Arson Read Online Free PDF Page A

one who can.”
    Arson’s eyes followed her down the stairs. The hummed melody of an old hymn rang through the air, a hymn he had never bothered to memorize.
    He reached under his mattress and pulled out a comic book from the pile he’d collected over the years. The pages were thumbed through and worn, but he still got satisfaction from them, even if they were old and cliché. They were splintered fragments left behind from a long-lost childhood filled with heroes and villains facing impossible odds and uncertain futures, a black and white world in which there was no gray. Arson felt more a part of their reality than his own. The stories didn’t seem to care who he was or what he could do; it didn’t matter. In their world, he wasn’t alone. In their world, a freak like them—like him—could become a hero.
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    Arson could feel the night wrap its fingers around him like smoke. As he raced outside, his face cracked from the heat, and his eyes began to burn. In order to ease the pain, he wet them, blinking rapidly when he could, when he wasn’t running. Out of breath, but it didn’t matter. Couldn’t keep still.  Run , he thought.  Run. Anywhere but here !
    The air cut through his teeth. Faster he moved, past the abandoned house on his left, through the field of neglected grass and waste.  To the marshes , he thought,  away from Grandma, away from everything . It was quiet there, quieter than the lake tonight. Quiet enough to think about what plagued him most, though he hated it.
    His breaths were short and stifled by panic. His heart pounded and struggled to keep pace, pumping more heat than blood. He moaned, praying it would stop. But the anger only grew. Violent memories, only hours old, fueled the fire within, begging for release. His skin didn’t burn, his body couldn’t wilt, but the smell of rotting, bubbling flesh surrounded him, and he could taste its horrible flavor on his lips. Pimples on his face disintegrated and oozed down his cheek. Fireflies sparkled in front and behind him, and he was lost between. Leaves and branches crunched underfoot, and he listened for the sound of summer, of night, but all he heard were screeching tires and the shattering of broken glass somewhere in the distance. Perhaps a few fools had lost their lives in a head-on collision.  Lucky , Arson thought, clenching his fist tighter as he ran.
    By the time he arrived, the veins in his wrists and hands had swelled blood red. Tears slipped down his face only to disappear. He was afraid. Something about the place caused the hairs on the back of his neck to move. Arson never made a habit of coming here, but he was desperate more than anything. He knew it was childish to think a place so calm could awaken such fright, but the dark was good at playing his fears back to him.
    Enraged, he grabbed a jagged rock and threw it into the black, hoping it would split the veil of darkness, and then the sky would pity him. Bugs and moths swarmed around his head, seduced by the light from his body. Closer they came. He looked down, taking one wary step into the pool. The grime and soot covered his clothes and stained his hands. He wondered if the cold water could quench him tonight.
    Arson then dipped his entire body into the pool and waited. Distracted by roaming fish and water snakes, he held his breath and clenched his eyelids tighter. Grandma stopped hitting him, but Arson knew that beneath the fabricated smiles and almost love, she still loathed him for what he’d done, for what he was. Maybe she was right. Maybe he was a monster, a demon, a pig. He wondered how one person could be responsible for so much madness and pain. He thought back again.
    â€œIt’s only a dare,” Danny said.
    â€œI believe you; I just don’t want to do it. I don’t like fire.”
    â€œName a hero who’s afraid,” he heard him sneer.
    Silence.
    â€œI dare you,