Where Fires Dare to Burn

Chapter 01 - Brick Walls and Arcade Machines

Normally Luke Arbor hated getting the bus.

It was an echo chamber of jabbering voices you could never fully block out, not without blasting music loud enough to make your ears bleed. A giant, self-contained scuba tank of body odour, stale coffee and fast food. Seats were jammed so close together that you could barely tuck your knees in and were forced into running battles with strangers over the coveted middle arm rest. A place with broken air conditioning and ailing suspension that rattled your spine with every pothole.

But today this coach was a magnificent metal steed carrying him towards the first chapter of life that would truly be his. He leaned his head against the window and looked out, watching as the thick woodland slowly gave way to the outskirts of Lasquette Bay. Blazing afternoon sun lit up the silver-grey crescent of buildings that hugged the shore of Lake Superior. Luke could briefly see the colourful blips of sails and kayaks dotting the water before the road sloped down and they were swallowed up by the buildings.

He could feel his heart beating faster already. Not long now. He felt like a kid again. Well, he still was a kid if his parents were to be believed. Nerves jangled alongside his excitement. He remembered feeling the same sensation the first day he'd walked into his high school back in Milwaukee.

Though his body had started to fill out since then, he was a still a little gangly and a fresh swell of self-consciousness began edging into his mind. He glanced at himself in the window reflection; fiddled with the unruly fringe of his messy brown hair. He'd made sure it was clipped short before he left to keep things simple, but now that only seemed to highlight the roundness of his face and the pale shock of his skin.

Luke winced just thinking about it. His attempts at a beard so far had been an embarrassing failure, so he opted to remain clean shaven, but that only compounded his boyish features. His nose was broad, his mouth broader. His mom always said his expressions were larger than life and he didn't know if that was a good thing or a bad thing right now.

Oh, come on, get it together, Arbor, he thought angrily, determination overpowering those insecure thoughts and feelings in a surge. He'd worked too long and too hard to let nerves derail his first taste of independence now. It had taken a long, gruelling year after his high school graduation to scrape together the last of the money he needed and now, at a bright-eyed nineteen years of age, he was ready to strike out on his own.

He was ready.

The broad streets of the town swallowed him up and Luke drank it all in like a kid staring through a toy shop window. He'd been here before – once – for his orientation but that had been almost a month ago. He'd liked the place then, and he liked it more now. People flooded in and out of shops, diners and restaurants, clustered on street corners, and formed flocks of brightly coloured joggers in the sunshine.

A rattling guitar riff exploded from Luke's pocket, yanking him from his examinations. Twisting awkwardly in his seat, he dug his phone free from the pocket of his jeans and glanced at the screen. Then he thumbed the green circle and placed it to his ear.

"I told you, mom, I'll call you when I get there!" he chuckled as he slumped back in the seat, still idly watching the people of Lasquette Bay.

"You must be there by now!" she chirped back. "Sorry, hon', you know your dad would've driven you, but with work-,"

"Mom, I already said don't worry about it," Luke replied, rolling his eyes. "I can handle a bus ride by myself. We're in Lasquette – should be at the campus soon."

"Are you excited?"

She sounded more worried than excited – no change there.

"Can't wait." The bus made a ponderous right-hand turn, and a sign caught his eye.