Russell Carpenter

A child grasps a match in his soft, young hands. With a flick of the wrist, the placid yellow of the wood is transformed into a foreboding swatch of black. Touching the flame to a wizened leaf whose veins are easily visible under its battered skin, smoke commences to spiral up around the gnarled trunk of an elderly pine. Consuming the leaf, the reds and yellow blend together forming a lethal collage. A toy soldier crashes down from above onto the newly color-infused leaf. As soon as he lands on his bed of fire, deformation starts. The soldier’s plastic head is lost forever: in its place resides a pool of bubbling green. Looking on is the seven-year-old child, to whom the smell of fire is more intoxicating than alcohol.

It was never malicious. Nothing that Aidan did was. It was about independence, a concept foreign to him, living within the stifling atmosphere of his family. His parents were happily married, did laundry, and cooked dinner, and it was this stability that burned away whatever independence he might have had. Aidan’s sister was always making sure that he wasn’t doing anything she considered bad, and thereby establishing her role as the most annoying person he knew. Whenever there was something challenging that he might do, being older, and more competent, she did it instead. He was left sitting around with nothing interesting to fill his time. Strangely enough, it never crossed his mind that his family was directly connected to his lack of independence. At seven, Aidan’s mind was too one-dimensional to understand that. He thought of his parents as God: an unchangeable, superior entity. Even if he had recognized his parents as the source of his problem, he would not have cared. All he wanted was the opportunity to do something that was enjoyable and at the same time difficult. However, being an unnaturally proud child, Aidan hated asking anyone for anything, and he thought that if he did anything without his parents’ permission, he would be punished. Then there was his friend Maurice. He was incredibly short with black hair and eyes so dark that distinguishing between the pupil and the iris was impossible. When Aidan was with him, he lost all inhibitions, and both of them relinquished any rational thoughts that seven year olds have.

Inhibiting the intense mid-summer sun, the prickly leaves of a pine created shadows reminiscent of cascading waterfalls. The golden sunlight illuminated the two young boys hunched over a purple plastic bucket. Maurice reached into the deep pocket of his camouflaged pants, and pulled out a little green soldier with its gun pointed toward the tranquil blue sky. He opened his hand and the soldier fell straight down into the bucket, making no sound, landing on dry leaves of past autumns and dead, stiff twigs the boys had collected from the pine. Next, he took out the red box of matches. Maurice handed the matches to Aidan, who quickly grabbed one, looked nervously around, and struck it. Maniacally giggling, he tossed the match into the bucket and watched the rusty brown leaves burn until they turned black, their heat melting the green Marine. Both boys were sweating profusely, but they noticed nothing but the fire. The bright yellows and reds of the flames died down. Enthralled with their success, the boys added another soldier to death row, with the execution scheduled for one month later. They decided that their secret would be easier to keep if they paced themselves. But once back at the house, both boys realized that nothing they could do would match the excitement of burning yet another soldier. Grabbing a spade, Aidan dug a hole in the center of his backyard, which was brimming with sickly three-feet tall grass. Using their extensive knowledge of fire, the boys coated the edge of the hole with pink and white stones. Maurice took some dried leaves out of the confines of his pocket and lovingly placed them, and the ill-fated soldier, into the pit. Without a word, he lit a leaf and watched the orange creep down its spine, sucking the life from it like an anaconda.

Aidan’s sister smelled a familiar smell wafting up to her room through her enormous air conditioner. For a moment, the smoke soothed her. Then she jumped up with a start and stared out the fingerprint-covered window. The boys and their fire were clearly visible. She ran outside, yelling the whole way, and with her leather boots, stomped as hard as she could on the fire, dousing it in seconds. The fun was over.

Soon after, sitting Maurice-less in his drab room, Aidan realized that there was no punishment that his parents could enforce that would be worse than living with guilt, so he vowed to notify his parents of his delinquency before his sister had a chance. Although the confession came much sooner than he would have liked, Aidan finally did what he had always longed to: he took responsibility. Never in his life had he been happier than when he told his parents about burning toys in the woods, where a misplaced match could have spelled an early grave for the entirety of the backyard. His parents had already known about his adventures with fire (despite his best efforts Aidan’s sister had revealed all to them via telephone), but they were surprised that he had confessed instantaneously.