The area around the town common is crowded with cars, it seems a lot of people have turned out for Lakeville Days. All of downtown’s parking is full, especially in the area between Lakeville High and the town common. Finally, about a quarter mile away, I find a parking spot near The Clip Joint, the town barbershop, and lock my truck.

My hands shake as I approach the glowing lights of the common, and as I get closer I feel sweat break out in the small of my back. I know what it is, and I hate that I’m so afraid of it, but I can’t help it.

It’s the torches. Since being burned, I’ve had a deeper fear of fire than most people. For the first two years after I got out of the hospital I couldn’t even use a gas stove, but did everything in microwaves and electric stoves. For a whole month I ate nothing that didn’t come out of a George Foreman grill.

It was only moving to the cabin that forced me to use fire at all again, since the cabin has propane burners and my disability salary doesn’t exactly pay for me to renovate everything inside. Still, I do a lot of cooking on my George Foreman.

But now, I see fire all around me. At least a hundred tiki torches are tied to poles around the common, their glow flickering in the light summer breeze. Their flames aren’t high, just a few inches, but the smell of burning citronella oil is heavy in the air, and I know that the torches are hot to the touch right now.

My eyes cut to the left and I see the food tables, the bluish purple flame of the paraffin candles burning underneath the chafing dishes. My mind starts recalling figures from long ago, numbers that most people don’t even know. Stuff only firefighters and OSHA people worry about. Ignition temperatures, and rate of spread… and burn severity.

I stop and take a few deep breaths, trying to remember why I’m here. Chrissy. She’s here, and considering the music I’m hearing I’m guessing that the Social dance is going to start soon. They’ve already cleared away a big chunk of the grass on the other side of the common and I start making my way over when I stop, seeing one of Chrissy’s paintings.

It’s beautiful. The way she used the dark swirls throughout the canvas… I know what it is, actually. It’s the cove where she and I first had sex, the point of view almost precisely from the boat. I stop, just staring at Chrissy’s vision, and I feel like I understand more about her than all the words we’ve exchanged. It’s a glimpse of her soul, a snapshot of her mind at the time we first had sex, and it moves me inside.

I blink, and walk around the gazebo slowly, seeing each of the pieces, so enchanted and caught up in these insights into the soul of the woman that’s brought herself into my life that I almost run into someone. “Oh… sorry.”

“No, it’s okay, I… sorry,” the woman says, finally realizing who I am. She walks away, and for a moment I think about turning away too. It’s a harsh reminder of my reputation in Lakeville, the reclusive hermit freak with a shady past.

I didn’t come into town for them, though. I came for Chrissy, and as the band in the gazebo starts playing I start looking for her. I’m sure, as the highlighted guest of tonight’s little event, she’s going to be asked to dance for the first song. While that’s probably Dirk, I want my chance to dance with her too.

Let the whole town look, I don’t care. What I care about is seeing Chrissy, the night wrapping around us as the music takes us into a place we haven’t been before. Maybe I can find the courage to tell her what she’s come to mean to me over the past weeks together. I want to tell her how she’s warmed my heart, and how she’s hotter than even this summer sweltering to me. I want to tell her how I look forward to the fall, the winter, and more now, and that for the first time in a long time, I look to the future with some light in it and not just misery and darkness.

I reach down, straightening my tie as head towards the dance area. Suddenly I see Chrissy, and she’s a vision, her back turned to me and her body looking delectable in a red dress that clings to her body. She’s got boots on, but that only makes her even sexier to me as she moves, shaking her hips back and forth to the jazzy music like some old school bobby soxer all grown up and filled out and so delectable that my cock twitches in my pants.

I step forward to see if I can get in, maybe she’s dancing by herself when I see Justin reach out, grabbing her hand and twirling her back in. I stop, and he looks up, seeing me on the edge of the crowd. He grins, pulling Chrissy close before grabbing her ass and bending her back in a deep, soulful kiss.

Fuck… no, I can’t have been played like that. I stumble back, tripping over something before falling on my ass. Suddenly fire’s falling at me and I scream, my voice high pitched and panicked as I roll, desperate to get away. Not again, not again, I can’t-

“Looks like the Fryerman is a coward!” Justin laughs, and I stop, sitting up in shame. My pants are wet, I know I just pissed myself and I get to my feet, running in shame. “Run, Crispy! Run!”

Some others take up the taunt and I run harder… I don’t know if I’m ever going to stop.