The Fire People (a flash fiction horror story)
Image courtesy of StockVault.
INTRODUCTION
This story is about a hypocrite.
A particular kind of hypocrite. The Republican kind of hypocrite.
Full disclosure: For most of my life I was registered as a Republican. The Republican Party was the party of reason. It was the party of moderation. It was the only responsible political choice for people like me – decent, simple, hard-working individuals who believed in living within their means and delaying gratification.
The Democratic Party represented a wholly different set of values. The Democratic Party was about taking your money and hard work and giving them to somebody else, usually somebody who was unwilling to work hard or delay gratification. The Democrats were about welfare, and socialism, and a new set of values that eschewed the traditional strengths of American culture.
So I remained a registered Republican for most of my adult life. But along the way, the Republican Party changed.
This change began in the 1980s, during the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Christian conservatives, through instruments like the Moral Majority, began to organize and seize control of the Republican Party. Over the years this lingering conservativism, masquerading as religionism, held on and festered until it found a new champion in Donald J. Trump.
Trump was, in my estimation, the worst president in the history of the United States. I won’t belabor his sins, but suffice it to say he wrecked the country AND he divided it. Maybe you don’t share that opinion. Maybe you’re wrong.
The end result is a group of people who not only don’t mind if their leaders lie, cheat and steal, but a generation of Americans who believe lying, cheating and stealing are normalized.
What an astonishing departure from everything I’ve known over my lifetime. To think, these folks believe lying, cheating and stealing aren’t so bad because everybody does it, including the president!
Worse, they lie to themselves, and that’s what “The Fire People” is about.
Here we have a woman who outwardly presents as a religious, conservative, moral person. But look beneath the veneer and you find somebody who isn’t what they seem, somebody who aspires to a different kind of life, one that they outwardly condemn when it’s somebody else but secretly embrace for themselves.
Fate has a way of tripping up people like that, and that’s exactly what happens to the protagonist of “The Fire People.”
She gets what she thinks those other people deserve.
I wrote this story in the late ’90s but sadly, it’s more relevant today than it was back then. I guess it’s true that the more things change, the more they stay the same.
Del Stone Jr., July 18, 2024
—
THE FIRE PEOPLE
… and if I die before I wake,
I pray the lord my soul will take …
It was the smoke alarm that hauled Gabby out of a dream-filled sleep, a barb of sound hooking through her left ear, through the center of her brain, piercing muzzy, subconscious images of guilt and sin and virginity.
She did not know what was happening, and staggered out of bed to answer the telephone or thumb the buzzer on the alarm clock or remove the clothes from the dryer. But after a moment of eye-rubbing she recognized the shriek, and her skin seemed to shrink around her bones. Oh my, she gasped to herself, and she almost said it. She almost spoke the sacrilege:
Oh my God.
She reached for the doorknob without thinking and – too late now – it was hot, hotter than the little travel iron set on “cotton,” and the door swung open as she jerked her hand away, a surprised gasp whistling through her lips. A wave of twisting heat and light rolled into the bedroom, as if she had just popped the door on the oven after baking a tray of dinner rolls.
Fire – fire – fire –
Flames blew up the stairwell with a roar, chewing along the pebbled ceiling and gnawing at the banister and reaching for the register at the top of the landing. The air was filled with the cauterizing stench of chemicals and woodsmoke, and Gabby could think only stupid thoughts: How did this happen? What did I do to deserve this?
And then she was crawling for the sliding glass door at the other end of the bedroom, which opened to the fourth-floor balcony – never mind what she would do then; all that mattered was escape. And as a part of her brain tallied the losses – her clothes and furniture, the photographs of her Sunday school students and her great-grandmother’s Bible and the gold-plated crucifix pendant given to her by the Reverend Thomas Miller for her years of service to the Antioch Baptist Church – another part of her glanced back resentfully at the advancing flames, and that was when she saw them. Sinister movement amid the ugly glare.
The fire people.
Her muscles froze, and the breath eased out of her so that her belly grazed the furry nap of the carpet. Although she knew she must get out now or die, she could not tear herself from the sight of them.
