I can feel them burning.

I can feel it burning through the fabric before they ever touch the flame.

The matchsticks knock against each other every time I walk, and the sound alone is enough to make something ugly twitch inside me.

The city is unbearable tonight. Everything is too loud—too bright, too close.

Everything feels designed to irritate me. Jeepney brakes scream against the roads. Music blasts from passing cars loud enough to rattle my skull. Strangers shove past my shoulders without apology, and every touch feels like friction against exposed skin. Somebody laughs too loudly behind me, and suddenly my jaw locks so hard it aches.

I keep walking, as the suffocating heat gets into my lungs. The crowd moves too fast, too carelessly, like nobody understands how exhausting it is to exist this angry all the time.

And maybe they do not. Maybe they have never carried rage inside them so long that it starts feeling alive.

I shove my hands deeper into my pockets until the matchsticks press painfully into my palms, and the sting almost comforts me. Well at least pain makes sense—anger makes sense. It is easier to feel furious than admit how much wounds still live in me.

People love telling angry people to calm down as if rage appears out of nowhere, as if anger is not built slowly through years of swallowed words and bitten tongues. They tell them through memories that never stop replaying themselves at the worst possible moments. Through learning how to survive by holding everything in until your body no longer knows the difference between rage and breathing.

And lately, ̶I̶ ̶t̶̶h̶̶i̶̶n̶̶k̶ I have stopped trying to put the fire out.

Every sound around me becomes another spark. A car horn, a stranger cursing, someone bumping into me without looking back. My mind collects irritation greedily, feeding the flames already clawing at my ribs.

I can feel the anger rising higher with every step….

…Hotter.

̷S̷̷h̷̷a̷̷r̷̷p̷̷e̷̷r̷.

̲H̲̲u̲̲n̲̲g̲̲r̲̲i̲̲e̲̲r̲.

I reach my hand into my pocket, and suddenly ɪ ᴀᴍ ɢʀɪᴘᴘɪɴɢ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴀᴛᴄʜꜱᴛɪᴄᴋꜱ ᵗᵒᵒ ᵗⁱᵍʰᵗˡʸ.

I can’t take it anymore.

Pain flashes through my palm. I slowly open my trembling hand inside my pocket and stare at the broken matchsticks crushed between my fingers, their red tips burned black from the pressure alone.

I guess the anger was never inherited quietly, because it was forced into me. Fed to me. Buried so deep in my chest that now it leaks into everything I touch, into every thought, every memory, every breath.

̶I̶ ̶t̶̶r̶̶i̶̶e̶̶d̶ ̶s̶̶o̶ ̶h̶̶a̶̶r̶̶d̶ not to become the fire.

But nobody tells you what happens when a person spends their entire life swallowing flames.

Eventually, they stop 𝔟𝔲𝔯𝔫𝔦𝔫𝔤 inside you.

Eventually, 𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔶 𝔟𝔢𝔠𝔬𝔪𝔢 𝔶𝔬𝔲.

The Frontman