Gasoline and teeth

This isn’t a survival story. It’s a burn notice.

I walked into the fire with my teeth bared, daring it to bite back. I was so sick of being frozen that I was willing to fuckin burn. And I did. I burned my fuckin skin off. I burned all the comforts I was clinging to. The reasons. The excuses. And what’s left now that all that shit is ash is me and my fuckin want and my fuckin choice. For a long time, I played by this hidden rule that I couldn’t want what I most wanted: to write and to be seen. I’d come close, brush by it now and then. Then I’d run in the opposite fuckin direction. I lived my life like it was already over. Like I was at the end. The thing about the fire is I didn’t set it. It’s not like one day I made a declaration, lit it with a match, and did a solemn formal ceremony. The fire was already burning. It just needed gasoline. I love that smell, like car and dirty heat and potential destruction. This isn’t a phoenix rising from the ashes story. Let’s be clear about that. There’s nothing uplifting here.