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High school is just like hell. The teachers however, are not the demons. It's us, the students who are. You have to wear the right clothes, hang out with the right people, say the right things, or it's social suicide. And unlike a real suicide, the troubles don't stop if you actually go thru with one.
In my case, it was a year ago, when I explained that I was a democrat. In the middle of Texas. Worse, I was a social democrat. They say that kids today are a lot more liberal than their parents, but I quickly learned that in my high school, it wasn't the case. I should have see the signs : the morning prayer, the essay subjects, the small school library, but I guess I was watching CNN and listening to NPR too much to go down from my cloud.
The government did everything wrong according to most of the student body, but they loved their public school with a passion. Hey, every year, there was a friendly football game between the fire fighters and the school seniors and the fire fighters were celebrated as heroes.
But the government did everything wrong. Nobody seemed to realize that schools and firefighters WERE part of the government.
The only part of the government the kids seemed to like was the army, which in my opinion, was the worst part of my government, but "we have to keep fighting the commies".
But you know the worse, they called me a commie for wanting the government to be more just to all of it's citizens, but at the same time, yelled at me because I didn't support the fight against commies in Russia.
Make up your mind will you, am I or am I not a communist ?
To make matters worse, most of the kid's fathers worked at McHenry's research facility, which was a major NASA supplier. The government was wrong, but most of their parent's were working for a company whose sole client was the government.
I wasn't so lucky. My father died when I was a baby, leaving my mother to raise me by herself with little help from anyone. We were on welfare when I was an infant, getting by with the little insurance money my father left, and moved here in the middle of nowhere because small 2 bedroom houses were really cheap : nobody wanted them.
It's really simple : McHenry's paid well, so the citizens either renovated their houses or had a bigger one built every few years. As such, every two decades or so, a new sector with better houses would open up, the highest paid employees would slowly move up to it, with the second highest paid employees buying their houses and so one, leaving the lowest paid employees unable to sell their house.
That's when my mother and I moved in, when I was 7. The housing market for the city was then crashing, but already, 10 years later, a new development was opening to cater to the people already residing in the area. Within 2 or 3 years, our house would be worthless simply because there would be better houses available to next to nothing.
My mother worked in the only grocery store of the town. Most of her colleagues were wives of employees of McHenry's who didn't really care about their job and only worked part-time, making my mother a valuable loyal employee.
But that's still meant that we were rather poor, hence my insistence on a good government.
Now, no one would talk to me. After all, this was the last year of high school, and next year, most of the kids would be going to college out of state while I had to attend the nearest community college, almost 90 minutes away from my house.
They would go far in life while I would work in a grocery store like my mom, they all made sure I was very well aware of it.
Well, not all. A few of the boys would, from time to time, be nice to me. Invariably, it was so they would have a chance to date me at best, or take advantage of me at worst.
So, I was sitting in our social studies class, in which we study how the government work, and I was frustrated by how ignorant and prejudiced the kids were when I felt my hair move.
I heard several of the girls yell in fear and a few seconds later, the sprinkler system went on along with the fire alarm.
As we were leaving for the rendezvous point, I noticed that the other students in my class were almost all looking at me, trying to avoid me.
Once outside, the principal asked me to go see the nurse right away, to my utter confusion.
The nurse took me by the side of the school while the fireman were arriving and started to inspect my hair.
"Susan, the other students in your class and your teacher saw your hair burst into flame, and if you take a look at your blouse on your back, it's all burned up. But your hair is fine, and your neck isn't burned. "
I touched my back and noticed that indeed, the back of my blouse was all burned up. I was taken by ambulance to the hospital in the next city, where they couldn't explain it further. Once I changed into fresh clothes brought by my mother, there was no signs left of the incident.
The doctors were unable to explain it, but still charged my mother 1800$ for the consultation. That's another thing that frustrated me. All of the McHenry's employees and their family had health care supplied, leaving only 2 citizens of the town without health insurance, who also happened to be the poorest family.
When I returned to school the next day, no one even bothered to talk to me until lunch time. Students avoided me in the hall and sat further away then usual from me in the classes. Even the teachers were looking at me in a weird way.
Class was worse then usual because of all the water damage which wasn't yet fully repaired, but as we were told, life goes on.
At lunch however, they didn't miss me. I was left to sit alone at my table which can sit 20 students, and only a few minutes after I sat down, some students started throwing food at me.
It didn't take time to degenerate into a major food fight, with only one victim. When I yelled to stop it, the student just started to yell insults at me.
But they all stopped at the same time. About five seconds before the sprinklers started once more. This time however, I was able to see it from the various reflections on the windows of the cafeteria.
My entire hair was on fire. Not a weak bush fire, but it was rather as if my hair itself had been replaced by flames.
