Chapter 2: The Price of Fire

Chapter 2: The Price of Fire

The next day at work was a special kind of hell. The numbers on the spreadsheets swam before Aaron’s eyes, grey and meaningless. The fluorescent lights hummed with a flat, soul-crushing monotony that felt like a personal insult. Every mundane detail of his life—the bitter taste of office coffee, the squeak of his chair, the forced small talk by the water cooler—seemed pale and washed out, a faded photograph of a life he was no longer truly living.

All he could think about was the tart.

The memory of its flavor was a phantom limb, an intense, vibrant ghost that haunted him. It was more real than the keyboard under his fingers. The brief, blinding euphoria it had delivered had spoiled him for the dull ache of his normal existence. The craving was a physical thing, a hollow pit in his stomach that no amount of cheap food could fill. He kept finding himself touching the pocket of his shirt, where he’d tucked the single, iridescent purple hexagon of confetti. It was a tiny, shimmering anchor to a world that was infinitely more interesting, and infinitely more terrifying, than his own.

The void left by the memory of his grandmother’s jam was a nagging curiosity, a tiny black hole in the fabric of his past. But the pleasure had been so absolute, so perfect. It felt like a fair trade.

By the time he got home, the desire had curdled into a feverish need. He paced his small apartment, the unpacked boxes mocking his paralysis. He told himself he was insane. He told himself to stay away from the pantry, to just eat some instant noodles and watch TV like a normal, miserable person. But the memory of the reward was a siren song, promising another escape, another moment of pure, unadulterated bliss.

His resistance crumbled. Before he knew it, he was standing in front of the pantry door again, his hand on the knob, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He was an addict, and this was his needle.

He pulled the door open.

The void was waiting. The cloying smell of ozone and hot sugar filled his senses, and there, in her perfect circle of light, stood Lady Lacuna. Her impossible smile seemed even wider tonight, her sequined dress catching the light in a thousand pinpricks of emerald and gold.

“He’s back for more!” she crooned, her voice echoing in the vast emptiness. “I knew you had the spirit of a real player, Aaron! The first taste is always the sweetest, but it only whets the appetite, doesn’t it? Ready to place another wager on the wheel of fortune?”

He nodded, unable to speak. The sheer wrongness of her, the needle-sharp teeth and the insectile poise, sent a tremor of fear through him. But the craving was stronger.

“Another REWARD, I presume?” she asked, tapping a long, manicured finger on her chin. “You’re not the RISK-taking type. Not yet. But for a prize to have real kick, the payment must have weight. No more trifles. No more jam. Give me something with… texture. A secret. Something dark and buried that you’ve never shared. The heavier the secret, the finer the vintage, my dear boy.”

Her words slid into his mind, bypassing reason and targeting the deepest, most shameful corners of his memory. His mind reeled, searching for something valuable enough. And then, it surfaced. An ugly, scarring memory he had spent a decade trying to forget. A memory wrapped in the smell of gasoline and scorched pine.

His voice was a strained rasp. “When I was fifteen,” he began, the words tasting like ash. “My friend, Jordan, and I… we were stupid. Playing with fireworks in the woods behind his house. One of them, a cheap bottle rocket, shot sideways into a pile of dry leaves next to old man Henderson’s shed.”

Lady Lacuna leaned forward, her eyes gleaming with a hungry, predatory light. “Go on,” she hissed.

“It went up so fast,” Aaron whispered, the scene playing out in his mind’s eye. The crackle of the flames, the whoosh as the old, dry wood caught. The panic. The suffocating, oily black smoke. “We didn’t mean to. We ran. We just… ran. We heard the sirens later. We never told anyone it was us. Henderson lost all his tools, his old boat… everything.” The shame was as fresh and raw as it had been ten years ago.

“Oh, delicious!” Lady Lacuna clapped her hands together with that sharp, cracking sound. “A secret with the tang of fear and the smoky finish of guilt! An excellent, excellent wager! Payment… accepted!”

The sensation was far more intense this time. It wasn't a gentle tickle; it was a violent wrenching. He felt the memory being torn out by the roots—the heat on his face, the acrid smell of burning tar paper, the gut-twisting terror of seeing the first flicker of orange turn into a roaring beast. For a heart-stopping second, he saw the face of his friend Jordan, illuminated by the fire, his mouth open in a silent scream. Then, a wave of nauseating static washed through his head, and it was gone. The entire event was wiped clean, leaving a vast, disorienting emptiness.

A triumphant fanfare erupted from the void. Lady Lacuna held up a bottle. It was a deep, dark green, sealed with black wax. The label was elegant cream parchment, with a single, exquisitely drawn picture of a praying mantis, its head cocked as if in amusement. The name was printed in stark, crimson script: Le Rire de la Mante. The Laughing Mantis.

“For a memory of fire,” she announced, “a reward to light a fire within you! Enjoy your winnings, contestant. And do come again!”

She tossed the bottle. It flew through the blackness and landed perfectly in his hands, cool and heavy. He blinked, and the world snapped back. He was in his kitchen, bathed in the mundane yellow light from the hallway. The pantry door was shut.

He stood there for a long moment, the heavy bottle in his hand. The hole in his memory was terrifyingly large. He knew he had just given something away, but the details were gone, replaced by a buzzing void. It was like knowing a word is on the tip of your tongue, but the word itself has ceased to exist. He felt a profound sense of loss, a chilling dislocation that the raspberry jam hadn't caused.

He needed to ground himself. He needed proof.

With shaking hands, he set the bottle down and pulled out his phone. He scrolled through his contacts until he found the name: Jordan Riley. His oldest friend. The only other person who knew. He pressed the call button, his breath catching in his throat.

Jordan picked up on the third ring. “Aaron? Man, it’s been a while! How’s Tucson treating you?”

“Hey, Jordan. Yeah, it’s… it’s fine,” Aaron stammered, his mind racing. How do you ask someone about a memory you no longer have? “Listen, weird question. I was just thinking about some of the stupid stuff we did back in high school.”

“Oh god, where to start?” Jordan laughed. “That time with Mrs. Gable’s flamingoes? Or when we tried to build that potato cannon?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Aaron said, his palm sweating. “But hey, do you remember… do you remember that time with the fire? Behind your house?”

There was a pause on the other end of the line. Aaron’s heart hammered against his ribs.

“Fire?” Jordan asked, his voice laced with genuine confusion. “What fire? Man, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Did we almost start a fire?”

“No, not almost,” Aaron insisted, a cold dread seeping into his bones. “The shed. Old man Henderson’s shed. We burned it down with a bottle rocket, remember?”

The silence on the line stretched for an eternity. When Jordan finally spoke, his voice was concerned. “Dude, are you okay? We never did anything like that. Henderson’s shed? That thing got struck by lightning the year after we graduated, burned to the ground. Total freak accident. You must be mixing us up with someone else. We were stupid, but we weren’t arsonists.”

The phone felt like a block of ice in Aaron’s hand. Struck by lightning. A freak accident. The memory wasn’t just gone from his head. It was gone from the world. Lady Lacuna hadn’t just taken his past. She had unwritten it.

“Yeah,” Aaron whispered, his throat tight. “Yeah, you’re right. Must have been a weird dream or something. Sorry.”

He hung up without saying goodbye. The dial tone buzzed, loud and accusing in the silent apartment. His gaze fell upon the bottle of wine on his counter. The Laughing Mantis. He could almost hear a faint, saccharine cheer, could almost see a flash of needle-sharp teeth in a smile that stretched far too wide. He wasn’t just trading his memories. He was trading reality itself. And the price, he was beginning to realize, was far more than he could ever afford.