Fire and Stone- Liesl

He stared at me from across the busy street, through the falling snow, a man in a black coat that reached to his knees, inconspicuous in the rush of passerby. Everyone was dashing along, chins tucked tight into their coat collars in an attempt to ward off the cold. No one noticed him, no one glanced his way. I could have sworn that some people passed right through him without noticing. It was almost as if he wasn’t there at all.

I grabbed my brother’s arm, “Look over there,” I said, turning him about, “Do you see that man, the one in the black coat? He is staring at us. Just standing there, staring”

“There isn’t anyone there;” he half chuckled, “There is no one watching us. Now come on. We have to get home. I feel like my fingers are about to fall off”

He thought that I was crazy. I would have thought that I was crazy too, except for one thing about this man, or this shadow, this vapor of a man. His eyes.

When my brother had pulled me down the street in the direction of home, I had caught his gaze. I had seen his eyes.

They were gray, flat, and lifeless, stone cold but for one thing. Behind the cold, unforgiving look, there was a fire, a raging inferno that gave off no heat. They were the line between snow and fire, the fine line between life and death, where souls could remain in this world, or pass on to what lies beyond death.

And this man, the man or shadow, the man with the eyes of fire and stone, he had come for me.