Page 92 of Born in Fire
His lies tangle with the fragments of truth emerging in my mind. I did work here, but the rest feels wrong. Another memory surfaces—Tyler grabbing my arm just like this, hurting me.
“No,” I say more forcefully, planting my feet. “I’m not going with you.”
Tyler’s façade cracks slightly. “Don’t be difficult, Ju-Ju. You know what happens when you’re difficult.”
The threat in his voice ignites something inside me—a heat that begins in my core and spreads outward. My skin feels suddenly too tight, too hot.
“Let. Go.” Each word emerges with surprising force.
“Or what?” His voice drops to a dangerous whisper as he pulls me toward a service entrance. “You’ll scream? Make another scene? No one believed you last time, and that was before all those sessions with your shrink.”
The heat inside me intensifies, building pressure like a kettle about to boil. Tyler falters momentarily, his expression confused as he feels the unnatural warmth radiating from my skin.
“Jesus, you’re burning up. Are you on something?” His grip loosens slightly. “Is that why you’ve been hiding out? Drugs? With that thug you had hanging around with you?”
What is he talking about?
I seize the opportunity to wrench my arm free, stumbling backward. “Stay away from me.”
Tyler’s charm vanishes entirely, replaced by cold fury. “Enough games.” He lunges forward, grabbing both my arms with bruising force. “You’re coming with me now, and when we get home, we’re going to have a serious discussion about your behavior.”
The threat in his voice, the painful grip on my arms, the memories surfacing of similar moments—it all converges into a single point of rage and fear. The heat inside me explodes outward, no longer contained by flesh and bone.
“NO!” The word tears from my throat as something fundamental shifts inside me.
My skin begins to glow, faint at first, then brighter—a golden light emanating from within. The air around us shimmers with heat. Tyler’s eyes widen in confusion, then alarm.
“What the fu—?” He tries to release me, but now I’m the one holding on.
“You don’t own me,” I say, my voice strangely calm despite the rage building inside. “You never did.”
The light intensifies, pouring from my hands where they grip his wrists. Tyler’s expression transforms from anger to genuine terror as the glow spreads to his skin.
“Juno, stop!” His voice rises in panic. “What are you doing? STOP!”
But I don’t know how to stop. The power flows from me like a tide breaking through a dam, unstoppable and overwhelming. Tyler’s skin begins to crack with golden light, like pottery in a kiln.
“Help!” he hisses, but his voice seems to fade. “Help me!” It’s barely a whisper. And then the sound is cut off completely as the light consumes him. For one suspended moment, his form is illuminated from within—a human-shaped vessel of golden fire—before collapsing inward.
Where Tyler stood, only ash remains, drifting in the afternoon breeze.
I stare at my hands in horror. They look normal now, the glow fading as quickly as it appeared. My body temperature returns to normal, leaving me cold and shaking in the aftermath.
Oh, my God!
I killed him. Disintegrated him completely. There’s nothing left. Nothing but dust.
Around me, life continues with surreal normalcy. Pedestrians walk past, some glancing curiously at the bedraggled woman standing alone, but no one seems to have witnessed what just happened. Or if they did, they’ve chosen not to acknowledge it, perhaps believing it was some kind of street performance or publicity stunt.
“Another one of those movie promotions,” I hear someone mutter as they hurry past. “Getting a bit extreme, if you ask me.”
My legs threaten to collapse beneath me. What am I? What kind of monster destroys a human being with a touch? In barely a second. The questions swirl in my empty mind, finding no purchase, no context.
I should run. Disappear before someone connects me to the mound of dust on the pavement. Before someone realizes what I’ve done. Before I hurt anyone else.
But as I turn to flee, movement at the entrance to Craven Towers catches my eye. A man emerges from the revolving door, his dark hair slightly disheveled, his shoulders set in a tense line. Even from this distance, something about him stops my breath.
Without conscious decision, I take a step toward him, then another. The invisible tether that drew me to this building now connects directly to this man. Each step feels like coming home, like solving a puzzle I didn’t know needed solving.
