Free At the End of the Road by Grant Jerkins

an eye, and this certainly looked like it could have put out an eye. But it hadn’t, and the physical damage could be explained away. They were safe.
    His chest was a different story. Kyle had been standing a lot closer to the fire than Grace, so the scalding berry flesh had been hotter when it hit him, and there was a lot more of it. They both looked at his torso. Kyle’s belly and chest were covered in raised red dots. And each dot stung like an ant bite. He looked a lot like he had the year before when he had a bad case of the chicken pox. He wouldn’t be able to explain this. But his face was unmarred. It was all on his chest and belly. Kyle knew all he had to do was keep himself covered, be careful not to undress in front of Mama, and she’d never know. He was safe. They had managed to do something very stupid, get themselves hurt in the process, but not have to suffer their mama’s wrath.
    This took away some of their enthusiasm for experimenting with the fire. They just sat there, hurt, and glad they weren’t hurt any worse than what they were. After a while, Kyle picked up a pinecone and tossed it onto the ashy embers. It smoked a minute, then caught fire, the pinesap acting as an accelerant. Then Grace saw a seedpod from a magnolia tree and threw it on the fire, but it didn’t burn so good. Then she got to looking around for something that would burn better. Kyle too. And soon they were right back in it, their wounds just fading memories.
    Kyle found a plastic milk jug mostly buried in the dirt. He dug it up and held it out to the fire. The jug blackened then bubbled then burned. It was amazing. The plastic drooped and elasticized. A poisonous smelling smoke stung his nose. Green flames took hold of the bubbling plastic. Grace stopped what she was doing to watch. Kyle was, after all, the Fire Master.
    The melting plastic started to drip from the burning end. Fat drops of green flame that made laser beam sounds as they fell, that sounded to Kyle like sound effects in a science fiction movie. But the Fire Master had to drop the jug into the fire when the flames raced up toward his hand. They stood over the fire and watched the plastic coalesce into a burning, molten pool. Kyle found a fat stick and stuck it in. He wrapped the burning blob around the end of the stick like spaghetti on a fork. Now he had a stick that dripped sizzling green orbs of fire.
    When Kyle wasn’t paying attention, a drop of molten plastic landed square on the top of his bare foot in a quarter-size dollop. It stung like the devil and seriously burned his skin—far worse than the berries. He couldn’t brush it off. The plastic had seemingly melted right into his skin, hardening immediately. Kyle reached down and pulled it off—taking a goodly layer of flesh with it. It hurt bad, but he was too fascinated with his wand of dripping green fire to stop and appreciate the pain. It was just one more wound he’d have to hide. In fact, Kyle would be hiding this one for months to come. He would have to wear shoes and socks every day to cover it. And every day the burn would seep plasma and platelets that would soak into his sock and then harden into a scab. And every night, no matter how carefully he tried, when he took off the sock it would pull off the scab. The wound took three months to heal. And Kyle would have a perfectly round scar on the top of his foot for the rest of his life. But Mama never found out.
    Right that moment though, the amazing green liquid fire took prominence over pain. As it got hotter, the flaming green drips progressed into a steady stream and Kyle was able to draw out lines and circles and patterns of fire in the dirt. Grace clutched Wonder Woman and watched him drawing with liquid fire.
    All good things come to an end, and eventually the plastic consumed itself. Kyle headed off for the trash cans lined up behind the house to see if he couldn’t find another milk jug.
    “Kyle!”
    “What?”
    “Look.”
    Kyle