“Reckless Burning”

Excerpt from Famous Actress Disappears

“What’s all that stuff in the Gucci bag?” Carlos asked.

“Making a break with my past,” Lydia said. “A little controlled burn.”

“In the theater?” Carlos said. “You know I have a thing about theater fires.”

“Seriously,” she said, looking at the fingernails of her left hand. “I didn’t know about your thing with theater fires.”

“We talked about it. Seriously? The Ring Theater fire, Vienna, 1881? The Iroquois Theater fire, Chicago, 1904? The Station fire, for god’s sake, Rhode Island, 2003?”

“Oh,” she said. “The rock and roll one.”

“Yeah,” Carlos said. “The rock and roll one. A hundred people died.”

“This lighter belonged to my father. He was such a smoker.”

“What are you planning, Lydia?”

“It’s just a performance,” Lydia said.

“When I was a kid,” Carlos said, “my big brother had a thing about being burned alive. He made us watch all the big fire movies. 1959: Arson for Hire; 1953: The Flaming Urge; Flash Fire aka A Dangerous Summer. Growing up in Watts and all. Then at San Quentin I had a cellmate who was in for, get this, ‘reckless burning.’”

“Just a little baby fire, Carlos, like a pretend fire; hardly a real fire at all. Just a performance.”

“This guy I was in San Quentin with, we used to talk late at night. He was in for ‘reckless burning.’ He was a nice guy but he should have known better. That’s how people end up in prison.”

“I would never end up in San Quentin. It’s just a little fire. I’ve worked it all out.”

Carlos drove. “This guy I was in San Quentin with? The one who was in for reckless burning? You know what happened after he got out? He hung himself.”