly up curtains. I observe how their colours change according to the substance they encounter. My new skin—it will always be new, it has never fit, after twenty years it still itches—prickles with suspense. Will the blaze move this way or that? Shift to the right or to the left?
I am familiar with fire, though it often proves an unpredictable force, a fickle friend. I could tell you that every blaze is unique and that each one’s character depends partly on the qualities of the night on which it comes to life—temperature and humidity of air, whims of wind—partly on the intentions of its creator. I take pride in my fires. They’re good ones. Vibrant, spirited, swift. Red and orange and yellow dominate my palette, though swathes of purple or blue or green can make my painter’s blood sing. Especially at the start, while taking shape, my fires bear the unmistakable imprint of my touch and respond obediently to my needs. Inevitably, like any headstrong adolescent, the raging flames will insist on going their own way.
I wait for a first cry, a muffled moan, a scream. The two girls must lie open-mouthed in their twin beds. By now they have sucked considerable smoke into pink, tender lungs. It wanders freely through their throats. Caressing, violating. In the next room, the sisters’ parents undergo transformation into a single charred heap. I see their joined mouths, the last kiss. Possibly there was time for her to waken and turn to him. If she’d touched his shoulder one moment sooner, he might have made it out of bed and half way to the window before my hot hand laid him down.
So far this fire has proceeded in surrounding silence. That can’t last. Soon a scent of smoke will select the dream of some nearby sleeper to infiltrate. (“I don’t know why it was me that woke,” the chosen one will later puzzle to the local paper and then repeat a hundred wondering times over kitchen tables up and down the block.) The fire department will be summoned, nearby households alerted. Porch lights switch on. In nightgowns and pajamas and slippers, neighbours mill over the sidewalk. Half awake, confused, they wait for the shrieking trucks, the flashing lights, the uniformed men. The futile effort.
By then, I’ll be gone. I have no wish to see my work ruined by water and chemicals, turned into a soggy, disgusting mess. They told me I never saw the burning house after I flew from it with wings of fire unfolding from my shoulders. They insisted I ran into the blanket that was held out for me. They repeated that I didn’t hide behind the chinaberry bushes at the end of the yard, didn’t watch alone amid the bitter fruit. The blanket folded around me, they swore, it swaddled me inside a skin of pain I wasn’t able to see through. The first of their lies.
This moment belongs to me. (My Father has fallen silent; He understands how much I need to savour such scenes undisturbed.) A long wait pays off at last. Myriad details that have been impressed upon my memory finally serve. I can see the pattern of the carpet that’s being singed, the grain of scorching wood. The particular combination of ordinary materials that distinguishes this house from the one next door. Love has made the burning structure mine.
My searing vision eats its way toward what waits to be devoured below. The boy’s room is on the ground floor, below those of his parents and older sisters. Why does he sleep alone down there, where at midnight he can waken to hear a doorknob turned by a gloved hand, the sliding open of an unlocked window? (His apprehension is unusual; in general, they believe themselves so safe, the innocents in these small towns.) I’ve seen how exhausted he looks in the daytime from too many nights spent straining to hear the intruder, to detect my stealthy step down the hall. Once when I was in his room, gently touching model planes and wondering if they could fly, I felt myself under observation. Light from beyond the window blanched the watching boy’s face, his throat. His eyes gleamed. He was waiting to see what I’d do next. I branded the air with the shape of my twisted cross.
Hello, Timothy.
Now he listens to crackling above. I wave my conductor’s wand and modulate the voice of the fire from dull to sharp. Smoke creeps down the stairs. They better wake up before the smoke hurts their eyes, I thought on the night it was my turn to be purified by flame. Cigarette smoke had always travelled directly toward me. If I tried to move out of their path, the acrid plumes would alter direction to follow, as though my grey eyes held a special attraction. As though they wished to water and sting. As though their clarity asked to be clouded. How boys blow warm, wet breath on marbles, send them twirling across the grass.
Timothy. The right name, the right age. Once again, for the tenth time, I’ve chosen carefully and chosen well. The summer hay, the timothy. Hot scratches on my bare legs. In the middle of Harrop’s field I threw a marble as far as I could. I wanted to lose it so I could find it. I searched all afternoon in the timothy, though it made me itch all over. My hands, my arms, my shoulders. My new skin. Don’t scratch, you’ll only make it worse. I always find what I’ve lost, the ancient itch is always soothed, for a moment at least.
Timmy, Timmy, his mother has summoned a million times. He thinks he hears her calling from above now. A voice draws him up; the stairs feel warm to his bare feet. At the top, he can go no farther. Fire fills the hall. When he tries to push through the flames, they lunge back at him. Don’t touch. Crimson feathers fasten to his arms; sparks shoot from his shoulders. Fuel his flight back down the stairs and out the door. The night is shockingly fresh. He doesn’t see the well-intentioned, who wait with the blanket. (Later, they’ll say: We saved you.) He is thrown past any possibility of help, flung onto cool dew beyond. He rolls across the lawn like he’s done with Francie and Grace all summer; their clothes have been stained emerald shades since June. I was gasping amid the chinaberries, by the leaning fence at the end of the yard. You couldn’t eat the bitter fruit; you could only throw it or squish it between your fingers. Explode the smooth, tight skin; smear your face with what’s soft and wet and warm inside.
