Wildfire by Karim Zelenka
The TVs on the corner were telling lies again. Throngs of people left their homes and gathered by the electronics shop to watch images from twenty-three different sets. Sound was faintly piped through a pair of speakers on a nearby awning. Children, who perched on the shoulders of their parents, were the first to hear the news and they yelled it down to the crowd who surged below.
From my apartment on the third floor of a nearby building, I watched as the mob was strengthened by curious bystanders and nosy strangers. The outliers elbowed one another to get closer to the pictures. Punches were thrown and blood was spilled. A numb fury gripped the lapels of dangerous men, throwing them into a hastily assembled chaos.
When the police inevitably arrived, they squelched the horde with bullets. From inside the gnarled pit of human torsos, I could hear the screams of children as they were crushed against the thrashing bodies of their parents, who, despite being dead, were briefly animated by the incentive of hot lead. After smoke had fled the last warm barrel, the police gathered up their guns and retreated into vans and unmarked cars. A mangled mass of broken limbs and smashed skulls were all that remained.
As I made my way down the stairs to the uncertainty of the streets below, I passed by a narrow window overlooking an alleyway. From crevices, manhole covers, trash cans and dumpsters, a mischief of rats formed, joined hands, and then rushed the fleshy mound. Turning in disgust, I trekked back to bed, seeking comfort in the cold arms of my still sleeping wife.
