Title: Fearless
Rating: M for Language, Violence, Grotesquerie, and General Trippiness
Summary: A girl suffers trauma to her temporal lobe. The result: no fear. ~ Uh, I guess you don't have to squint for romance anymore. 1000 words per drabble.
Disclaimer & Important Notes: Don't own Freddy; don't own the rhymes. You know the drill.
.
.
.
.
Fire
(Night 75)
Ash doesn't hate him at all. Doesn't really hate anything, as a matter of fact.
But she does want him. Or she wants to feel him, anyway.
Or she wants to feel what he feels.
"What," Freddy asks, "is that?"
Freddy's always burning up. The fire that swallowed him so many years ago is still trapped under his skin. It scorched whatever ruined remains he had left of a heart as a man, and it lives there now in his hollow chest, charred and smoldering. Ash can feel the heat radiating from him, even though she always sits at least a foot or two away, perched on the edge of his table.
"Birthday present," she says, like it's nothing.
"It's a fucking heart," he says, and she can almost feel it all, almost touch it. Hatred. Rage. Anger. Fear. It's like everything got compressed into him with the force of that solitary explosion, burnt into him like a brand. He's moving frenetically; he's flickering and smoldering and glaring with ember-eyes out of the shadows. He's singeing the tips of her hair with his words and his gaze and the way he wants to kill her. And sometimes she wishes he would still try, because each time was a test, and each time she thought that maybe he was melting her a little.
"Well, holy cow. It is a heart," she says. Because she, on the other hand, is as cool as a patch of sand in the shade. Whatever fire that once resided in her is long-since gone, doused by a skull-crushing collision with reality. Fuck, fire, fear, she tells him disinterestedly one day. They're just more four-letter words. She's resting in peace, so to speak, still and chilled: passive, patient. The only warmth she feels is when she's near him. He blazes, just two feet away, close enough that she wonders—if she touches him—can she get some of that fire back? Will she burn her fingers? She might not be frightened, but she's fascinated: just watching that twisting, leaping flame that is Fred Krueger, the most savage and sadistic and gleefully unpredictable dream demon that ever existed.
He's so alive.
And she's so not.
Cinders and soot, dust to dust.
Ash to his fire.
Oh my darling, Oh my darling, Oh my darling Clementine,
You are lost and gone forever, dreadful sorry, Clementine.
In a cavern, in a canyon, excavating for a mine,
Lived a miner, forty-niner, and his daughter Clementine.
Light she was, and like a fairy, and her shoes were number nine,
Herring boxes without topses, sandals were for Clementine.
Drove she ducklings to the water every morning just at nine,
Hit her foot against a splinter, fell into the foaming brine.
Ruby lips above the water, blowing bubbles soft and fine,
Alas for me! I was no swimmer, so I lost my Clementine.
In a churchyard near the canyon, where the myrtle doth entwine,
There grow roses and other posies, fertilized by Clementine.
.
.
.
.
This drabble is dedicated to Elf-Warrior-13 for the prompt, "Fire."
It is 377 words long, and much easier to write after "Frigid" (the previous drabble) stopped being such a, well, frigid bitch. I like its simplicity, and though it might be cheesy, I like the last line as well. One thing that "fire" gave me the opportunity to do was play with Ash's name. Names are important (especially in writing), and I chose hers for a reason. I had thought, in the beginning, about naming her Ashlynn or something and just calling her "Ash" for short, but when in doubt, go for simplicity. Therefore, consider Ash not a diminutive, but her actual name—indeed, her identity in some ways.
"Fire" was pretty well-behaved, and is also written in present tense (mainly because "Frigid" was still demanding it). In theory, they occur simultaneously. You can tell me whether or not it worked.
Thanks for the support, Elf-warrior-13. Your prompt warmed my heart. ;)