No one followed me down the front steps with wings fluttering from their shoulders. Only when the fire trucks screamed around the corner did I turn inflamed eyes from the gaping doorway to the Thoms and Booths and Carpenters gathered on the sidewalk. The uniformed men pointed spouting hoses. They were able to save the houses to the left, to the right.
It will be an hour before the liquids and powders do their work tonight; before this fire can be controlled, quenched, killed. It will be another hour before four bodies are carried out. The boy behind the bushes is shivering; suddenly it’s so cold. Not until dawn begins to bleed the sky will this year’s Timothy emerge from hiding. (It didn’t happen that way, they’ll always say. We rescued you, we held you, you weren’t alone.) He’s done wrong, he must be punished. First with questions. What happened? What did you see? What do you remember?
I remember. I remember all of it now. Yes, yes, whispers my Father. Memory swells inside me like marbles fill my pockets. It warms, strengthens, purifies. My pajama shirt is stained grass-green. My fingers drip with the juice of chinaberries. I paint my face; in red, write hieroglyphics that will never wash away.
I believe in the sacred flame. When my Father asks me to spread fire, I obey quickly and without question. Ours is not to wonder why; we’re here to carry out His commands. On one level, my duty is to cleanse through fear. At every funeral, the survivors look like they’ve been shaken hard by their near escape from flame; despite television and Xanax, they’ll never feel safe again. Extreme heat destroys germs, eradicates disease. Sin purifies into cinder. Ash absolves. Sprinkle it on wounds and sores. Strike the match and set them free. Let them feel the holy heat, raise them with smoke above this sick and troubled land, dissolve them into divinity. Then my work is done and my Father allows me to leave. The traumatized town will not notice I’m gone. There’s never a goodbye.
You would think my existence an empty, drifting one. I say this apparent aimlessness conceals His plan from unfriendly scrutiny. During the cold months between one summer blaze and the next, I admit, it can be difficult to maintain clarity of vision and resolve of purpose. I must steel myself against the crash of spirits and the plummet of mercury that follow every fire. The current winter seems particularly long and hard; warmth drains too quickly from memory of the most recent Timothy. My tenth Timothy. I wait out frozen months in an obscure room in a sprawling city. Lie low, instructs my Father. Behind closed curtains I turn scrapbook pages, study yellowed clippings. Several thousand pixilated dots of black display my ten-year-old face beneath a headline. fire kills four, one survivor! From more recent reports with similar headlines, faces of other boys stare back at me. Or are they each the same thousands of dots, subtly rearranged? Has only a single boy ever peered through curtains of flame? foul play suspected! bold font exclaims. cause of blaze unknown. I smile at such stupidity. It amuses me when it doesn’t make me sick.
This is not a confession. I have done only right. You will not find the secrets of my method here, nor the keys to a coded art. Ask my Father, He knows. Despite its criminal incompetence, our Mounted Police will stumble on me eventually. I’ll offer no resistance when they lock me up. Pride will keep me silent; my deeds speak for themselves. Yes, I realize that the fifth estate will pounce on my story and, in typical media fashion, misconstrue, misinterpret, malign. It will try to diminish the importance of my achievement, to tarnish the beauty of my handiwork. So I must leave behind these pages, these clippings, this testament. My Father wishes it.
And my souvenirs sustain. During the months between autumn and spring, I become enraged by careless accidents. Faulty furnaces and live wires and open hearths are strewn across this cold land; from coast to coast, cigarettes smolder beneath sofa cushions. fire claims five! I weep with anger. Mishaps like these can diminish the power of my art, obscure its effects. Easy, admonishes my Father.
Huddled beside the radiator, I envision the tenth Timothy. He walks beneath trees stripped of leaves without realizing where he’s heading. He finds himself before a black, gaping hole. His new family says: Don’t go there anymore. They don’t matter; they don’t belong to him. Don’t touch, they warn when his puzzled fingers explore his new skin. It itches; it doesn’t fit; it doesn’t belong to him either. He can’t stop shivering; before, he never felt the winter. I could tell this Timothy that it will get colder each year and that numbing decade will succeed numbing decade. Or is it only me? I understand that the atmosphere is becoming increasingly smoky, warm. Brown and yellow filth rises from several million factories. Grey exhaust trails from countless cars, buses, planes. We’re racing heedlessly toward the final fire. Our star will soon explode in a shower of sparks that will dazzle Heaven then die.
