The Burned House

The Burned House

Nobody decides to destroy something they love. It happens in increments — a thing unsaid, a door not opened, a conversation deferred until it was too late to have it.

He looked up one day and the house was already burning. Had been for a while, probably. He stood at the edge of it and tried to remember exactly when he stopped trying to stop it.

The structure's still there. Technically standing. He drives past it sometimes and can't decide if that makes it better or worse.

The Burned House is part of The Chianti Chronicles — fiction set inside the SYNTHESIS universe. Full story available to Sovereign Threshold members.