I panicked, but within seconds, I was able to see my hands burst into flames as well. Soon enough, the water extinguished the flames and I was able to see that even thought my blouse was burned near the neck and the cuffs, my hands and my hair were not burned at all.
This time, I ran outside, but I didn't met the others. Instead, I went in the opposite way, running toward my house.
When I arrived, the police was already there. They asked me to stop where I was, and they even took out their guns, aiming them at me.
"Give us your weapon or your lighter miss, and raise your hands"
"I don't have a lighter or weapons. I don't know what's happening to me !". I raised my hands, but soon noticed that once again, they were bursting in flames.
The police officer yelled at me to stop it, and approached slowly, still aiming at me. They kept asking me to stop it.
"I can't control it. I don't know what's going on"
I could now see that my feet were now on fire, and that the fire went from my hands to my elbows.
One of the police officers returned to their car and brought back a fire extinguisher which promptly returned me to normal.
My blouse had both arms burned off, even thought the intense fire only reached until my elbow, and my feet were entirely bare. It was as if my shoes and my socks, as well as the bottom of my jeans, had vanished.
The police officer told me the pavement was really hot, but even with my bare feet, it felt as cold as usual.
At first, they wanted to drive me to the police station, but they decided against it and instead, had me sit by the sidewalk.
I insisted I couldn't control it and that it didn't burn me. Within a few minutes, an ambulance arrived and the paramedics confirmed I was fine.
But I wasn't fine. Three times in the last 24 hours, I had burst into flame. The first time, it was just my hair. The second time, my hands were also in fire. The third time, my feet joined the rank as well as my forearms.
Where would it stop ?
When my mother arrived, I was still sitting on the sidewalk, but the police officers had left me. She sat next to me and listened to my recollection of the events.
As I was explaining how the students were throwing food at me, my mom jumped away from me, and I soon realized that my hair was once more in fire.
My mother, who had not yet seen me in fire, started to panic, which only seemed to make matters worse. Now, three quarters of my legs were on fire as well as the entirety of my arms.
My God, what was happening to me !
I tried to stay calm. I could see that the flames were slowly dousing themselves. I started to breath slowly, picturing myself in a calm and soothing place.
My arms were still in fire, but instead of bursting with flame, they just seemed to be made of flame. As if the surface of my skin was burning red but otherwise normal.
As I looked at my hands, I was able to see that now, my entire body was now covered in fire in the same way. My mother was terrified, but I actually felt good. To me, it was still almost 100% normal. I was still feeling well, but my body was now made of fire.
I kept the breathing exercises and manage to reduce the intensity of the fire until patches of skin emerged from the fire and slowly grew until even my hair was totally extinguished.
So, I was able to turn it off.
Sadly, I soon realized I was now naked on the side of the street, with all of my clothes vaporized by the fire.
My mother and I quickly went back into the house where I decided to draw a bath to continue the conversation mostly underwater, for safety.
While I was in the bathtub, the school called my mother and explained that until I was able to guarantee I wouldn't burst into flame, I couldn't attend school anymore.
I concentrated once more, breathing deeply, thinking of positive thoughts and returned to a normal body, well, almost.
My hair was now red, as if it was still hot, but there was no fire leaving it. When I touched it, it seemed cool to the touch, but my mother could feel the heat generated by them.
I was despaired. It seemed clear that when I experienced frustration, I would burst into flame, burning everything around me.
I wrapped a towel around my body, but had no expectations that it wouldn't get burned. After a talk with my mother, I decided to touch the internal walls of our basement freezer.
To my surprise, I didn't feel it's coldness, and my skin didn't seem to freeze on contact. After we emptied the few things we had kept, I jumped in it.
We figured that perhaps cold would help me. When my hair returned to their natural brown, we thought we were right, but later during the night, there were a few episodes where I briefly burst into flames, but in a less intensive manner.
After consideration, I realized that it's not so much the cold that helped me, but rather my perception that the cold should help me. In a way, it was a placebo.
I still burned two towels and a book I has been reading during the first event, so I decided to remain naked in the freezer where I manage to sleep all night.
The next morning, I thought about the events of the previous day when I awoke, and without surprise, become once more crimson red from flames. I stood up to reduce the area I was physically touching the freezer.
This time, instead of just calming myself, I tried to picture my body being cold to the touch. While I remained apparently composed of fire, I managed to stop the ice on the sides of the freezer from melting, but everywhere I touched, the ice was still melting instantly and slowly, the bottom of the freezer was also turning red.
I relaxed to turn off the fire and once again, succeeded for my entire body, leaving only my hair on fire. After a good cold shower, I was normal once more.
I put an old dress on after breakfast, and took a walk to the fire department, to see if they had ideas. These people were the experts on extinguishing fires.
Sadly, the fire chief recognized me as the girl with the hair on fire, so I had to explain everything that went on since the previous day. Within a few minutes, almost all of the fireman were around me listening to my story.
