I tear off a bit of paper and set it alight.
Watching the flame burn bigger and brighter calms me.
I toss it into a pit, filled with sticks and leaves.
The fire becomes bigger and louder.
Hearing the crackle of the fire.
Witnessing it's roaring and dangerous beauty.
It fills me with the urge to keep it alight.
I grab what I can.
Leaves
Sticks
Paper
Everything imaginable.
But soon the fire begins to admit a foul stench
Like the smell of singed hair and skin
I dump a bucket of water on the flames and peer into the pit
I see someone there
They're dead
By the looks of it, they've been dead.
I grab the remains and set them down.
The face is nearly unrecognizable.
Gazing into the burnt corpse of the person I realize that in my desperation to keep the flame alight,
I had thrown myself in the pit
The fire had taken over my senses
And now, I was staring at my own corpse, and I felt cold hands drag me down below.
