Into The Flames

    From the moment I saw her I knew that my life was about to change. She was a reckless beauty, with a dangerous mind. She introduced me to a whole new world that I never knew existed. She showed me what it was like to be free.
    
    Where to begin? Back in my hometown, I suppose; that's where I first met her. I was walking along the railroad tracks and there she was. It was past midnight, and our small town was fast asleep. But not her. She was sitting in the middle of the tracks in an armchair. I didn't think to ask how she got the chair there, or why she was sitting there; it just didn’t matter. For a while I just stood there, just looked at her. She looked so dramatic leaning back in her armchair, a cigarette dangling from her hand. She looked like nothing else mattered. I wanted more than anything to just talk to her; I would gladly listen to anything she had to say. But I had not the slightest notion of what to say to her. So I did the only thing I could think of.
    "Can I bum a smoke?" I had never smoked until that night, but I didn't think twice about it. She told me her name was Phyre, but as I grew closer to her I doubted that was the name she was given at birth.

    "Dakota? Sounds like some sort of warrior princess." She smirked a little. "Do you consider yourself a warrior, princess?"
    "I've never been in a situation where I've had to be a warrior." I added with resentment: "Don't call me princess."
    "Everyday is a battle. Life requires warriors."  I couldn't decide whether I admired that statement or if I was frightened by it, so I said nothing. Together we inhaled chemicals in the moonlight. The smoke that rose above us looked strangely beautiful to me, perhaps because I knew it was poison. It was silent for a few moments, and then she spoke again.
    "You're still here." It was just an observation, but she seemed surprised by it, maybe even grateful. I just nodded. She looked me up and down, sizing me up. "Do you plan on staying in this town your whole life?" I did not.

    "Then you're coming with me. I'm going to the city, tomorrow." The thought scared me; I had never been an impulsive person, but then again, I had never smoked cigarettes either.
    So I agreed to go with her. As much as I didn't want to leave, I went home and got together a backpack to take with me. I left a note for my father, it read:

Goodbye. I’m safe, I promise.

 I was only eighteen, too young to realize how wrong I was.
    

We met in front of a Seven Eleven, where we bought coffee and waited until someone stopped for gas that was willing to let us ride with them. Inside of the truck the enormity of what I was doing sank in. It was terrifying. I had always wanted to get out of my hometown, to go somewhere that was actually somewhere; but actually doing it was overwhelming. But then I saw the look on Phyre's face, it was one of complete calm. It's hard to feel anxious when you're looking at Phyre; you just can't help but be calm too, even a little excited.
     When we got out of the strangers truck I looked around. We certainly weren't in Kansas anymore. Home was far away now, or maybe it didn't even exist anymore. But home didn't matter; we weren't going to go back. Thousands of questions were going through my head, all of which I should have already known the answers to. Where were we going to live? How were we going to get money for food? I was already in over my head.
    "How much money did you bring with you?"
I didn’t have much, but between the two of us we had enough for a down payment on a bachelor apartment. It was dirty and smelly, but we lived there now, so I loved it. We had no furniture of our own, only the small table that was left there by the previous renters, so that night we slept on the floor. I was amazed that we already had a place to live, but Phyre said that in a neighbourhood like this there were always empty apartments. I guess that meant we were in a bad part of town.

          I went to sleep not knowing what was going to happen to us. We had very little money, no food, we were both unemployed, and we were sleeping on the floor in a dirty apartment. It was the best sleep I had ever had.
    Phyre was still sleeping when I woke up, so I let my mind wander. I thought about what my father was doing, and if he had found my note yet. I knew he'd be crushed when he did. He tried so hard, and now he would feel like a failure. My mom had left without a word, and my dad's world had fallen apart. Not only had the love of his life walked out, but he suddenly had to take care of me all by himself, pay all the bills and clean up the house. Yes, he would be crushed, but things would be easier for him now. Still the guilt flooded through me. I was all he had after my mother left, and then I just walked out on him too. I was driving myself mad, I just wanted to go home and tell my dad everything was okay. But then I looked at Phyre sleeping on the floor next to me, and everything was okay.

    When Phyre finally woke up we started to discuss job possibilities. She told me that our best option was waitressing, where we could make tips. After a few days of hunting we were both hired at a diner, it was dirty and served questionable people, but it was better than nothing.

          A week went by and we were still doing fine, we were both working full time at minimum wage, which with tips gave us enough to pay rent and buy food. It was great; the only thing that bothered me is that we still didn’t have a bed. We had taken to piling our dirty laundry up and sleeping on that, but whenever we went to the laundry mat our makeshift bed receded into nothing again. I tried not to let Phyre know that it bothered me; it didn’t seem to bother her. Nothing really bothered her though; she just lived her life as it was. Sleeping on the floor was just another part of the adventure. It all seemed so surreal. How had I gotten myself into this? I didn’t, Phyre got me into this. How had she convinced me to just leave everything I knew behind? Sometimes I wondered if there was anything she couldn’t get me to do. What else did she have planned for me? I doubted anything, she didn’t make plans, a thought would just come to her, and then it would be a reality. Secretly I hoped she could teach me to live like that. Was it something you could teach? I had no idea, but I was willing enough to try.

          Phyre came to meet me after my shift at the diner one day and we walked back to the apartment which we shared together. After a bit of mindless chatter Phyre said something with a little more relevance.

