Boating

At school they watched a movie about tectonic plates and an island made of fire. The island flowed away from itself down into the sea, then hardened to rock and back into an island. Stretching and reforming, over and over. The island was really a live volcano spewed out of the sea. The teacher said of course people couldn't live there. On screen, the lava bubbled thickly and poured down a valley of rock. Its surface seemed to dry in the air as it moved, dark rock cracking over an orange liquid surface. Broken toffee.

That night, after Sylvia has turned off the light, Federico imagines himself alone on the island, falling, rising in a boat. Spat out of a fiery core he rides the bright valley into the sea.