My own ice age seems unending; this frigid season threatens never to thaw. I must stir to keep my blood from congealing. I am the figure you don’t see walking alone down the street, head bent to pavement. Your eyes glide blindly by my ugly clothes, my thin frame, my peaked features. You fail to notice me hunched over cheap food in plastic places. I have shrunk deep inside myself, away from the fear that surrounds me. This city poses danger. I wouldn’t be effective here. The impact of my fiery touch would be lost amid random stabbings, overdoses, rapes. My hand would falter, my aim would miss. Steady, He commands. I see young boys, already sick, polluting the corners. So many Timothys I can’t save. Soon, promises my Father. I must take care not to be infected. A little longer, He instructs. I try to stay inside, I try to stay clean. I turn scrapbook pages and pray upon a galaxy of glass.
My marbles are a secret inside a tin can that’s old and dented and pale green. The full, heavy weight of the container anchors me. I take off the lid and remove the varicoloured globes. Each one warms quickly to my touch. I count slowly, careful not to lose track when the tally grows awkwardly large. I count again and again. There is only one holy number. By the time I count the last marbles, the first ones have grown cold. There are too many; they can’t all be warmed at once. Then I feel His firm hand on my shoulder, pressing away my panic. Patiently, touch by touch, I warm my secret world once more.
I can dream all day over a single flicker of colour caught in a single crystal cage. The trapped bubbles of breath. In the street, I keep my hands in my pockets (the scars make people flinch) and caress several special marbles hidden there. Like smooth boys, they whisper when you touch them. They moan to be released. Hey, breaking voices plead from the corners I quickly pass by.
When they let me out of the hospital, they said I was as good as ever. Brand new skin on my shoulders, arms, hands. It’s yours, they assured me. Another lie. It was shiny and hard and artificial. Not my skin, not anyone’s. It still chafes like hot August hay. Don’t scratch.
And they gave me the green can. They said it was all that survived the fire with me, but I couldn’t recognize this container, I didn’t remember any boy who’d hoarded treasure inside green tin. I wondered if this was another of their lies. Everything else burned, they insisted. I still stank of smoke. The scent clung to me, it wouldn’t wash off, the new family kept catching their breath. Some people tried not to stare at my scars; others nudged each other in the stores. He’s the one. I didn’t listen. Now there was a murmuring in my ears. He had found me.
In the spring, His sun uncovered the schoolyard from beneath soiled snow. There was a month of playing marbles. Before and after classes, during recess and lunch. The other boys were startled when I joined in. Each day I’d choose lucky specimens from the green can, send them spinning across the field. The click when two marbles touched made me inhale sharply. I got you! crowed Billys and Alans and Todds. Their pants were smeared from kneeling on the muddy grass. Their faces looked pinched and winter-white. They opened their mouths, pushed back hair. They squinted and took aim. Mine! they cried when I let them win. I felt them roll my glass self between their palms; they made me moan. Then I narrowed my smoky eyes and won back my treasure. The boys became bored with marbles, abandoned them for baseball.
My Father’s voice becomes louder and more insistent as the days lengthen with spring at last. He believes me too dreamy. He worries I will forget the radiant plan. Temperature rises. I feel heat reach toward me. A force that has waned across vast distance. I stretch like a cat, blink. My head jerks up from a glass universe at His curt command. All right, He snaps. Get to it.
There’s nothing to pack except for the scrapbooks and the green tin can. I go where I’m told, arrive where He needs me to be. Licence plates tell me this is Beautiful British Columbia. Another small town. They’re all essentially the same. One main street, two traffic lights. In summer, this place is complacent as a cat curled on a warm ledge. I am the ball of fur that will stick in the town’s throat and make it gag and choke and gasp for air. Until then, there are backyard barbeques and picnics at the lake. Children are out of school and men take three-week holidays. These people are so unsuspecting, I pity them.
My operation is swift, smooth, skilled. A waitress feeds me information while across the café her boss glares with eyes that nip like little girls. Twelve thousand, smelter work mostly, quiet. Good. Next, the local paper with its badly focused photos of Kinsmen congratulating themselves at their annual banquet. The sports-page promise that the high-school basketball team will try harder next year. Ads for used cars with low mileage, announcements for auctions rain or shine. There it is: basement apartment, furnished, immediately.
The stucco house is on one of the older streets on the east side of town. It’s been too large for Gladys since George passed away five years ago this fall. No number of over-stuffed chesterfields can fill so much empty space, too many vacated rooms. At night Gladys lies awake in the big double bed, presses a hand between her legs, listens to the house shift. It groans like the bellies of vanished children she spent twenty years filling. I’ve rented rooms from a dozen varieties of Gladys, from here in the west all the way to Prince Edward Island. They never charge enough and are always eager to believe any story offered them. Gladys stares openly at my hands; revulsion and fascination wrestle. I know she wants to touch the shiny skin just once, quickly. “The car went off the road and rolled three times, my world turned upside down,” I explain. Gladys’s lips tremble. She apologizes at length for the basement furniture, which graced the rooms above until they bought new ten years ago. When I go out, this woman will creep down the stairs to pick through my few things. (The suitcase containing my history is locked; the green can hides behind the furnace.) She wants to see if I’ve burned holes in her carpet or left water rings on the table. She is quickly impressed by my neatness; it’s enough to make her like me. I don’t smoke or drink—they’re filthy habits. And I’m so quiet.
