Urban Angel

Urban Angel:

“The Little Matchgirl” Reimagined
By M. F. B. Porter

I could feel the damp grass seeping into the back of my faded jeans and long dark hair, but I couldn’t bring myself to open my eyes and be blinded by the gray sky, a cold and unfriendly reminder on my bare arms and face.  I exhaled through my nose and tried to remember the dream I reluctantly woke up from.

I shot up with the realization that I had fallen asleep.  I glanced around with muddled confusion.  My eyes were still trying to adjust, which cast abstract dark shapes everywhere I looked.  What time was it? How long had I been here? I rapidly blinked my burning eyes and they did not take the grim sky as well as I’d hoped.  I liked to think the sun had been shining while I was asleep, but as always, when I woke up, a thunderous roll of hungry clouds had swallowed the sun.

I glanced down at the tarnished silver watch I’d recently found, the worn leather band tugging it around my wrist, and sighed.  I’d been coming to the quiet meadow for years now.   It was a small and peaceful haven that I had all to myself.  Quiet and unpolluted were a combination that had become sparse luxury after the Revolution, and I wasn’t about to spoil it for myself by telling anyone about it.  Luckily, there was no one close enough to me to worry and come looking.

 The clearing was circular and naked of flowers or weeds.  Towering trees loomed darkly around, caging the meadow in a sort of superior way, as an angry teacher might glare down at a disobedient student.   I begrudgingly turned away from the sky, telling myself that I can’t miss something I never had.  Still, I subconsciously began to daydream about a flower, yellow perhaps, sprouting from the dry patches of dirt between grayed strands of grass.  I shrugged on my blue and black striped jacket, rising to my feet, and trudged into the dead forest.  I couldn’t bring myself to spare a glance back to the waning life of the meadow; if it was even worthy of that title anymore.  

Beyond the brief stretch of grasping forest, I stepped out onto the charred concrete.  A biting breeze permeated my thin jacket and with a haunting shiver I pulled up my hood, my inky hair spilling out.  I recalled a time when my hair had been light, the color of creamy caramel. I quickly brushed the thought away, too nauseating to linger on.  My bare feet gathered a fresh layer of dusty ash as I followed the sidewalk through the maze of dilapidated warehouses that people now inhabited.  Assorted sickly people huddled randomly into themselves, clinging to the walls of the buildings, hung in tattered fabric that had been chewed on by rats or rotted mostly through.  I kept my head down, trying to find shapes in the ash on my feet.  I snuck a glance at the people every so often, but always regretted it instantly.  Momentarily forgetting this, I looked up anyway.  Even though I’m never surprised, the sights only get more appalling.  A man with no teeth is left muttering from the ground, his mouth darkened with dirt and cavity.  I couldn’t have been sure how old he was.  It was impossible to tell.  A teenage girl; bone thin and barely covered by a string of fraying, moth-eaten cloth, sprawled out awkwardly on a square of sidewalk blanketed in graffiti.  She had a needle protruding from the inside of her elbow, a thin stream of blood running down, sinisterly painting the ground.  It was almost instantly leeched of color when the spatter hit the sidewalk, and disturbing choking noises sounded from the girl’s throat.  Does lack of emotion leech color, or does the lack of color leech emotion, I wondered?  She couldn’t have been more than 16.  Her eyes rolled back into her head, white marbles.    That was the last time I looked up before reaching my destination.  

I wasn’t sure how long I had been walking, because I couldn’t tell if night was cloaking the city or if it was just a cloud of ash filtering out daylight.  Regardless, the sky was dark and heavy rain started to flood the somber streets and whirl around the grime on my face.  

I turned toward the only white building in the city, my reflection somehow cleaner in its silvery windows.  I spotted clean, dry faces inside, through the blur of dirty rain.  They were wrapped in swirls of color, badges of wealth and power.  On the front of the building, sleek silver letters said “The Phoenix Must Burn To Emerge”.  I couldn’t agree more, I thought bitterly, even though I knew I was fortunate to be able to read at all.  Most had forgotten.  I crossed the wide road separating me from the building; a vast line between us and them.  I followed the sidewalk around the building and crouched to the ground, thinking disgustedly of how they pour buckets of white paint down the building from the roof to keep it white.  They don’t wash away the ash, just paint over it.  It wouldn’t last long, just like a tiny band-aid over a gushing wound doesn’t last long. I shuddered with a wave of anger, and pried the metal plug from the floor that led to the basement.  Without a blink, I shimmied down, descending the ladder with silent conviction.  My feet finally brushed the bottom, and I made myself steady, the only light coming from the halo at the surface.  I fumbled into my jacket pocket, and my grip tightened around a papery pack of matches.  Matches were getting more and more rare, so I had to trade my shoes for them.  I lit one, making a harsh scratching noise.  It illuminated only the small circle of air around it, so I had to wander the vast dungeon for a long while to find what I was looking for, lighting match after match.  Finally, the little flame gave just enough light for me to see the gas pipe.  I circled it for a while, staring, calculating, and I felt almost like a wild animal circling its prey.  I wondered vaguely if that’s what I looked like.

Eventually, I approached, gripping the wheel tightly, turning it with the anguish of everyone who had been left to rot or die.  I kept turning it, the pain of all the tortured and murdered innocents flowing through me.  We will have justice.  I’m going to save us, I thought.  I turned it until I tasted the fumes in my mouth and saw shadows of things I knew weren’t really there.  My fingers had been burned by the countless matches as they all sizzled out, but I knew I’d only need one more. Again in darkness, I removed the last match from the box by feel, and struck it against the side.  For a moment, I stood there inhaling the fumes and looking longingly at the flame.  Fire was such a beautiful thing, wasn’t it?  It could grow and rage on, and everything in its way would run or be swallowed.  It didn’t discriminate against innocent or guilty…  But I knew my sacrifice would be the salvation of many others.  My people.   You and I will be the same, I thought of all the unfairly privileged above me.  The Phoenix Must Burn To Emerge.  I tossed the match to the fumes, and it exploded.  

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I could feel the damp grass seeping into the back of my faded jeans and long caramel hair, but I couldn’t bring myself to open my eyes and be blinded by the bleeding sun, warm velvet on my bare arms and face.  I exhaled through my nose and tried to remember...