It was a normal Thursday, or at least that was what Jay thought. He woke up at 6:30 am, and he had missed the bus again, so he dressed in the boring school uniform; a white shirt, some gray pants, a pair of black shoes and a big blue sweater, the only part of the uniform Jay liked. He called a cab and waited at the front door for what seemed a thousand years until a yellow car stopped in front of him. He got in like he always did when he missed the bus, but this time there was something different. Jay didn’t know it yet, but his life was going to change since that taxi ride. The taxi driver was a fifty year-old, colored man. He started driving without asking Jay where he was going; he drove as fast as a nascar racer in the city streets. Then, he stopped in the middle of the highway. There, Jay was forced to get off the car. The old man just left without asking for the money Jay owed him. He walked down the sidewalk. The smog that was thrown by the cars got inside his eyes, making him cry, and the penetrating smell of gasoline was making him sick. He walked for another half mile with all the honking between the cars that passed quickly at his side. Then, he saw him. A man that was lying on the sidewalk all burned and smelling like a piece of meat over the campfire. The man wore ragged, old clothes. Suddenly, his gray, stormy eyes looked directly into Jay’s eyes as he walked towards him. When Jay was close, the man started mumbling something and then threw a little, dirty bag towards him. Jay picked it up, looking at the strange man. Inside of the bag, there was only a small golden ring that had flames carved into the side. Afterwards, the man just banished in front of Jay's eyes. Scared by what he had just seen, he ran towards the closest known place he could think of, his school.
He arrived at 9:10 am, just in time for recess. Although he had missed the first to hours of the day, the only thing that worried him was the little gold ring that he safely hided in the bottom of his backpack. He felt his body walking like a machine to the place where he always met with his friends, the library, but this time he wasn’t as talkative as always. All he could think about was the burned man, who he decided to name Chuck. Jay decided to act normally until he discovered what the weird event meant. The only imprudent thing he did was to wear the ring in his index finger as he observed it. He left it there, so he could keep an eye on it all the time. As he walked to his next class, physics, he tried to remember what Chuck mumbled before disappearing, but his attempt was pointless, he couldn’t remember a word. In the classroom, the teacher handed out the corrected exams, and Jay, as an average student, got a 55 (F). When he saw this low grade, he became really mad at the teacher and wished her desk were on fire. Suddenly, as he sighed, frustrated, a large blaze of fire escaped his mouth, covering the desk in flames. He ran out of the classroom, and, feeling his heart beating in his ears, Jay ran home, where he felt safe again.
He arrived home with the ring still in his finger and with the hope of forgetting the entire morning. As he entered his home, he noticed a big white note placed on the dinning table. It came from his parents, and said that they had to leave the country because there was an emergency in their companies in Portugal. He was alone again. He was used to be home alone because his parents were always too busy working. He started making a cheese and ham sandwich, and accidentally put his hand over the stove. After reacting by pulling his had off the fire, he noticed something peculiar. He felt no pain and showed no physical signs of being burned. After realizing that the incidents that happened that day were caused by the little golden ring, Nicolas ran to get his computer, and searched for magic rings and fire breathers. After some minutes, he found the answer he was looking for in the old book of Nordic tales: “a very long time ago, there was a god that hated Odin with all his heart, and, to destroy humans he made them a gift, a golden ring with flames carved into the sides. This ring can give simple humans the power to control and resist fire, but at a high price. The one that wears it lives forever, seeing his relatives die unless the finger where he holds the ring is cut off by his most loved person”. After knowing all this, Nicolas tried to take the ring off, but he couldn’t. He panicked as he thought about living with it until he was old and then ask his best friend Camilo to cut his finger off. Since that day, he wasn’t the same; nothing was the same anymore. He had the power to control one of the most powerful elements of nature. He was Hephaestus, the Greek god of forge and fire.
This inexplicable event helped Nicolas improve his live in several different ways. He started really living life by becoming a really active person that went to the gym and practiced sports. Also, he became popular and rich because he started his carrier as a magician that controlled fire, which made him start gaining money in great amounts. One day, his happiness was definitely over when he accidentally burned his parents’ house. That day, he lost everything he really had. He realized that, even though his life might seem happy and successful, under that apparent happiness, he hided a terrible agony that would hunt him the rest of his life.
He decide it was time, and finally called his beloved girlfriend.