The dawn came, as it always did, regardless of what happened in the small, trembling house at the edge of the village. Light, pale and hesitant at first, then bold and gold, spilled over the fields. Roosters crowed, a sound usually met with the stirring of life, but here it was just a noise against a wall of silence. Cows lowed in the distance, a deep, mournful sound that seemed to fit the mood. The sky was a flawless, heartless blue, as clear and smooth as a pane of washed glass. It was a morning that promised new beginnings, but in the home of Wisterdom's family, the night had never ended; it had only grown older and more desperate.
The air inside was thick and sour, steeped in a tension that had coiled itself around every piece of furniture, every breath. Wisterdom's elder brother had not slept. His anger was not a flame that had gutted out; it was a banked fire, smoldering under a layer of ash, hotter and more dangerous for being contained. All night long, Wisterdom had crouched by his sleeping mat, his small hands clasped so tightly his knuckles were white moons. He had prayed to every god and spirit he could name, whispering promises into the dark, begging for the simple, happy normalcy of yesterday to return. But the night passed without an answer, and the morning light revealed only the same wreckage. It was as if destiny was a river with a set course, and their family was caught in its current, dragged toward a cliff they could all sense but not see.
The dispute between his elder brother and elder sister was a knot that would not untangle. Their words from the previous evening hung in the air, invisible but sharp as splinters. Their parents moved through the rooms like ghosts, their faces etched with a helpless exhaustion. The father was a man reduced. Wisterdom watched him, and his heart ached with a new kind of pain. He saw not just his father's sadness, but the crushing weight of it. It was in the slump of his shoulders, which usually carried sacks of grain with ease. It was in his eyes, which looked at his two eldest children not with authority, but with a bewilderment so profound it was like a child's. He spoke little, his voice a dry rustle when he tried to intervene. He was the pillar of the home, and Wisterdom could see that pillar cracking under a pressure it was never meant to hold.
The mother was different. Where the father was bowed, she was in constant, frantic motion. Her love was a tangible force, a shield she kept trying to place between her children. She followed the elder brother, her voice a soft, pleading stream of words—soothing, reasoning, begging. She touched his arm, she smoothed his hair, she offered tea he would not drink. It was like trying to put out a fire by blowing on it; her efforts seemed only to make the invisible flames dance higher. The neighbors had gathered outside the low fence, drawn by the unnatural silence that was more alarming than shouts. They stood in small clusters, some peering with naked curiosity, others whispering with concern. A few called out gentle admonitions or offers of help, but they were voices from another world. The family was trapped in a glass bell of their own strife, and the conclusion everyone waited for seemed to recede further with each passing minute.
The two youngest brothers, small wide-eyed shadows, huddled together in a corner. They were too young to understand the words, but they were fluent in the language of fear—the sharp tones, the heavy silences, the way the very walls seemed to vibrate with unhappiness. They clutched each other's hands, their faces pale.
Then, for a moment, it seemed the river might change its course. The elder brother stopped his pacing. The torrent of his rage appeared to subside, leaving behind an eerie, stagnant calm. He stood in the middle of the main room, his chest heaving, then slowly sank onto a stool. The mother let out a shuddering breath, her hands flying to her mouth as if to trap a sob of relief inside. The father's eyes closed for a second, and a faint, tremulous hope touched his worn features. He looked at his two terrified youngest sons and made a decision. "Come," he said, his voice rough. "Let's get some air." He herded them outside, onto the old wooden wagon hitched to nothing, a place they often played. It was an attempt to remove them from the poison in the air, to give them, and himself, a moment of respite.
Wisterdom stayed, his prayers momentarily stilled. He saw his mother smile at his brother, and it was a smile so bright with desperate hope that it was almost painful to witness. It was the sun breaking through a typhoon cloud, beautiful and utterly doomed. He would remember that smile later, how it lit up her whole face, how for one heartbeat she looked like the mother from before, from the happy yesterdays. That smile, he knew even then, was the last of its kind. It was a flame about to be snatched by the wind.
The storm had not passed; it had merely been drawing a deeper breath. The silence that followed was not peace, but the vacuum before the explosion. The elder brother sat on his stool, but his stillness was not calm. It was the stillness of a coiled spring. Wisterdom watched as his brother's eyes, red-rimmed and hollow, scanned the room without seeing it. They were turned inward, watching a private horror show. He was not remembering the argument with his sister; he was traveling back years, to a time of illness and poverty, to the sight of a tiny, feverish Wisterdom coughing in a corner, to empty rice pots and his parents' whispered despair. The injustice of it all, the old, buried helplessness, fused with the fresh anger of the night, creating a compound more volatile than any chemical.
The brother stood up abruptly. The movement was so sharp it made Wisterdom jump. He walked into the small room he shared with the other boys, and began to move with a terrible, focused purpose. He was searching. Wisterdom saw his elder sister now, sitting rigidly on the floor by the hearth, her earlier defiance gone, replaced by a watchful dread. She was a statue of apprehension.
Then, the destruction began. It started with a soft, ripping sound. The brother emerged from the room clutching his personal diary, a cheap notebook with a blue cover. Without a word, his face a mask of blank fury, he tore the cover off, then began shredding the pages. He did not simply rip the book in half; he attacked each page individually, a systematic dismemberment of his own thoughts. Bits of paper, some with careful handwriting, others with doodles, fluttered to the dirt floor like confetti for a perverse festival. Then he turned to his clothes, pulling them from a hook and hurling them through the open doorway, where they landed in a heap in the dusty yard.