People, in the fire. Of the fire.
People with huge, swaying breasts that seemed filled with jellied gasoline, and bulbous penises that twitched and sprayed bright arcing gobbets of lava. Copulating. Fornicating.
People fucking.
They raced across the ceiling in a kind of frantic insectile glee to roll against the draperies so that the fabric exploded in flames, or shoved impossibly long, bright, arms into the air register so that it fumed inky smoke, or rolled across the bubbling carpet toward her, shimmying under the bed where she kept her magazine photos of naked men … Oh no, don’t find them, I didn’t put them there, not mine … and then the closet doors jumped open and the fire people swept napthic penises and breasts down the breadth of her wardrobe, and the other things in there, the little box of sex things, the gels and straps and mechanical devices, so that the contents erupted in a righteous blaze that flanked her, a gallery of jittering, undulating shapes rising between her and the balcony.
Now I lay me down to sleep; I pray the lord my soul will keep … the children’s catechism sprang perversely to her mind, and as the fire people circled her and drew closer, reaching out with the promise of an embrace that would boil the meat from her bones, the next verse of that simple prayer hovered at the back of her thoughts, and she knew exactly what she had done to deserve this, and which lord had come to take her away … and keep her. …
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone’s stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra’s Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone’s comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled “December” for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman’s Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone’s novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild’s award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida’s best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn’t look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .
Recently I posted a link to a story about former Republican Congressman Aaron Schock, who finally admitted he is gay. Schock was known for opposing gay rights measures while in office.
In my post I said something to the effect that from now on, I would assume any Republican opposing gay rights is secretly closeted.
The post received a number of responses, some of them depressingly predictable in their defense of the GOP. So to clarify:
Do I believe each and every Republican lawmaker who opposes gay rights is secretly closeted?
Of course not!
That was a literary device, written for dramatic effect. Not every Republican lawmaker who opposes gay rights is secretly closeted, but some are, and they are being caught in homosexual trysts, which makes them liars and hypocrites.
I became curious about some of the examples and compiled this list. Bear in mind it’s only a PARTIAL list. I could have added more names:
Republican Bob Allen: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught offering a male undercover officer $20 to perform oral sex on him.
New Progressive (derived from the Republican Party) Robert Arango: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught posing shirtless on the gay sex solicitation app Grindr, resigned in shame.
Republican Roy Ashburn: Opposed LGBTQ rights (and blamed that on his constituents), arrested for DUI after partying at a gay nightclub. Admitted later he is gay.
Republican Bruce Barclay: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught hiring gay prostitutes and shooting videos of the sexual encounters.
Republican Robert Bauman: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught soliciting sex from a 16-year-old male prostitute.
Republican Randy Boehning: Opposed LGBTQ rights (and blamed that on his constituents), caught sending racy photos to a 21-year-old male on the gay sex solicitation app Grindr.
Republican Larry Craig: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught asking a male undercover agent for sex in a Minnesota airport men’s room.
Republican Richard Curtis: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught paying a young man for sex and dressing in women’s clothes.
Republican David Dreier: Opposed LGBTQ rights, discovered to be living with his “partner,” another man.
Republican Mark Foley: Caught soliciting teenage congressional pages, disgraced.
Republican Phil Hinkle: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught offering an 18-year-old male $140 for “a really good time.”
Republican Jon Hinson: Denied he was gay, married, caught performing oral sex on a man in a Washington, D.C. men’s room.
Republican Troy King: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught by his wife in bed with another man.
Republican Jim McRery: Opposed LGBTQ rights, accused of using his college fraternity as a front for gay activity.
Republican Glen Murphy Jr.: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught performing oral sex on a 22-year-old sleeping man.
Republican Aaron Schock: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught taking a shower with another man, admits on social media he is gay.
Republican Edward L. Schrock: Opposed LGBTQ rights, caught leaving messages on a gay sex line, did not seek re-election.
About the author:
Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone’s stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra’s Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone’s comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled “December” for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman’s Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone’s novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild’s award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”
Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida’s best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.
As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn’t look a day over 94.
Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, Ello and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .