Between the Devil and
the Deep Blue Sea
by Amanda Lara
CeCe dates you because you are an arsonist. You know this because when her family moved into your building, she’d knocked on your door and said, Hi, my name is CeCe, but Mrs. Wu down the hall said to steer clear of you ‘cause you’re a pyromaniac. Is that true? You had just gotten back, in fact, from setting fire to a rose garden down the street. The thrill of it was still racing up your spine. You said, Yes, I am, and she’d asked you out for coffee right then and there. Later—while she’s taking off her shirt behind the coffee shop’s dumpster—you think, One day I am going to watch this girl burn. On her phone, CeCe’s got your number saved as ‘Babe’ alongside an orange string of emoji flames.
Before your mother dumped you at your rich-bitch aunt’s doorstep, you cannot remember the desire to watch something crumple to ash. Abandonment interlinked with puberty made for a poor combination in sexual development; in high school you began bringing lighters on dates, or fucking girls on the forest floor just to toss a Zippo into the closest patch of dry brush. Your rich-bitch aunt is a lawyer, and even though she does not like you, she keeps you out of prison. Thus far your record is only blotted with periods of community service and one overnight stay in a police holding cell; to top it off, you’re fairly handsome, so whenever you feel like finding part-time work, it’s easier to flirt past the checkered pattern of your past. Arson is kind of kinky, anyway. Sometimes women call you Christian Grey.
Before your mother dumped you at your rich-bitch aunt’s doorstep, you cannot remember the desire to watch something crumple to ash. Abandonment interlinked with puberty made for a poor combination in sexual development; in high school you began bringing lighters on dates, or fucking girls on the forest floor just to toss a Zippo into the closest patch of dry brush. Your rich-bitch aunt is a lawyer, and even though she does not like you, she keeps you out of prison. Thus far your record is only blotted with periods of community service and one overnight stay in a police holding cell; to top it off, you’re fairly handsome, so whenever you feel like finding part-time work, it’s easier to flirt past the checkered pattern of your past. Arson is kind of kinky, anyway. Sometimes women call you Christian Grey.
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By contrast, CeCe never presses for the specifics on why you like to set fires. From what you know, her father is a hard man; a courtcircuit judge and darkly puritanical to boot. In retaliation, CeCe says she’s compiling a list of criminal lovers—so far she’s dated men who’ve committed tax evasion, robbery, and second-degree manslaughter. Someday, I’m gonna date a serial killer, she confides one afternoon at your apartment, a serious expression on her face, but when I go missing, don’t tell anyone. The two of you are huddled beneath a blanket, watching a rom-com rented from the nearest Redbox. Outside the world is bright but blistered with winter frost. You very nearly kill her then.
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“Outside the world is bright but blistered with winter frost. You very nearly kill her then." |
Eventually you notice that she’s begun to replace her perfume. Pomegranate and lavender give way to something sharp, something strange and beautiful; it doesn’t take you long to figure out that she’s dousing herself in gasoline, showing up at your apartment twenty minutes late for dates and saying, Sorry, I just showered, while her hair drip drip drips oily stains onto the carpet. Aside from that very first conversation, the two of you have not spoken about your fire-setting tendencies. CeCe is being deliberately inflammatory and it leaves you hot and bothered and hateful all at once.
You begin to hear the stories: whispers surrounding Cecilia Moore, daughter of a federal judge, twenty-five years old with a private-school diploma and no career to show for it. Rumor has it that she actually OD’d in high school, and that she liked being dead so much that she wanted help getting back to the grave. Ex-boyfriends actually take the time to DM you through Instagram, Twitter. She’s goddamn crazy, writes the burglar, a lumpy forty-something truck-driver named Sam. Stay the fuck away, if you know what’s good for you. It is not a small town, but somehow everyone within your small circle of friends manages to know something about her—the girl who asked to be kidnapped, the girl who wanted to kiss a murderer.
On the day you and CeCe break up, she’s dyed her hair from blonde to red. It’s an artificial color, a shade or two lighter than wine, not too far off from blood. Today her hair hangs in waves, frizzed out towards the ends, so that it looks like a spill of cold, dark flame.
Do it, she begs. Help me.
A twisted, sickly part of you is actually tempted. The most infuriating part about CeCe, you think, are her eyes. They’re blue, ocean-blue, desperate and lovely and wet with every blink of her long lashes. More than anything, you want to dry up the sea in her gaze; to stick a lighter into each pool until all the water in her goes up in steam until there’s nothing left but blind dry socket.
No, you reply. I can’t. I love you. This is neither a lie nor the truth, but it does its job.
Within moments CeCe has gathered up her things and left, tearless, ruby-glossed mouth trembling. CeCe dated you because you are an arsonist. She is twenty-five and still living with Daddy dearest; their nightly screaming matches are the building tenants’ most frequent noise complaint. CeCe only understands love in the shape of damage.
You begin to hear the stories: whispers surrounding Cecilia Moore, daughter of a federal judge, twenty-five years old with a private-school diploma and no career to show for it. Rumor has it that she actually OD’d in high school, and that she liked being dead so much that she wanted help getting back to the grave. Ex-boyfriends actually take the time to DM you through Instagram, Twitter. She’s goddamn crazy, writes the burglar, a lumpy forty-something truck-driver named Sam. Stay the fuck away, if you know what’s good for you. It is not a small town, but somehow everyone within your small circle of friends manages to know something about her—the girl who asked to be kidnapped, the girl who wanted to kiss a murderer.
On the day you and CeCe break up, she’s dyed her hair from blonde to red. It’s an artificial color, a shade or two lighter than wine, not too far off from blood. Today her hair hangs in waves, frizzed out towards the ends, so that it looks like a spill of cold, dark flame.
Do it, she begs. Help me.
A twisted, sickly part of you is actually tempted. The most infuriating part about CeCe, you think, are her eyes. They’re blue, ocean-blue, desperate and lovely and wet with every blink of her long lashes. More than anything, you want to dry up the sea in her gaze; to stick a lighter into each pool until all the water in her goes up in steam until there’s nothing left but blind dry socket.
No, you reply. I can’t. I love you. This is neither a lie nor the truth, but it does its job.
Within moments CeCe has gathered up her things and left, tearless, ruby-glossed mouth trembling. CeCe dated you because you are an arsonist. She is twenty-five and still living with Daddy dearest; their nightly screaming matches are the building tenants’ most frequent noise complaint. CeCe only understands love in the shape of damage.
After she has left for good, you scribble her name over and over on a piece of paper--CECE CE CE SEE CE—before setting it on fire. Rather than dropping it into the sink you put it into the trash; soon enough, heat licks its way up up up inside your home, sinking quivering orange teeth in everything in sight. Overhead, the smoke detector wails; in the hall, there is a bustle of panicked movement. No doubt the authorities will trace the source of the blaze back to your place, and it’s unlikely that your aunt can help you out of a felony charge this time.
To you, this all means very little. You sit back, relax. As the smoke rises, you do nothing except watch.
To you, this all means very little. You sit back, relax. As the smoke rises, you do nothing except watch.
Amanda Lara is a writer with credits in both fiction and journalism. Her work has appeared in Goldman Review, Ember: A Journal of Luminous Things, and Inaccurate Realities (among others) and has been published in print, electronic, and audio mediums. Prior to her creative endeavors, she wrote a bimonthly column entitled “Teen World,” which was geared towards young adult readers, for the Fullerton Observer. Amanda resides in Orange County, California, and can be found on Twitter @amhlara.
A 2019 Pushcart Prize nominee, Lara's story can be found in Issue 17 of Glassworks.
