by Amber Burns
Rowan crossed the room to approach an assortment of cloth bags that hung from the wall on nails. They were of different materials and sizes, and each emanated a different earthy smell. He dipped his hand into one cloth bag and withdrew several leaves of fresh mint. He rubbed them gently beneath his nose and smiled as the fresh smell danced into his nostrils. Then he plunged his fingers into another cloth bag. His hand emerged filled with dried and candied lemon. He nodded and lumbered back to the cup of boiling water. Then, kneeling carefully above the glass, bathed in the orange glow of the fire, he dropped the bits of candied lemon into his china cup. He stirred the contents with a tiny silver, ornate spoon. After a moment, he let the mint leaves flutter into the cup and stirred those as well. Then he sat back before the fire, feet outstretched so that they sat just inches from the roaring flames. He clutched the small cup between his tattooed fingers and, watching the flames dancing as one would watch television, Rowan sipped his homemade tea.
He drained the cup as the fire told him stories. In the dancing of the fire, he watched the body of a woman emerge, crafted from the seductive tangle of sparks of yellow and tongues of red. He raised an eyebrow as she the woman made of fire and flame seemed to raise an arm to beckon him forward.
“What the…”
The flames danced, and the woman appeared to sway curvaceous hips back and forth, back and forth, in a dance that both taunted and intrigued Rowan. He swallowed and blinked, not wanting to get closer to the open fire for fear of burning himself, but at the same time, wanting nothing more than to be fully engulfed by the story he found unfurling in the lightning bright flames. He set his cup down and inched ever so slightly forward, ever so slightly closer to the storytelling fire.
As he did, a pile of bright white flames burst to life just to the left of the woman made from the tongues of flame. Rowan blinked rapidly, trying to convince himself his eyes were seeing things. He swiped his fists over his eyes, trying to clear them of any smoke or any other substance that might be forcing him to see what he thought he was seeing. Yet his eyes were clean and clear, and the fiery vision remained before him; a strong, muscular body made from flame had burst into vigorous burning just to the left of the fiery lady. To Rowan’s disbelief, the muscled mass of fire twisted and burnt itself to the left until it touched the would be woman of flame. Rowan glanced down at the tea he still clutched in his now shaking hands. Had he chosen something else instead of the mint? He sniffed at the glass. No, it was surely mint, and yet still he decided to set the tea down on the hardwood floor.
The fire appeared too strange, a woman and man crafted from flame twisting in bright beauty before him. He often sat before the fire and imagined creatures appearing made from the flames; he sometimes spied foxes, or snakes, or the head of a cat. But these visions appeared briefly, and they were completely abstract, pictures he searched for and found in imperfect inflamed representation, like spying an animal made out of clouds. He had never before experienced anything like this; images so vivid, so obvious in their forms, so absolute in their storytelling. It sent shivers running up and down his spine, and goose bumps careening over his tattooed flesh. He shook his head and yet, for all his discomfort, was unable to tear his eyes from the cinematography of the flames.
The two flame beings, a man and a woman, tangled and danced, twisted and leaped, becoming one flame so bright and thick and hot that Rowan had to shield his eyes and push himself backward, away from the intense heat of the fire. He shimmied back so quickly that he knocked the china glass over and sent it spinning in a wild flurry of wilted mint leaves and dregs of wet sugary lemon. When he dropped his hand from his face he was shocked: the massive fire had completely sussed out. Not even an ember burned amidst the coals.
“How… how can that be?”
Rowan’s mouth dropped open and swiped his tattooed fingers over the tangles of his ink black beard. He squinted and stared at the fire for a few moments, stupefied, before he jumped back into action. He squatted before the deep fireplace he had built with his own hands. Carefully, lovingly, he poked at the embers with the fire stick he had crafted by melting down the sharpened edges of a piece of metal he had found discarded in the forest. Yet for all his loving stoking, the fire would not come back to life. The room soon lost its warmth as autumn was quickly progressing and the nights were growing cool as a glass of summer lemonade. Rowan shivered against the cooling air.
“Fuck,” he muttered to himself.
He stood, intending to fetch the blanket from the couch and make his way to bed, but he then remembered the spilled tea. He crouched and picked the mint leaves from the floor, dropped the bits of candied lemon back into the emptied china cup. He stood and breathed out, still a bit shaken and confused by the story the fire had so graphically splayed before him.
The moon flashed her slippery silver smile at Rowan as he made his way to his bedroom. Before wrapping himself beneath the handmade quilts, he made sure to turn over the coals in the small iron stove that sat at the foot of his bed. It would burn on ever so slightly, keeping the bedroom warm through the chill of the night.
Rowan rolled himself into bed, pulling the quilts up around his body. As his eyes grew heavy and he began to fall into the deepness of a satisfied sleep, the woman made of flames danced through his mind. That night his dreams would be decorated with the crackle of her hips, swaying back and forth so smoothly, so electrically, like a twisted, seductive lullaby.
