Porcelain

Chapter 45

"We really doing this?"

"Too late to back out now."

"No it's not."

"Yes it is, in my mind," Estelle said, making sure that the house was empty. When it was empty enough for her liking, she threw gas onto the wood floor, then left the house. From the outside, she held out her hand for a match, which Dally handed to her. She quickly struck it, and tossed it into the broken window.

Fire blossomed in the wooded house, and she stared with a sick kind of awe, the orange flames reflecting in her blue eyes.

Loud cracks as it started to collapse snapped her attention back.

"And now we run," she said.

_____
As they ran, they were both high on adrenaline from the crime they'd just committed. Something about it made her want to laugh.

"I'm surprised you were so reluctant to do it, Dally," she commented.

He shrugged. "Didn't want to bring attention to the fact that we're here. They're still after you," he said seriously.

"I know. But we both know how to do this shit," she replied.

"And also, it reminds me of what happened with Johnny. What if there had been people in there tonight? There weren't supposed to be kids in the church either," he said.

"I understand that. But I've been fighting to keep what happened then out of my life now. Learning from it is one thing, letting it keep me from doing shit is another."

"Like burning down a house? I think you should learned your lesson with this one," Dally said, crossing his arms.

She shrugged helplessly. "Too late now, we already did it, and you helped me. But I can hear that the fire department's on its way already," she said, gesturing in the direction she heard the scream of the sirens.

She grinned. "But don't lie, I know you didn't entirely hate doing that. Something about it was... Satisfying."

In truth, for her it was a kind of closure, she would never have to experience pain in or because of that house again. And for Dally, seeing the house collapse in the distance and the weight that lifted off Estelle's shoulders as they both rode an adrenaline high, it was something he hadn't felt in months. He felt alive.

Estelle knew her feelings on the matter were a bit displaced, she shouldn't feel excited and triumphant for committing arson, even if it was to her own house. Especially since it was to her own house.

The gas can was placed back into the Curtis' garage, the book of matches back into Dally's jacket. The crime would be very hard to trace back to them, especially because next to no one knew the truth of Estelle Parker's whereabouts, even fewer knew of her plans, and none would turn her into the cops. No one cared about where Dallas Winston was, most just hoped he was far away and out of too much trouble. Not that the cops really cared about who did it, most people knew that nothing good was going to happen to that house anyways. The graffiti on the walls had already said that.

The house had been made almost completely out of wood, and the fire had consumed it very quickly. As the firefighters battled the flames, Estelle could tell most if not all of it would be gone.

She was glad. Less evidence for the cops too, had they decided to look back into the previous crime in that house.

A sudden sting came though her as she realized nearly every crime in that house had been her fault. And that lead to more. Maybe now the chain would finally be broken, but it would be ironic as hell for arson to end her crime streak and the horrors that always seemed to be surrounding her.

"What's wrong?" Dally asked. He had seen her giddy smirk drop.

"Every crime in that house, it was my fault."

He shook his head. "You didn't ask for what your daddy did to ya. He was fucking asking to be stabbed. He deserved it. None of that was your fault. And even if it was, so what? What does it fucking matter? You did what you had to."

"Doesn't mean it's not my fault."

"Did you not just hear what I said?" Dally snapped. "But if you want to mope around and blame yourself I guess I can't stop you. But I can tell you to suck it up, princess, or else the cops are gonna be onto us."

She shook her head, putting on a steely and professional face. "Right. Back to the house, or we goin' away tonight?"

"We need something that takes us out as suspects, if they even care that much. Since no one can clear our names as to where we were tonight we need to go hide this one out."

"No shit. Where to?"

_____
"What are you thinking about?" She asked as they sat in silence, in an abandoned building by the train tracks.

"Not much, why?"

"Cause I am. I think it's interesting what brought me to where I am now. So many things happened. So many of them were terrible. And I just did a pretty fucking bad thing, as I sit here with you. And I'm pregnant. Somebody's mom just burnt a house down. Somebody's mom is a murderer."

"It's your house to do whatever the fuck you want with. And besides the deaths were in defense. You ain't a bad person."

"And neither are you Dally. We're just a couple of kids. And kids make bad choices sometimes."

"I ain't no kid."

"We're seventeen. We can live like seventy more years if we try. Why aren't we kids?"

"We're seventeen. We're grown up. Neither of us have been kids for a while. And besides, you can't be a kid with a kid."

"We don't have a kid yet. We can still be kids if we choose."

"Well, people like us don't live to be old."

"I think people like us deserve to. We fight to earn our days here, I think I deserve good years."

"There are no good years here," Dally grunted.

"Then let's go away together, far far away. Hell, we can get the whole gang out of this miserable place if you want. We might have to live here now, but I am not gonna die here."

"That's nice that you can imagine a future like that. But I don't think you get to decide if you're gonna die here or not."

"You're right, I can't, but I can damn well try. Do you ever imagine getting out of here, out of all of it, and finding good in the world?"

"What's the point? There is none, at least that could help me."

"That's why it's nice to imagine, Dally."