Charred |
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Chapter 1 |
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| Inspiration: Floating candles They’re like little boats, bobbing on the water. You shake the bowl and they toss about in the waves. Take the matches and light the wick: a spark of life, ignited. Mesmerised you sit and stare at the small flame, reflected in the water and the glass. Someone runs past you and bumps the table. In the second you turn to express you displeasure, to scold the person, you miss it. The candle capsized in your absence and its life is snuffed out. Because of the water you don’t even have any smoke to show for its life. There is just the smallest bit of steam and the blackened wick. As you sit and fiddle with the lifeless candle my mind flashes back to many years ago when I found a boat bobbing in the ocean, smoking and charred. *** Walking along the beach I kick at the sand, spraying it all about me, getting it into my sneakers. I take a few more steps, contemplating continuing on my walk and ignoring the slightly damp and completely gritty sand that was beginning to rub my feet violently. It doesn’t take long for me to decide not to. Sometimes the little things annoy me more than the big things. It may have been my fault that sand got into my shoes, and now by the feel of it my socks, but I have the opportunity to do something about that. To my right I see a cluster of rocks and decide to sit on one of them to avoid getting my backside wet. Sighing as I sit down and tug one of my shoes off, upending it and shaking it maniacally, I finally look out over the water, expecting to see a clear horizon, the sky speckled by the occasional bird flying overhead and the ocean churned by the odd wave. Instead there’s a pillar of smoke rising high above some longboat drifting out to sea. The sight is puzzling, unusual. Who ever saw a boat burning on water? It reminds me of when the dead are buried at sea and their coracles lit of fire, beacons to the light the way through death. This line of the causes me to wonder who’s boat it is, who lit it on fire, why they lit it on fire and probably most importantly, who are they. I shove my shoe back on my foot and run back to the nearest house to call the police, or someone. Overhead a crippled seagull squawks in distress. Had I turned around I might have seen it plummet into the sand near where I had been sitting. *** Eventually the authorities arrived. I was sitting on the beach, watching the pillar of smoke disperse in the atmosphere. I could smell the burnt wood though, mixed though it was with the strong scent of saltwater. There was something else too, a smell I didn’t want to identify for fear I’d lose my stomach. I still lost it. I heard them talking after they had brought the remains of the boat to shore. Three bodies, presumably teenagers. Burnt beyond recognition. It’s dark when they ask me to leave. I’ve told them everything I can, about when I noticed the boat, what I did, who I spoke to, where I’d come from. When I see the body bags I don’t wait for them to ask me a second time. *** The news report that night failed to mention the boat or the three victims, but that didn’t stop me from wondering, speculating, dreaming about it. My dreams were strange, filled with fire and water, wine and cracked cups. There was a prince, a strange young man and a princess whose hair was like the flames that danced upon the water, wild and beautiful. But the prince was dying and the strange man, a boy in appearance by eyes so old, he was lighting him on fire and sitting by the girl as the boat caught alight about them. It was strange that they never screamed in my dreams. I would’ve thought they’d have screamed as the flames licked at the skin, consuming their clothes. There was one moment where I was lost; in amidst the flames it seemed there was a fourth figure, hands outstretched to others, as if calling them forwards, out of the flames and into another life. A blinding flash of light prevented me from seeing what happened and where the figure went, as all I was left with was the burning bodies in the boat. *** You put down the dead candle as it is useless until the wick dries out, and take another from the box. You smile as you set it upon the water and light it, watching as it drifts away from you, as if guided by some force you cannot see or comprehend. |
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