The mother was on him again, her voice rising in a wail. "No, no, my son! Stop this! What are you doing?" She tried to wrap her arms around him, to steal his hands, but he was a force of nature, shrugging her off as if she were a clinging vine. He marched outside into the brilliant, mocking sunshine, the torn pages clutched in his fist. She followed, a step behind, her pleas continued.
The brother looked around the yard, at the clear sky, at the watching neighbors who now fell completely silent. His eyes landed on Wisterdom, who stood frozen in the doorway. His voice, when he spoke, was flat and cold, yet it carried across the still yard with the clarity of a shattering icicle.
"Wister. The matches. Bring them to me."
There was no "please," no explanation. It was a command from a general on a battlefield. Wisterdom's mind went blank. All he knew was obedience, especially to this brother who had often carried him on his shoulders, who had secretly given him extra food from his own bowl. The fear was a liquid cold in his veins, but his body moved on its own. He turned, scurried to the kitchen shelf, and found the small, familiar box of wooden matches. He did not think of consequences; he did not think at all. He was a member of his brother's will. He ran back and placed the box in the outstretched hand.
The brother knelt in the dirt, scattering the torn diary pages into a small pile. He struck a match. The *scratch-sputter* was obscenely loud. A tiny yellow flame bloomed at the tip of the stick. He touched it to a piece of paper. It caught, blackening at the edges, curling in on itself with a weak orange glow. But the morning wind, that gentle breeze that had been rustling the leaves so pleasantly, chose that moment to sweep across the yard. It was not a strong wind, but it was enough. It kissed the small flame and snuffed it out. A wisp of grey smoke rose and vanished.
A guttural sound of pure frustration erupted from the brother's throat. The failure of the fire seemed to be the final insult, a personal taunt from the universe. His head snapped up, his eyes finding Wisterdom again. They were no longer flat; they were ablaze with a terrifying certainty.
"Kerosene. Now. The can from the kitchen."
The words punched the air from Wisterdom's lungs. *Kerosene*. The word itself was dangerous. It was the smell of the lamp that lit their evenings, but also the smell of danger, of quick, devouring fire. This was no longer about burning paper. This was a line being crossed into a territory so dark Wisterdom's twelve-year-old mind could only recoil in horror. Yet his feet were moving again, carrying him back into the dim kitchen. His hands, clumsy with terror, found the plastic canister, half-full of the clear, pungent liquid. It sloshed heavily as he carried it, a horrible weight. He returned to the doorway and handed the can to his brother, their fingers brushing briefly. The brother's skin was furnace-hot.
What happened next unfolded with a nightmarish clarity, each detail etched into Wisterdom's memory forever. His brother stood, unscrewing the cap. He did not look at anyone. He looked up at the flawless blue sky, as if issuing a challenge. Then, with a movement that was almost ceremonial in its horror, he upended the canister over his own head.
The world did not just slow down; it fractured.
Wisterdom saw the stream of kerosene, clear and slick in the sunlight, arc down onto his brother's black hair. It darkened the fabric instantly, spreading in a grotesque stain across his shoulders, soaking into his shirt, dripping down his arms and torso. The sharp, chemical smell cut through the dusty air, overpowering everything.
A scream, raw and elemental, tore from their mother. It was not a word, but a sound of pure animal terror. She did not hesitate. As the last drops fell from the can, she lunged forward and threw her entire body against her son, wrapping her arms around his oil-soaked chest from behind, pressing her face against his back. "NO! MY CHILD! NO!" she shrieked. The kerosene soaked into her own blouse, a dark bloom spreading over her heart. She clung to him with a strength born of absolute desperation, her body a living anchor. "Please, please, please," she begged, her voice breaking into a thousand pieces. "Don't do this. Forgive me. Forgive us. We love you. Please."
The yard, the house, the watching neighbors—everything ceased to exist. For Wisterdom, the universe contracted to this single, frozen tableau: his tall brother, standing rigid and drenched, a human candle; his mother glued to him, her face a mask of anguish; the matchbox, a small red threat on the ground beside them. The sunlight was too bright, highlighting every terrible detail. The roosters had stopped crowing. The wind had died. It was as if nature itself was holding its breath, waiting to see what a human heart, boiled over into madness, would do next.
Time stretched into an endless, silent scream. Wisterdom's own mind raced, a frantic, trapped bird. He could not move, could not speak. Inside, a prayer formed, not to any formal god, but to the very elements. *Rain*, he thought, squeezing his eyes shut. *It's raining now. A cloud. A single drop. Please, just rain.* He looked at his elder sister, still sitting motionless by the hearth inside, and a hot, sudden spike of blame shot through him. *Why couldn't you just be quiet? Why did you have to say those things?* It was an irrational, childish thought, but it was the only one that could find purchase in the chaos.
The silence was the most deafening sound Wisterdom had ever heard. It was the sound of a decision being made in the deepest, most tormented chamber of a soul. It was the sound of a match, not yet struck, but waiting. The conclusion the world had never seen was not a shouted verdict or a physical fight. It was here, in this terrible, oil-soaked stillness. It was the moment a son became a weapon aimed at himself, and a mother became a shield made of nothing but love and sheer will. The river of destiny had reached its waterfall, and they were all going over the edge together, suspended in this horrific, endless moment before the plunge.