HEARTS OF FIRE

By L.H. Cosway

Copyright © 2015 Lorraine McInerney.

Smashwords Editon.

ISBN-13: 978-1508535638

All rights reserved.

Cover designed by RBA Designs.

Editing by Indie Author Services.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

Contents

Playlist

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Epilogue

PLAYLIST

Dear reader,

If you’d like to listen to the playlist for Hearts of Fire CLICK HERE.

I haven’t been everywhere, but it’s on my list.

—Susan Sontag.

For this world of readers and writers. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be than here with you. May we all have an adventure just like Lille’s, in the pages and in our minds.

One

Jack and Lille met on a hill

I had a list.

I was trying to tick one thing off it, but I was having trouble convincing Shay to assist me. In the small Wexford town where I lived, there was only one tattoo parlour, and Shay Cosgrove owned and ran the place. He was several years older than I was, and I had a tiny crush on him, but that was another matter entirely.

Right then, I was trying to convince him to give me a tattoo, and he was having none of it.

“I’m sorry, Lille,” he said while crossing his tatted-up, muscular arms across his chest and giving me a placid look, “but if I put ink on you, your mother will have my guts for garters, and going up against Miranda Baker is not on my bucket list.”

“But getting a tattoo is on my bucket list, and I adore your work, and I don’t want to have to drive all the way into the city to get it done, and….”

He cut me off when he placed two fingers on my lips to shut me up. I swallowed and blinked, momentarily forgetting everything I was about to say because, as I mentioned earlier, I had a crush on him and his fingers were on my lips.

Gulp.

My eyes got all big and round, and my breathing accelerated. Shay smirked knowingly as he withdrew his hand from my mouth. Smug bastard. The sad thing was, he was well aware of my crush, but he found me about as attractive as a flat, lifeless piece of cardboard. All of the girls in this town fancied Shay, but he only went for the sexy, sassy hot chicks who were no doubt wild in the sack.

I was not sexy or sassy, and my clothing was as plain Jane as you could get (thank you, Mother) — ergo, not hot.

I was the arty girl with her head in the clouds, and it was not considered cool to be seen with me. In fact, it was considered the complete opposite of cool.

But I was an artist, just like he was, so I thought we could bond over our shared loved of canvas and paint. That never happened. At best, Shay tolerated me. At worst, he wished I’d bugger off and quit pestering him with questions about tattoos.

How does the gun work?

What kind of ink do you use?

How often does the skin get infected?

Can I have a go of the gun?

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever tattooed on someone?

So yeah, I was a question-asker. Most evenings I’d find a reason to stop by the parlour and admire his drawings, which were hung up all over the walls. I’d try to show him my own stuff, but he was uninterested.

Shay was into dark art, like Giger and Kalmakov.

I was into Pop art, like Warhol and Lichtenstein. I was all about colour.

Anyway, back to my list. It only contained ten items so far, and getting a tattoo was one of them. I’d designed it myself. It was a multi-coloured, paint-splashed hot air balloon. I’d wanted to get the tattoo first, because most of the other items on my list were about having an adventure and breaking free. For me, nothing symbolised an adventure more than a hot air balloon.

Where would it take you?

What would you do when you got there?

Who would you meet?

And since hot air balloon rides also had a chance of ending in disaster, I thought it was all the more appropriate. After all, there’s no point to an adventure if safety is guaranteed. The whole purpose is the unknown, the danger.

I craved it more than anything.

Shay had gone back to his sketching table, his back turned to me, when he said, “I’m not doing the tattoo, Lille, so you might as well get going.”

I swallowed the lump in my throat and headed for the door. Just before I stepped outside, I turned around and said, “If you’re afraid of someone as ridiculous as my mother, then you must work so hard on all those muscles to hide the fact that you’re a massive wimp, Shay Cosgrove.”

I sounded like a petulant child. Plus, I was being hypocritical, because if anyone was afraid of my mother, it was me. Still, I felt the need to put Shay in his place. He thought he was so hip and cool, but really he was just a pretentious small-town arsehole.

Wow, I think my crush just disappeared. Cowardice was a surprisingly big turn-off.

“Lille,” he began in an annoyed tone, but I left before he could get the last word in. I had to get to work anyway. I muttered my annoyance to myself as I struggled up the hill to the restaurant. Everywhere in this town you were either going up a hill or down a hill. It was like whoever built it was having a good old joke on behalf of all its future inhabitants.

While I was on my summer break from college, where I was studying for a degree in business (at my mother’s behest), I was working part-time at a small restaurant in town. I was scheduled for the Sunday afternoon shift, and the place would be packed with families having dinner. I liked this shift best because my boss, Nelly, let me do face painting for the kids while the parents enjoyed their meals.

On a normal day I was a waitress, but on Sundays I got to be an artist. Well, as much as turning little boys into Spiderman and little girls into fairies counted as being an artist. I especially liked it when the girls wanted to be Spiderman and the boys wanted to be fairies.

I was all for breaking the mould.

And I loved kids. In fact, I felt far more comfortable talking to five-year-olds than I did talking to adults. Kids told you exactly what they were thinking. Adults said one thing when they really meant another entirely. It was confusing.

I had a hard time connecting with most people. My curiosity and endless questions tended to turn them off. Mum said I came across too eager, and that I had to work on being more aloof and unattainable, whatever that means. I thought on this as I went inside the restaurant and began to set up my face paints at an empty table by the door. I smiled as I heard several little girls squeal in delight when they saw me. I was known as the face-painting lady around these parts and elicited much excitement in children.