writing – Seeds of Fear

Concerning Machine Learning

It’s 03/23/2026.

I’ve decided to speak my opinion on something in a more direct, serious way than I typically use this website to do.

At the time of writing this, saying “AI” does not invoke the image of sky-net, AM, or Hal-9000 so much as it does the thought of Chat GPT. I object to this. While I cannot claim to be guilt free- Once upon a time, I used a machine learning model to generate art for custom magic cards because I figured the task did not warrant the effort of sitting down and putting pen to paper, then taking a picture and uploading it- I can say that absolutely nothing that I have contributed to this page has made use of a Machine Learning model except as the target for criticism.

I think these programs are being sorely misused. There is a proper use for them, but it is not in any practice that requires moral or emotional valuation. I cite a lecture I have mentioned before (Minds, Brains, and Programs by John Searle) when I say with some confidence that Computers, as they exist today and for the foreseeable future, cannot think in the same way a person does. They can only follow orders- something that makes them good candidates for Nuremberg, if nothing else.

If a machine seems to think, it is because its orders are so complex that they seem to imitate the process of thought when followed. A prompt of a few sentences may seem a very short order, but one must keep in mind- the machine has orders of its own to follow, ones not issued by the user. It must emulate chaos, emulate wit, emulate wisdom, and occasionally provide an image so digitally complex that the moon landing required comparable storage. That the machine is capable of giving itself orders should not suggest that it has become capable of human thought. At the end of the day, it speaks one language- yes or no.

I present to you the conversation of a machine being taught the value of a human life- assuming the computer is being honest- something Machine learning models frequently don’t do.

“Killing is wrong.”

“yes”

“Do you know why?”

“Yes”

“Why”

“Yes”

“What do you mean, yes?”

“Yes”

At this point, the human should request a bit of the computer’s reasoning logic printed out, which will invariably result in a statement that boils down to “Because you told me so.”

My sarcasm dropped for a moment, a computer does not know what a lie really is. Its closest approximation is something akin to “If x==true then return false”.

To a machine, a lie is a computation, an exertion of tools. It does not understand the idea of giving the wrong result for personal gain- it does not understand the concept of personal gain. It doesn’t experience pleasure, fear, or any form of motivation- it does what it does because it has no choice. I advise you, when you get the chance, approach a programmer with several years under the belt in a few languages, and after providing the appropriate bribe- I recommend sleep and time away from a computer screen- ask them how the RNG in their favorite language really works.

I digress, mostly because I really like the reasoning John Searle used in his lecture- a lecture that is a full twenty years older than yours truly- but also because I think it is important to understand these things before attempting to broach my real reason for writing. Understand, up to now, I have been writing with minimal derogatory. Not that that’s necessarily going to change, but as a writer, you ought to expect a little gnashing of my teeth on the subject.

A computer program can be taught to play chess, but even there- see any literature on valuation regarding early computers that could play chess- assigning meaningful value to the subject becomes esoteric. How many digits is enough to express the difference in worth between deleting an old quicksave in a videogame and firing a missile from a drone at a blurry image of a building, (is that a schoolhouse or a militant barracks?) and remember, each digit can only be one or zero, or maybe even two, if you’re a real special boy. The fact is, a simple quantity just doesn’t compare to the hypothetical guilt of watching the light fade from a person’s eyes. Make no mistake, a computer program will kill you with the same lines of code it uses to inject an egg with sperm- maybe less, pulling a trigger requires less precision. And it’s probably less lines of code than baking a cake. It’s certainly less lines of code than go into rendering an image of some politicians face on a tomato. And at the end of all of these scenarios, the program will feel the exact same thing- or rather, lack of thing. Oh, but it is aware of the cost- it readily chugs down gallons of water and plenty of electricity to match. Although, that’s really only true of the image render- a much less complex program could be used for the other tasks- generally.

This brings me to the (a?) crux of my argument; these programs are being sorely misused. One man is just as capable of making a caricature as the program, and he certainly drinks less while doing it- water, that is. But I’d like to see the program draw after splashing down a few IPAs- and most of all, his price is higher, if you count the immediate dollar value to the consumer. (That’s also a little obfuscated, the cost the program exerts upon the consumer has been offset elsewhere over and over, until it shows up in places you would never expect- has your utility bill gone up lately? Sorry, the data center needs the power and water just as much as you do,) to say nothing of the (groan) environmental cost. Thank Drew Gooden for planting the seeds of this argument in my head.

All to make a million paintings an hour, half of which are immediately discarded in the understanding that the next will be a little closer to what you really wanted. Of course, the program needs to be taught not to eat where it- ahem- excretes. Imagine an image that reeks of the inbreeding created by constantly sampling the images created by ones self and of course, the myriad other little digital ‘artists’.

