Daniel Devlin is a high school outcast. Living in a rundown house with no water, he's haunted at all hours. Tormented by school bullies during the day and hounded by his mother's monstrous boyfriend at night, Daniel's only source of solace is his escape to an abandoned construction site on his way home. Fascinated by fire, Daniel burns small piles of leaves. And occasionally small animals. His life takes a turn for the strange when, while wandering the construction site, Daniel comes across a corpse propped up against a wall on a filthy old mattress. Nothing seems quite right after that. When Daniel believes he's seen the corpse move, his entire world seems to distort. Is his mother's boyfriend, Markus, just a drunk? Or can Daniel believe what he saw as a child, that Markus is a monster, both in his mind and in the flesh. Daniel becomes obsessed with the corpse, skipping school to spend hours staring at it. Hours of one-sided conversation. But, can the corpse be more than just that? As he shrinks further from his awful life, Daniel begins to remember things he never could before. And learns new things he can't begin to fathom.