One of them suggested that I wear one of their fireproof vests, so that I wouldn't burn everything around me. I explained that I couldn't be held responsible if I still burned it away, but they wanted to test it anyway.
In the bathroom, I removed my old dress and only put their vest on. It was rather heavy and irritated my skin, but I felt confident it would work. After all, they went inside a fire with it and it resisted to the intense heat.
We went outside, in the practice area, and they asked me to show them. I thought about the events, and soon enough, my entire body was covered in flames. To their surprise, after a few seconds, the vest started to burst into flame and soon enough, I was once again naked, covered only by flames.
The fireman asked me not to calm down. They wanted to make tests, so I agreed to remain there, on fire.
They lit a fire close-by, and asked me if I was able to feel it's heat. At first, I just approached my burning hand, but soon enough, I was sitting in the fire, feeling well.
They used multiple hoses to douse me down, and once again, I appeared to be completely waterproof. It's as if my fire had learned to resist it.
One of the fireman asked me if I was able to fly, like the human torch. He explained to me that in the Fantastic Four comics, one of the characters has the same power as I do, except that he can also fly.
I thought about more and more frustration, and tried to jump in the air, visualized myself in the air and so on without success.
But when I tried to push heat toward the ground, I was eventually able to levitate a few feet above the ground and by increasing the strength, I succeeded in actually moving slowly in the air, which the fireman immediately approved as flying.
I relaxed until I was once again myself, but soon realized this meant I was entirely naked in front of a dozen fireman.
I hid myself with my hands, but one of the fireman gave me a towel to wrap around me.
We continued to talk for other an hour, but nobody had ideas for me. They all recommended I remained outside, or I could burn any building to it's ground. The Fantastic Four fan recommended I continue my flight training and suggested the old sand pit on the outskirt of town.
I returned home a little before supper, and decided to do a test.
I stood naked in our backyard, standing on a rock, and placed in a plate next to me a frozen steak. I "flamed on" and reduced the flames to their minimum. I then started to tap gently my hand on the steak, leaving it only a fraction of a section at a time. After a few taps, the steak was cooked hard, but cooked nonetheless.
I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to cool down my entire body with the exception of my left hand, allowing me to walk in the house without burning everything down, but still letting me experiment cooking food with my bare hand, or even just boiling water.
After my mother came home, she agreed to come with me to the sand pit so that I would have a back-up in case of problems with my flight.
I walked bare footed with my old dress to the sand pit, but my mother followed me in her car, which looked rather weird, but I no longer cared.
The first hour of flight training was rather hard. I had a hard time moving faster than a butterfly, but shortly after dawn, I got the hang of it and was able to fly at roughly the speed of running. I was also able to go about twenty stories high and roughly maintain my position, but the further away from the ground I went, the harder it was to move.
I tried a few loops and turns and discovered I was even more agile in the air than I had been underwater.
My mother was able to follow my every move because I was really bright in the night, but she was not the only one to come see me. Two of the fireman eventually came to see if I was indeed practicing.
As odd as it may be, when I was on fire, I didn't feel naked. I feel clothed, but by fire. The four of us had a long conversation together about my new power, and when at some point the fire stopped, I no longer felt ashamed to remain nude in front of them.
From that point on, I had a new routine in life. I would practice my flight in the sand pit all day while my mother was at work, and sleep outside under the stars in our backyard. I would be home schooled in the evening. The cold or the hotness didn't bother me and sleeping outside was the only way I could ensure a nightmare wouldn't burn the house down, even if, in practice, I never burned the grass I slept on.
About three months later, I turned 18. I decided to celebrate my birthday by flying away from home, by myself, but I had a serious problem : I couldn't carry anything with me, including clothes.
It's actually a colleague of my mother who found a solution. I decided to fly to a California naturist resort. They were really surprised to see me land near their pool, but otherwise accepted me, especially since my stay had been pre-paid by credit card.
After a few visits to other resorts, I found a resort in Florida who agreed to let me stay at their center in exchange for agreed to make a flying show for their members every week.
At first, I thought I would miss my mother, but after a little practice, I was able to fly from Florida to her house in only a few hours, allowing me to visit her every few weeks.
But the most fun I've had was a tour of Antarctica. I really scared the scientists when they saw a nude 18 year old girl knock at their door when it was -40 outside, but they still welcomed me and feed me.
Everyone who knew me was waiting for a super villain to arrive, to force me to fight him. After all, to most guys, this was my origin story, and after each origin story, there is always the appearance of a super villain.
Wednesday, 18-08-10 14:43
Cute. It's nice to have a naturist story that's not just naturist exposition (although naturist exposition is important).
Thursday, 12-08-10 06:44
Hey great story. I enjoyed it a lot. are you going to write more about the Fiery Teenager. God I hopes you do.