2
“Do you have the keys?”
Nina rolled her eyes and stuck her head out of the car window.
“Jess. How do you think I was able to open the window to yell at you? Of course I have the keys.”
Jess wrestled with her oversized designer scarf and called over the mass of wool. “Okay okay okay! I just wanted to be sure, Nina, okay?”
“Okay,” Nina laughed. She drummed her fingers on the leather of the steering wheel. “Can we please just go now?”
“Yeah come on Jess!” Anna called from the back seat.
“Seriously. We are actually like never going to, like, leave,” Esme whined, twirling a strand of long black hair.
“I’m coming!” Jess opened the door to the passenger seat and squeezed in. “I’m sorry but you know I’m not going out until I look good. And I mean good.” She flipped open a compact of blush and began powdering her cheeks with shimmery rose.
“We’re going hiking,” Anna retorted. “You don’t have to look good.”
Nina twisted around in her seat and fixed Anna with a look.
“Honey, we always have to look good,” she said. She reached out a hand to rub a bit of lipstick off of Esme’s teeth with a perfectly manicured fingertip. “What if we need to take a cute Instagram pic?”
Anna rolled her eyes.
“Whatever. Can we just go already?”
“Yes, we can!” Nina sang. She twisted the key in the ignition, and the car roared to life. She pushed her sunglasses down over her green eyes and backed the car out of the driveway.
The early autumn sunshine fell from the sky as easily as the leaves fell from the trees. Nina rolled down the windows of the car and tossed her hair back over her shoulders, enjoying the way the breeze ran its fingers through her fiery red mane. Jess played the role of DJ, plugging her iPod into the car’s expensive speakers and blaring music as the girls rolled down the highway. Anna sang along in her off-key voice, absentmindedly playing with her chipping nail polish. Esme pulled a silver cigarillo from her purse and began to smoke a cigarette delicately, leaning ever so slightly out of the window in order to prevent the ash from falling on her designer leather jacket.
“This is going to be the absolute best picnic ever!” Nina grinned as she turned the car off of the highway and onto a small side road. Anna smiled and leaned forward into the front seat, squinting at the road ahead of them.
“It’s hard to see with all the dust from this weird side road,” she said, blinking rapidly.
“Yeah, but I
know where we’re going,” Nina assured, tucking her wild red hair behind her ears and settling back in her seat. “It is just up ahead a couple of miles this way.” She glanced quickly at the GPS, and then at Jess. “At least, that’s what Jess said.”
“Whaa?” Jess looked up from her phone, mid-text message. “Oh, yeah. Yeah, that’s what it said on Google maps, so yeah.”
“See?” Nina pursed her pink lips in a smile. “Google maps knows what’s up, even if I don’t!”
“Alright,” said Anna. “I am just really excited to get out there and get into nature, you know? Get gritty… maybe climb a tree or something…”
Nina’s perfectly shaped eyebrows shot up her forehead.
“Oh no,” she said, her gaze holding the curving of the road before her. “I am not climbing any trees. My Louboutins are not going to go through that kind of hiking shit.” She fixed her red-bottomed heels with a fond gaze.
“How are you going to hike through the forest with heels on?” Anna asked.
“Yeah, Nina, you should have at least worn wedges,” Jess offered. “Like those are full blown stiletto.”
“Well it’s not like we’re going on a hike or something,” Nina defended.
She kept her eyes on the road and fought the feeling of annoyance that had begun to bubble in the pit her stomach. Why did her friends have to ask so many questions? And why did they always have to pick on her? It was probably because they were just jealous they weren’t making enough money to afford more than a single pair of Louboutins.
Nina inhaled deeply and added. “We’re going on a cute picnic. That does not require full blown woodsman attire or anything like that. You can still look cute on a picnic.”
“Yea but what if you step in some animal shit? Poopy stilettos… not so cute,” Anna fired back.
Nina bit her bottom lip and forced a stiff smile across her face.
“You just worry about you, you little forest adventurer,” she said through gritted teeth, her voice jumping in pitch. “I’ll take care of myself and my cute shoes too, alright?”
“Is there like a rest stop somewhere? Because I totally have to pee,” Esme whined.
Nina reached forward and cranked the music.
“I can’t hear you!” she yelled. She smashed her foot down hard on the gas pedal, and the girls shrieked as she sent the car flying forward along the bumpy dirt road.
***
“We’re Here,” Nina sang as the BMW screeched to a stop, kicking up a cloud of thick dust as it came to rest in a small lot just off the roadway.
Huge trees, their limbs calmly shaking colored leaves to the ground, stretched as far as the eye could see. Grasses and bushes tangled and wrestled for dominance amidst the thick trunks of endless trees. Some branches had become completely bare and stood stark and impressive, dark and strong against the concentrated blue of the sky. Other trees still clutched desperately to their last green leaves, as if trying to will summer to stay forever.
