Harbor Firewake

The lever slams down and the deck shivers, sparks skittering across tar-dark planks while color punches the sky. Smoke rolls low over the harbor, and fireworks flower green, pink, gold, their reflections trembling in the water between moored boats and the stone pier. I stand guard at the console, fingers gritty with fuse dust and oil, feeling the notch-cold metal bite as the counter ticks up. The crowd presses forward behind the railing—leather sleeves brushing, breath warm—transformed by the blast into believers, faces lifted, shadows split and doubled by light. This waypoint exists because joy draws witnesses, and witnesses remember. The rack of rockets looms like a stitched skyline, waxed paper rasping in the damp, and a paper lantern sways, shielding the edge where someone could slip. On the fence, the scrawled Where Vojta? catches sparks and soot, a question nailed to the night so it won’t wash away. Ships hold station, ropes creaking, as if listening. We celebrate and we barricade, cratered boards under our boots, scanning beyond the glare. The sky closes again, and Vojta remains unaccounted for.