Flare Read Online Free Page A

eyes and too consumed with panic to move.
    Ash cussed and curled his body into a tighter ball as the pain in his eyes continued to sear. He cried and yelled, keeping his body clenched inward as if he were being beaten by a mob.
    After a minute the pain in his eyes subsided, and so did the pain on his lower back. His head still hurt, but its intensity was dissipating, so Ash opened his eyelids. He saw stars at first, which faded until the room came back into focus, lit with an ethereal glow. He stood up and looked in the mirror to see that he had indeed been hurt, because his eyes were horribly red. He also noticed that his back looked as if it had been rubbed with a steel grate.
    I only got caught in the curtains for a moment, and it’s the deepest sunburn I’ve ever had.
    Still, he was in one piece. His bloodshot eyes were still dark blue on the inside, and the burn on his back was localized to one area. His thick hair poked out from the bandage on his head, a little longer than it normally was, and he still had the same scars running across his right cheek, criss-crossing from the back of his neck to his chin.
    The boy with the messed up face and no friends , he thought, laughing dryly. Whatever just happened I’m still here, all of me.
    Ash examined the room and saw piles of cast-off medical equipment: IVs, pills, needles, alcohol swabs and a gurney. He picked up the bandage that had been put on his head and found that it was thick, dark and coarse to the touch. He noticed that it was heavy too, and a strange material lined the insides. The material was a soft plastic, and it also seemed to be lined with something itself.
    This isn’t a bandage for a head wound. This is to protect me from the sun out there.
    Ash realized that the curtains behind him might still be open, and he turned around to see that the curtain he had torn loose was now flapping ever so gently in the wind. It wasn’t a threat to him now but could be at a moment’s notice, so he turned his burnt back to the curtain and looked for a solution. He found a roll of duct tape in the far corner that Heather had placed next to a pair of scissors. He grabbed the tape and cut five pieces and placed them on his right pant leg. He backed up to the curtain, still afraid to face it, and pressed the loose edge flush against the wall. He sealed it with tape, and then relaxed.
    Ash was about to go upstairs, but he had to test the light once more, even though it was against his better judgment. He took his pinky finger and wedged it between the curtain and the window. He peeked it over the pane, and then withdrew after a second had passed. A moment later the pain set in as if he’d touched a stove, and the tip of his finger was red.
    Less than a second and it burns. Whatever this is, it’s real.
    “Heather?! Hello?!” yelled Ash towards the ceiling. “You here?”
    There was no answer.
    “Anyone? Is anyone here?!”
    He yelled three more times and pounded the ceiling with a broomstick, and then went up the stairs that led to the first floor. He banged on that door and yelled, but there was no answer there either.
    /***/
    Ash spent the next ten minutes playing with the bandage on his head. He knew that his finger would recover from the burn, but his eyes might not if he saw the light again. He moved the dark bandage around his head, and tried pulling it over his eyes quickly. He practiced this maneuver three times, and then positioned the bandage where it would allow the smallest bit of light in but would still allow him to keep his bearings. This bandage can only do so much . It’s still dangerous out there, and all I’ve got to protect me is a bunch of rags.
    Ash slowly built up the courage to open the door to the first floor, but before this he pulled the bandage over his eyes so that he could only see a sliver of light and then looked towards the opposite wall for good measure. He opened the door and there was no change in light, so he stole a look from