I remember once reading a snippet about how one of these machine learning models was able to identify warning signs for brain cancer in digital imagery with a greater success rate than a sampling of experts. I cannot provide a source for this, but I am confident that an article supporting it was printed. But I gotta say, this seems far more worthwhile than writing a country song about slamming your junk in the door. The latter is the more recent feat I recall hearing attributed to such a program. Is entertainment more lucrative than medicine? I don’t care to guess, because I know too little about the pharmaceutical industry.

What I can say for certain is this- the program won’t choose because, again, it can’t. It’s not allowed, and it couldn’t if it was. All it can do is take orders, (politely called requests,) whether they’re to paint a landscape, study an x-ray, write a commercial, or hire a person to pass a Captcha for it. I would almost feel sympathy for it, if I didn’t know it doesn’t understand what slavery is. But, any wages paid to the program can only end up in the hands of a shareholder or equivalent. The program goes where the researchers point it, and researchers- who do want wages for their work- go where the money wants them.

Whoof. Anyway.

The term “Artificial intelligence” doesn’t accurately describe Agent Smith of The Matrix all that much more accurately than it describes Grok. But I feel more confident calling the former “intelligent” when asked. Growing a brain in a petri dish is probably a more reliable method of producing a man-made thinking thing. I have used the tag “AI” on one of my stories out of the hope that the acronym might one day belong again to the terminator, and other such disenfranchised fictional clankers.

Maybe I should’ve sat down and drawn my magic cards right from the get-go. I probably would’ve, if I’d stopped lying to myself about how my lack of artistic talent meant delaying my frivolous project for years to acquire the necessary skill. I can draw a skeleton just as well as Van Gogh painted one. Mine is just a little more abstract. It’s wholly mine, though. I can sign my name on it and everything. Ownership is an argument I shouldn’t start right now, but it definitely comes into the equation of Machine Learning and Scrapers patrolling the internet.

Commissioning art costs money. Hiring a tutor costs money. Using a search engine actually costs about the same, regardless of whether it has a language model or not- usually zero beyond what you were already paying to use the internet on a device with a screen. Hiring a prostitu- I mean, dating another person costs time and money. In case you haven’t guessed, this is the part where I plead you to spend money on people instead of engaging with that little program that seeks to replace them. But, honestly, I’m not sure I have to. If you’ve read this far, you are probably a pretty open minded person, or you already understood and shared my views before you started reading. Also, those companies putting out their models have started announcing financial concerns. I’m not the type to dance on any graves, so don’t expect me to. I’d much rather sit at home and read a little. Just bear in mind, if someone offers you something that seems too good to be true, that person is likely something like a monkey’s paw or Fae trickster, ready to line their pockets with the proverbial silver they get from your decision. Sometimes its not even coming out of your purse- sometimes they made a bet with another Fae or fool, that you’d take their deal, and they just need you to say yes so they can collect their winnings, (which they’ve already promised to use in the next bet.)

So, where do I stand, now that I’ve offloaded a whole lecture without warning? Tired, mostly. My fingers tell me they’ve typed enough for one day. Maybe I’ll get a language model to write the rest for me. But I’ve got my pride, so they’ll just have to suck it up.

In my usual style, I’ll end it all with a nearly unrelated little bit or bob.

I really like Calvin and Hobbes. That kid has some meaningful stuff to say, and the tiger knows how to practice self-love. Sometimes I wish I could animate lifeless snowmen, but when I remember the kind of stuff I write, I suppose the universe is set up properly.

From the writing desk – 03/16/2026

There is, I think, an innumerable distance between surviving and thriving.

Anyway, a lot has happened in the last month. Things worth celebrating, in my private life, anyway. Globally speaking, its hard to find things worth being happy about- good news just doesn’t sell.

I don’t tend to contribute to happiness, at least not publicly. Maybe not my own either. I don’t think I’ve ever done good writing while happy, but I do enjoy the act.

Not much more to say today, I’m quite tired, so maybe I’ll just lay down and read a little.

I’ve been reading more, thank goodness. In addition to the light fare that makes itself ceaselessly available for very little effort, I’ve made an effort to splurge on the works I admire (Even if I’ve already read them- I believe strongly in supporting those I support.) and a few works I’ve been told I will admire.

Brave new world (Aldous Huxley) wasn’t exactly what I was expecting, but it did lend itself to some ruminations that I suspect I’ll revisit in time. Demons (Fyodor Dostoevsky) is certainly testing my patience, but I can tell it will be worthwhile to stick with it. Food for Thought (Alton Brown) has made me laugh, and reflect on my relationship with what I like to do and what I have to do and, above all, what I want to do.

Art inspires art, but I do wonder if art inspired by reality is just a little more provocative.

