The Lesser Blessed by Richard van Camp Page A

of gasoline empty and there was a lake in the room. Other kids had paint bags around their faces. Andy’s was leaking blood and propane, so much propane you could push the air, the water-weight air. And me lighting a hundred sticky matches, thinking, “The angels are igniting. Their thoughts are fire-strike matches.”
    I lit a match. I pushed the air with it and the air pushed back. And me, the Destroying Angel, screaming, “Let’s die! Let’s die! Let’sdie ! !” and my cousin Franky, eyes wide and mouth quivering, “Larry don’t Larry please Larry please—”
    then flash
    a hot gasoline wind blew through me
    then flight
    a bath of flames
    and the kiss of snow
    the flame light
    the flame rush
    Why am I?
    Why am I—
    the snow
    my back
    my skin
    rising like dough
    splitting into fish scales
    it’s not supposed to be black
    Mother, don’t cry. I’m not here. I’ve buried my bleeding hands in the snow. I don’t feel it. I’m far away. Don’t pull the blanket off.
    Why am I so on fire?
    Forever I am in the burn camp. I wear a white mask. The glass in my arms and back begins to work its way out. I learn to talk again. I spend a lot of time inside.
    I make a friend. A black janitor. His name is Shamus. He is blind. He says this is not a world for children. He says he can smell three different kinds of snow.
    A little girl in the child ward is sick, is scratching herself bloody. We play “bus” and “house.” She tells me she is allergic to the sun, but Shamus tells me she is allergic to her own skin. Shamus says what me and my cousins do is called “huffing,” says people usually go for the gold or silver paint. That’s the stuff that packs the best buzz.
    What he doesn’t tell me is that murder is a song. A smooth and silent hymn. One I keep inside. For I was raised by butchers.
    Shamus calls all the burn victims pigs ‘cause they stink and their skin is hanging in strips when they come in. He covers my mirrors and says, “You don’t want to see what you’ve become.”
    As part of my recovery, they take my mask off and hold a mirror to my face.
    “Accept,” the nurses say. “You have to accept what happened to you and your cousins.”
    They make me naked. I see raw hamburger on a human face.
    I could hear myself screaming. I would have continued screaming but I opened my eyes, and a Blue Monkey was sitting on my chest, staring into me.
    “Hello, Son of Dog,” he said, inches from my face. He punched his stump wrist in my mouth, gagging me. I sat up as Jed rushed into the room and threw on the light.
    There was blood on the sheets. My head throbbed and my hair was slick and hot. Jed put his hands through my hair and pulled away, blood on his fingers.
    “It’s in his ears!” Jed cried to my mother. “Larry! Ohmigod! You’re bleeding through your ears!”
    My mother stood there, white with shock. I remember holding my hands out to her and seeing her step back, the revulsion in her eyes as I hit blackout.
Hospital
    We took a cab to the hospital. My mom was hysterical, and she made a scene in the waiting room. We had to wait there for a long time. Jed calmed her down and talked to me. “Stay with us, Larry,” he said, “stay with us.” I kept falling asleep but my mom would slap me awake, worried I could slip into a coma. I was tired. It was about three in the morning.
    “Don’t let them see my spine, Mom,” I mumbled. “Please—”
    “Hush,” she said, “they won’t.”
    Jed asked, “What’s he talking—”
    “You,” she growled, “never mind.”
    “Don’t learn this, Jed,” I thought, “don’t ever learn this.”
    My head fell back. “Jed teddy bear.”
    I mumbled, “and Mother no mouth.”
    I looked around. The white towels. The white walls. The hospital. They want to cut off my ears. They say they’re burned. They can give me new ones. I am wearing a burn mask to keep the swelling down. “But if you cut off my ears,” I said, “what will hold up my glasses?”