Fire Boy

The fat boy made a snorting laugh befitting his piggy face. The fires always made him laugh; that’s why he made them.

As the lowest of the flames began to fade and the pungent smells of another smoldering house were being carried away on the light breeze, he looked around. This town was done. Well done. He laughed at his own joke.

He’d have to move his way out now, toward the woods. The trees were not large yet, having just been planted when the neighborhood was built, right before the war. It was the glorious and short-lived war that had taught him the power of fire. The power to cleanse. The power to erase. The power to take away — things, people, hope.

For the next few nights, he listened to the tree bark pop and the leaves crackle. He watched burned forest scraps curl and float away on convection currents. Occasionally, something that had survived all else would fall from the smoky sky, and he’d snack on a squirrel or a bird of some sort while enjoying his handiwork, giggling between bites.

Eventually, the trees gave up all of their magic, and he found himself standing in the ruins of his own making. The next town was perhaps twenty miles away. Too far for a fat boy to walk.

There was only one thing left to burn.

Without delay, he set a match to himself and felt the heat work its way through his clothing and to his skin. Roasting, he squealed a final piggy laugh that carried for miles on warm currents, until there was only silence.