Arson Read Online Free

night. Whatever do you dream about, boy?”
    â€œI’m fine, Grandma. It was nothing,” Arson whispered, gulping down the entire glass of birch beer, trying to avoid the subject.
    Grandma got up and placed the bottle of birch beer in front of him. “If you don’t want me to pry, I won’t. I try to care about you, but you don’t ever open up. I get so tired of your nonsense, wretch!” Suddenly, he saw her recoil. Arson could feel her eyes slithering up and down his frame.
    Then she grasped her cup of tea as daintily as ever and took a sip. In a blink, she was changed. “How’s breakfast, love?”
    He couldn’t understand how she did it, how she morphed instantly. Arson sighed and brushed off the rude remark before replying, “Delicious” with as much phony gratitude as he could muster. He found himself staring at random things around the room, anything to avoid her examination. She didn’t mean those words she said, he was sure…he hoped. Unscrewing the soda cap, he listened for the gasp of air escaping. Then he filled his glass with more of the fizzy beverage. He proceeded to down another full glass, every moment more stifling than the last.
    â€œThank you, Grandma. This is the breakfast of champions.”
    â€œOh, it’s nothing, love.”
    Getting up from his seat, Arson belched. “Excuse me,” he said, covering his mouth in an effort to conceal his stomach’s grumble. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed a spinning plate coming toward him. It whirled and turned in the air so fast, he barely had the chance to duck. Startled, Arson dropped to the floor in a panic as the plate aimed at him smashed against a wall and shattered on the tile. “Grandma, what are you doing?”
    â€œLet that be the last time you welcome foul behavior into this house. You’re not some gutter trash from the streets. I expect better manners in the future.” In a flash, her lips stretched back into a smile, and she knelt down beside him, picking up the broken fragments off the floor.
    Arson reached for some pieces. He could see her face change again.
    â€œLeave it for Grandma, Arson,” she said. “You’re gonna be late for work. Lord knows those crazy folks love their ice cream as soon as the cock crows. Get goin’ and leave the fixin’ to me.”
    Confused, he walked outside. He could feel the morning creeping in, the taste of dew sticking to the inner flesh of his cheek. “Another day,” he sighed. Casting his gaze out against Lake Pocotopaug, he groaned with melancholy delight and caught a glimpse of the ripples harmonizing in the wake of restless fishermen.
    Arson walked along the rocky path that Grandpa had created, time had weathered, and erosion had ruined before reaching the main stretch of road. Like always, nightfall would come, and the same road would usher him in again, back to the hell he knew as home.
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    * * *
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    He heard the sound of Mandy’s voice. Like music, but softer. “Hey, Arson,” she said, walking into Toby’s with another mindless clone.
    â€œTraded the last model in for a new one, huh?” Arson grinned. “Anything interesting this one can do?”
    Amidst a flurry of people, Mandy exchanged glances with him, not entirely sure what the comment meant. He pretended to read her mind and quickly gave her two scoops of double chocolate chip ice cream in a sugar cone and littered it with chocolate shots. After smiling a few times, Arson reluctantly turned to face paying customers.
    Demands from impatient mothers dying to put something into their kids’ greedy mouths came at him, as if each ricocheted off the last. Day in and day out, Arson noticed how each mother varied in the amount of her affection toward her child, most far too agitated by the time they stepped inside the parlor to be bothered with any nonsense from an ice cream scooper like