 "I've got a surprise for you when we get home." This was the first time either of us had referred to it as 'home', it made me smile. I decided that it really was home now, and I was glad.
    "What kind of surprise?" I knew that was a stupid thing to say, but I couldn’t even imagine what it could be. Phyre just laughed and led me up the stairs to our door. I was in complete shock when I looked inside. She had gotten us a bed, complete with pillows and blankets. She ran and collapsed onto it.
    "Do you like it?" She looked so happy, so proud. There was another emotion on her face and in her voice, but I couldn't figure out what it was. I followed her to the bed and lay down. It was far more comfortable than the floor. The blankets were soft, they felt like they had been washed and worn.
    "Where did you get all of this?” I couldn't speak clearly, having a bed just made me so happy, so grateful.
    "I got it from a Salvation Army; I hope second hand bedding doesn’t bother you."
    "More than sleeping on the floor? Not a chance.”  

We lay smiling at each other for a while, sinking into the softness of our new mattress. Slowly it dawned on me that we would be sharing one bed. My smile widened. Phyre threw a pillow at me. We laughed for a bit and then drifted off to sleep. The first night in our new bed brought me strange dreams. I dreamt of my father, how was he coping with me absence? In my dream he had hired a detective to find me. But when he did find some clues indicating where I had gone, my father disregarded them, as if he didn’t really want to find me after all. In another dream was lying on the bed with Phyre next to me. We were both naked, and somehow the bed had gotten in the middle of a busy intersection. Everyone was passing by as if they didn’t even see us, but there we were, right in the middle of everything.

          When I awoke Phyre was not beside me. I heard the water running and realized she was in the shower. Sleepily I wondered if she was getting ready for work. No, it was her day off, and mine. I got up and started to make breakfast. The only type of breakfast food I could make was pancakes, so that’s what we were going to eat. Phyre always made omelettes or poached eggs, but I was too embarrassed to ask her to teach me how. She came out of the shower just as I was searching for the syrup. We couldn’t afford real maple syrup, but we liked the butter flavoured stuff anyways. As we ate we thought of what we should do for the day. Most days we would just go for walks since we couldn’t afford to do anything else. One of the cooks at the diner also had the day off and was going to be busking on Yale Street so we thought we would go see him later on too. After a quick clean up of the kitchen we left for our walk.

We found our way to a playground, but there were no children there. We sat on the swings and swayed back and forth in silence for a bit.
    "Why did you decide to come with me?" The question caught me off guard, and I didn't know what to say. "You didn't even know me. Why did you come?" I thought for a few seconds.
    "Because I didn't know you; I wanted to experience something completely new. I was sick of living in that town. You seemed like you could get me out, and you did." She looked hard at me for a while, considering my answer. Or maybe she was just considering me. She stopped swinging and stood up, and I did the same. She came closer to me and whispered: "'You really want to experience something new?" I nodded. What happened next is somewhat a blur. She was closer and closer and then we were touching. Her arms were around me, and mine were around her. I could feel her breath, and then I could feel her lips. The kiss was long and deep, and over too soon. When it was over we stayed in our embrace, looking at each other. I was at a complete loss for words. Before I had seen Phyre as intriguing and beautiful, and I knew she brought out feelings in me that I had never felt before. But this was something else. I couldn't take my eyes off her. She was a force of nature.

          “We should go see Dion before it’s too late.” Her eyes sparkled as she said it. My head was spinning; I didn’t even know what to think, so I just didn’t. It was nice to not think, to just feel. But what was I feeling? It was a whole new emotion. Rather than trying to understand I decided to just go watch Lyon with Phyre. Maybe I was learning from her after all.

          We finally got to Yale Street Dion had already drawn quite a crowd. He was just sitting playing his acoustic guitar and singing, but he had a voice like I had never heard before. Each song seemed to get better and better, and it occurred to me that maybe my mood made them seem better than they were; although the crowd seemed to like him too. Phyre and I danced together as he sang; it was times like this that I understood how Phyre felt, like nothing else mattered. Spectators took our lead and began dancing too, and no one walked away without dropping some money into Dion’s open case. After an hour or so the crowd died down and Dion stopped playing, he stayed and visited with us for a while though.

          It was just absent minded chatter about things like who irritated us at the diner and about the party Dinah was throwing next week.  Phyre seemed sceptical that anyone named Dinah could throw a good party.

          “We can’t all name ourselves, you know.” Dion laughed, only to receive a dirty look. Phyre got up and said she was going to go find a rest room.

          “So what happened between you two?” He barely waited until she was out of earshot to ask me. He told me that I had been staring at her the whole time. I teased that the only way he could have noticed that is if he had been staring at me. He just laughed, but continued to ask what had happened. I was unsure about telling him, but did anyways. He didn't seem surprised, he just looked me up and down.

"Do you know what you're getting yourself into?" No, I had no idea. But rather than admit that, I went on the defensive.

"I can handle myself."

"More like Phyre can handle you. She pretty much owns you now." I was outraged. What was he even talking about? He had only known either of us since we started at the diner, certainly not long enough to say things like that. He sensed my anger and changed the subject. Still annoyed, I just nodded along as he spoke about his guitar and how one day he wanted to quit the diner and just play on street corners all day. He told me that he didn't want to be 'discovered', he was happy with the street scene. This conversation worked well enough to make me forget my anger and by the time Phyre got back I had forgotten all about it.