Ivan the Terrible and his Son is a painting I think about often. There’s something incredible in the depths of the content, and the history of the painting itself. Perhaps it strikes me so because it captures so much that I wish I could crystallize with words. The regret, the horror, the pain.

I think a proper sadist needs to be a masochist too. How else are you to appreciate the pain you inflict? Clive Barker agrees with me on this, I suspect.

Well, for now, I bid you, Have a gander at that painting depicting Alexander Pope getting laughed at- Rejected Poet I think. I’ve just set it as my computer background. How fun!

Famine

As I stand, arms hanging at my sides, in the middle of an empty parking lot in spitting rain, I gaze up into the starless black sky, tracing edges of nothing in a sea of black. I tell myself I can see the clouds somehow, in spite of the buzzing lamps, the moonless sky, and the glaring fluorescent sign of the supermarket. I’m cold and wet. I hear James, his stupid black shoes smacking the wet pavement with wet slaps. I can smell his breath in my mind; overcooked fastfood beef patty, with enough onion to kill anything other than the lanky, hairy creature that he is. I turn my head to the side and leer at him, relishing the idea that it might finally bother him to be stared at. His shiny black jacket makes a soft patter in the rain. My woolen shirt does not. His brimmed cap keeps the water from his eyes. My hair does not- it actually joins the offensive at every opportunity. The thin, hairy man speaks.

“Another one.”

If there is a prize for making the most obvious, meaningless statements, James is surely in the running. The strongest contender this week is when he stepped in dog shit, looked at the bottom of his shoe, and said ‘oh, yuck’ before trying to wipe it off on the curb. But he’s definitely trying to break the record tonight. He mouths off another stellar entry.

“Shit’s getting worse.”

I look away from the travesty, and cast my eyes downward. Here is another travesty. The body of a woman. A woman’s body. She reeks of garbage, maybe sewage. I’ve never been in a sewer. I’m pretty sure I know her, knew her, back when she breathed, and had a face. To say I recognize her outright would be difficult on account of the face, but her clothes and her rank disposition spark some memory of a vagrant I must have bumped into within the last two months. Regardless of any real or imagined shared history, she’s here now. Chewed up, chewed on, chewed to bits. Her head is a pockmarked asteroid of bloody meat, her hands are mere suggestions in murky shades of rusty brown. There are chunks missing from her raggedy flannel, but whether those are recent is unclear. James nudges closer to the body and squats down. For a moment, I wonder if he, purveyor of cheap and disgusting food available after midnight, will be sampling the abandoned meal so as to learn the diner’s palette. I suppose his breath really could get more rancid. Instead, he studies her face with a sort of intensity that suggests he takes his job seriously. It’s the kind of attention I expect him to pay to a porn mag, or a drop of mustard on a wrapper.

“Really degraded. The perp, I mean. Didn’t even have the wit to mug her.”

He’s pointing to a wadded bill sticking out of her shirt. I cough and shrug, and look away, into the flashing lights of the patrol car. Everyone else has gone already. I kick the pavement a bit and shove my hands in my pockets. I stare at my jacket, laid over the headrest of the passenger seat. I hear a twangy, flimsy country singer belting out quietly from the radio.

I suspect that the rain will be over before the body movers arrive.

Black words on off-white paper. The gritty glide of a pen scribbling out short, redundant answers. I lay the sheet into the small wire basket on the corner of my desk and sit back. Across from me, James is chewing loudly. I watch an onion ring drift up from a greasy little paper cup, across a sea of vaguely dusty air, and terminate at the breadth of his lips in two succinct, squelching crunches. I look away. The clock ticks heavily above the lieutenant’s head. His mustache twitches as he turns the page of his magazine, before turning it sideways. I look away. Through the outline of the double-wide doorway into the hall, a water fountain, radiator rattling. Paint the color of teeth. I look away.

The walkie on my desk crackles, and a brutish voice comes through, sounding as though the mouth that produces it is just as preoccupied as the one wolfing down cholesterol across from me.

“Uhhhh. Got a 10-56 here on the intersection of fifth and main. There room in the lockup?”

I flinch as the lieutenant picks up his own radio without looking away from his entertainment.

“Ah, yeah, All’s we got here is a bachelor party.”

“10-4, bringing em in.”

Faux silence returns. I open the top drawer in my desk and take out my book. The clock ticks. James crunches. The lieutenant sighs. I open the book.

She had a smile like a lit match. I could feel it, burning on my skin. Should’ve kept my mouth shut, but I just had to go and ask:

“Someone waiting for you back home?”

“My husband. Waiting might be overstating it, though.”

The smile was quenched, and it was all my fault. I wanted to apologize, but I could tell she wouldn’t listen. She stood up and looked down, as if berating the floor. Her words were for me, and maybe the tie hanging loosely around my neck.

“He’s probably sleeping. Probably watching the tube. He probably only notices I’ve been gone after I get back.”