The car door flung open, and a single shiny, black stiletto slid to the ground. Its match followed, and then Nina stood and stretched. She threw her long, pale arms up toward the sky, the diamond rings decorating her fingers catching the late afternoon light and sparkling madly, dancing and dazzling under the kiss of autumn sunshine. She slammed the door behind her and walked gingerly across the makeshift car lot until she stood at the precipice of a narrow path.
“Is this the right path?” Nina asked.
She ducked her head beneath a low hanging branch and whipped her sunglasses off her face. She had to blink her eyes several times in order to adjust to the dimness of the forest. The trees stood together so thickly that it would be impossible to squeeze between them. Their branches curled to form an archway of tangled chestnut and dying leaves that effectively blocked out most of the sun’s light. Nina took one careful step forward and winced. The forest floor was damp and mushy beneath the carpet of crisp fallen leaves. She stepped back from the ragged path and looked at Jess.
“Is this seriously where we are going?” she barked.
Jess looked up from her phone, stared at the path, then looked back at her phone. She began punching at the screen with her long, pointed pink nails. After a few moments, she nodded.
“Yea,” she confirmed. “This is where we are supposed to be.”
Nina turned back to face the tiny opening.
“You have got to be kidding me,” she said.
“Oh, come on, Nina, it will be fun!” Anna smiled, grabbing Nina’s arm.
Nina made a face. Her toes already hurt, and there was no way she was going to risk lugging her designer purse through this tiny slit of a path. If one branch snagged it, it would be all over.
“Let me put my purse back in the car,” she sighed, shaking free of Anna’s enthusiastic grip on her arm and picking her way back to the BMW.
The sun was too warm, and she wished she had worn shorts instead of the tight tartan pants she had decided upon. She dropped the purse into the back seat and paused to bend and cuff her pants at the hems.
“Alright, let’s go, everyone,” Anna called. “We can walk for a bit and then find a cute clearing where we can all hang out, ok?”
Jess snapped a selfie and then nodded.
“Yea, but like, we need to make sure we find, like, good lighting and a cute background and stuff or else the Insta pics will look stupid, and there will be no point to even having come all the way here, ok?”
Esme nodded. “Yea,” she agreed.
“Okayyyyy you guys,” Nina said. She brushed a fly off of her jacket. “Ew.” She pushed past Anna, her curvy hips bumping into a tree as she tried to move down the path. “Ugh. Can we just find this clearing?”
“We just started walking, girl,” Anna laughed. “We’re here to get some exercise and enjoy the scenery, too, you know, not just take some cute pictures in the clearing.”
Nina swatted at a low hanging branch.
“Whatever,” she grumbled, narrowly avoiding a pile of animal excrement. “Let’s just get moving.”
The thin trail wound around pines and other various trees, the names of which Nina did not know, and had no desire to ever learn. Every few minutes she would smash one of her hips into the side of a particularly thick tree trunk, sending her staggering slightly forward on the toes of her shiny black heels.
I’m going to be purple and blue all around the hips, she thought as she bumped into yet another tree.
“Having fun, Nina?”
Anna’s perky tone slammed into Nina’s ears and disgruntled her just as much as her hips slamming into the trees. She spat a bug out of her mouth and yanked a thorn out of her tangled hair.
“Just… just tell me when we get there.”
After what felt like hours of walking, the trail very suddenly came up short. Nina nearly tripped over her own feet at the absolute abruptness of the trail’s drop off.
“Shit!” she cried, jumping backward. Small stones crumbled from the body of the trail and trickled down the short incline that signaled the end of the path. She flicked her hair from her face and huffed out anxiously. “They should put signs up or something. I could have totally broken my neck.”
Nina’s anger melted away as she looked up and realized where they were. The forest had spread itself open before them; the tightly knit groups of trees had stepped aside, allowing them to bask in the green, earthy glory of a beautiful clearing. Here, the grass was short and soft, not tangled and reaching past their knees, and the top branches of the trees curled back and away from the sky, almost in exultation of the sun, allowing sunlight to bathe the grass in warmth. Nina scooted down the small incline, her heels dragging and catching in the dirt, sending skinny avalanches of rubble tumbling down behind her, kicking dust onto her precious heels. Yet it didn’t matter, they had made it; she had made it. No more bumping into tree trunks, no more smacking dirty leaves out of her face, at least for the moment, she could sit and relax and put her heels up. Not only that, but
she noticed as she staggered down and across the grass that she was very hungry.
“Aww, that was so fun!” Anna yipped as she jogged past Nina and threw a blanket on the ground. “And this spot is so perfect! Best day, like, ever.”
Esme sat down on the blanket and took out her phone.
“What the fuck,” she said. “No signal? Seriously?”
“Well yea, Esme, we’re in the middle of fucking nowhere,” Nina said. She lifted her foot and picked leaves off of her heels.