Ash and Oblivion

Mia looked into his amber eyes. She felt the hatred boiling in her veins, a desperate, feral need for justice. She wanted to claw his eyes out. She wanted to scream David’s name until the ceiling collapsed.

But the heat was too much. The grief was a crushing physical weight, a boulder sitting on her chest. She was so tired. She had fought the phantom flames for a year, and she had lost.

She thought of the scorched polaroid on her nightstand. She thought of the pain that awaited her in her stifling apartment. To live with the truth—to know this monster existed and went unpunished—would break what little was left of her mind.

A single tear slipped down Mia's cheek, instantly evaporating in the heat radiating from Cole’s skin.

"Please," she whimpered, her voice breaking. "Make it stop."

Cole smiled, a dark, victorious glint in his eyes. "Good girl."

He cupped her face in his burning hands and pressed his mouth to hers.

It was a searing, agonizing kiss. Mia felt as though a lit match had been dropped directly into her brain. A rushing sound filled her ears, like a vacuum pulling the very essence of her soul outward. She felt the memory of the fire ignite and turn to ash. Then, she felt David—his smile, his laugh, the way he held her—curl at the edges and burn away into nothingness.

The pain reached a blinding crescendo, and then, abruptly, there was only a cool, drifting silence.

\---

The city streets were still sweltering at three in the morning, the heatwave refusing to break.

Mia walked up the concrete steps from the subway tunnel, stepping out onto the empty pavement. The oppressive humidity wrapped around her, but she didn't sweat. She didn't feel the heat at all. In fact, she didn't feel much of anything.

She paused beneath a flickering streetlamp, her face perfectly calm. A blank, pleasant smile rested on her lips. She didn't know where she was going. She didn't know where she had been. Her mind was a quiet, pristine white room, swept clean of dust and clutter.

A shadow stepped out from the stairwell beside her. Cole adjusted the cuffs of his dark suit, looking entirely satiated, a faint hum of energy vibrating beneath his skin.

He offered her his arm.

Mia looked at the handsome stranger. She didn't know him, but he felt warm, and she felt a sudden, inexplicable chill. Still smiling her empty smile, she slipped her arm through his.

Together, the monster and his masterpiece walked away into the dark, sweltering city night.