🔥 Population 5 — Baltimore Blessings / Mythic Americana Edition
🔥 Population 5 — Baltimore Blessings / Mythic Americana Edition
by Scott L.
Razorback on Fire at THB —
Towson Hot Bagels
A story of flame, fate, and breakfast on an autumn morning.
Author’s Prelude
The author has seen a certain pattern.
The more he writes short romantic stories, the higher the numbers go — a leap in readership that’s nothing short of spectacular. He gets a lot of “Good morning, Scott” texts now, too. It lights him on fire.
Maybe it’s the timing, maybe it’s the tenderness, or maybe it’s the spark that runs through every word.
Editorial Blurb
> In this Baltimore morning tale, fire and ritual meet at the breakfast counter. “Razorback on Fire at THB” turns coffee, bacon, and love into symbols of endurance and grace — a poetic reflection on faith, repetition, and the heat that keeps life alive.
Scene 1 — Morning Coffee
“Gotta have my morning coffee,” Roy said.
The air in Canton, Baltimore City, was crisp enough to bite — sunlight clear as glass, a chill running just beneath the warmth. Inside Towson Hot Bagels, steam rose, voices hummed, and the smell of roasted beans and bacon drifted through the air like a quiet promise.
Roy and his girlfriend sat by the window. The world outside felt clean and simple — until the digital order screen flickered.
> A razorback boar wreathed in smoke, its back shimmerin’ red like embered steel.
It lasted a second, maybe less.
“Did you see that?” he asked.
She laughed. “What — the boar? Probably some weird ad.”
Maybe so. But the image stayed with him — alive, heavy, strange — the kind of thing that sits behind your eyelids long after you look away.
Scene 2 — Noontime Coffee
“It’s noontime — can’t go without my coffee,” Roy said.
They were back at Towson Hot Bagels, same booth, new light. Outside, the harbor shimmered under a pearl-gray sky, gulls looping lazy arcs over the water.
Their plates came warm — bagels split and toasted, bacon curling at the edges, crisp and glistening. Roy stared at it too long, watching the heat rise like ghostly smoke.
“You still thinking about that ad?” she asked. She was hot and ready to go, go…
“Yeah,” he said. “It’s hangin’ on me like heat.”
He sipped his coffee, and the thought lingered.
“The author said this to someone standing in the wind,” he murmured.
> “There was a time when the heavens were dark. Prometheus looked up at the cold sky and saw mortals shiverin’ beneath it. So he snatched Apollo’s chariot — the very one that dragged the sun — and tore across the heavens in a blaze of gold and thunder.
Flames poured from the wheels. The clouds split like curtains. And when he came back down, he left a trail of fire burnin’ in the hearts of humankind.
Then came Demeter, the goddess of the harvest. She saw the glow from the valleys below and said, “If you’ve got the flame, I’ll give you the grain.
That was the covenant — fire for warmth, bread for grace. The world was no longer hungry or cold.”
He smiled.
> “That’s what I’d like to think anyway — but it’s a whole different story when you’re wakin’ up to breakfast at Mom and Dad’s house, when we were young.”
And somehow that year, in high school, he didn’t even have to read up on Prometheus or Demeter. He knew everything by heart.
Scene 3 — Evening Coffee
“Gotta have my evening coffee,” Roy said. “Can’t face the big show without it.”
The night had settled soft over Canton. The glow from Towson Hot Bagels spilled out onto the sidewalk, golden and familiar. Inside, the crowd had thinned to whispers and clinks.
Roy stirred sugar into his cup and watched the swirl of dark and light — like smoke folding in water.
It was his third cup of the day — morning, noon, and now. Same table, same smell of roasted beans and bacon.
Outside, the harbor lights shimmered like sparks floating on the water’s edge.
Later, at the big show, when the lights went up and the sound filled the room, Roy still felt the fire — the same one that started with the boar on the screen, now glowing low in his chest.
He grinned, leaned in, and whispered,
> “Bacon, bacon — morning, noon, and night. I must be in heaven.”
Author’s Note
Repetition can wear thin if it’s hollow — but when it carries meaning, it becomes music.
In Razorback on Fire at THB, the word bacon returns like a heartbeat. Morning, noon, and night, it’s never the same — it grows, transforms, redeems.
At first, it’s just food: ordinary, sizzling, familiar.
Then it becomes a signal, an omen flickering through smoke and glass.
By evening, it’s a revelation — warmth turned holy, hunger turned gratitude.
The story repeats without repeating itself.
It’s not about bacon; it’s about the rhythm of being alive — those simple returns to comfort, to coffee, to creation.
Each repetition is a small prayer to the day that keeps on giving.
And if there’s a recipe worth keeping, it’s this:
> Coffee, bacon, and love. That’s all I need.
And make sure you have sweet, sweet butter.
Author’s Trailer
It is the author’s hope that he does not disappoint with Razorback on Fire at THB — Towson Hot Bagels.
If the story leaves even one reader smiling, thinking, or craving a warm bite of something real — then the fire has done its work.
Speech in Athens (The Firekeepers’ Testament)
A companion reflection to “Razorback on Fire at THB.”
He stood in the square, giving a speech in Athens.
No one listened — not the poets, not the merchants, not the gods.
Yet the wind caught every word, carrying them beyond the marble and dust.
And that was the payoff.
When people need myth and legend, it’s right there — waiting —
because of the ones who came before them.
They may not have paid with blood,
but with their time, their devotion,
and every spark of effort they gave to the readers and the world they loved.
Hopeville, USA.
🇺🇸
Editor’s Note
> “Razorback on Fire at THB” and “Speech in Athens (The Firekeepers’ Testament)” are twin flames — one burning in Baltimore, the other carried by the wind. Together they form the living mythology of faith, humor, and human warmth that defines Scott L.’s Population 5 universe.