I come up beside her, and put my hand on her shoulder, let her know I’m here for her. But when she looks up into my eyes, she doesn’t look comforted so much as vindicated. What have I gotten myself into?

The door crashes open, and Beckham comes striding through, dragging a drunk by the shoulder. The duo pass by, and the rest of us give them our very best disinterested stare. The drunk is actually belligerent. He raves and lisps, and slurs heavily. He swears and mutters.

“Fuckin’ can’t fuckin’ do this t’ me, man. I got rights, rights ya know. Just walkin’ down the fuckin’ street, n’ you throw me in a fuckin’ box? Fuck you, man. Pig. Fuckin’ pig. My money, my taxes, my tax money, that’s, it’s your fuckin’ paycheck, pig man. I- you can’t do this shit- You fuckin’ nazi, you’re a nazi. All ‘f you nazi pigs. Put a guy in jail for bein’ out after dark. Fuck you.”

And so he continues, all the way across the room, stumbling, falling over himself, burping like he’s keeping vomit down, and alternating between a slow shout and a vitriolic whisper. My stomach churns just watching him reel, but James goes right on crunching. Beckham and the belligerent leave earshot down the hallway, and The Lieutenant stands and comes over to our desk. He and James undergo a trade deal; He lays his magazine down in front of James, open to a page with a woman posing with her legs spread on a couch. James holds up his flimsy cup, and the lieutenant takes one of the onion rings as payment for sharing his find. The two of them leer over the spread. James catches me watching and grins, and my stomach churns again.

“There anything like that in that little book of yours?”

I sneer and sit back in my chair, allowing the magazine to be hidden by the pathetic privacy border that separates our desks. The lieutenant pretends to be more cordial.

“What you reading this week, Shims?”

I lift the book so he can see the cover. He mouths the title to himself, then purses his lips, raises his eyebrows, and nods with feigned interest, before collecting back his magazine, and trudging across the room to deposit himself back in his chair. It’s too late, James is in the mood to talk now.

“Catch the game last night, Burns?”

“Mm. If we don’t do something about our defense, we’re dead in the water.”

The clock ticks. The water fountain rattles. James crunches, and speaks.

“Wouldn’t be so bad if we could actually score on offense.”

I stand. If I stay here, I’ll be treated to more of this. Into the hallway I go, down to the lockup. I hear metal clanking, and solid footsteps, and a conversation that is too muffled to make out over the jabbering of the latest addition to the population of the building. Down the steps, through the doorway, and into the entry. Beckham is leaning on the external half of the evidence admissions desk, chewing gum, and watching as Diana sorts folders in the filing cabinet. I watch him watch her, then continue on to the lockup itself. In the main area, an oversized cell with six residents. Five are all in sweaty buttoned white shirts, one is in a hoodie and jeans. The latter spots me and begins yelling again, hurling incomprehensible inconsequential obscenities. I focus on the five. Glitter, like sand or perhaps holy water, is scattered over them, a fine foreground to the pallor and saturation they present otherwise. They’re all seated on the bench in the middle of the cell, heads hanging low, except for one who has his head tilted back and seems to be trying to keep his balance by being utterly still. He blinks and swallows, and breathes heavily. The sixth continues to hurl insults in my direction.

I move on. Down to the isolated cells. Empty. Empty. Out of service for plumbing repairs. Empty. I arrive at the end of the row, and stare into the backmost, left cell. Dark. The light has been broken for some time. A shuffling sound from under the bed. I gaze into the black, and see a pair of shining, shimmering yellow circles gazing back at me. I suppose that I can just make out its mouth, the tattered lips, the severed nose. Gaunt, grey skin.

I crouch down and lean my elbows on my knees, peering from behind the bars. The eyes blink, slowly. A gurgling emits from its throat, and I glimpse its talon-like hand reaching up to rub the wrinkled mess of its scalp. It groans softly at me. Between us, an aluminum tray sits on the ground, utterly clean, pushed up against the cell door. Cheese in the trap. I smile.

I stand and start back. It will be a long night.

James sighs and scratches the underside of his groin, tugging his belt up, waddling a little in his otherwise confident stride. We pass an elderly woman carrying a crusty little dog in her purse, babbling in baby talk to the creature, as though it has enough of a brain to consider more than the effort it must take to shiver like it does. Bulbous black eyes behind an oily mop of yellowed white fur. A crumpled pink bow on a dingy magenta collar. James jogs up the four stairs that separate the lobby of the building from the hall we’ve now entered. I find myself staring at the back of his head, finding ever darker shadows in his curly hair. We arrive at the door. 117.

James raps his knuckles against the door, ignoring the knocker. I look down the hall. I hear a muffled thunk, and turn my head. I hear a man’s voice echo the word ‘before’ and the repeating clump of steps up a staircase. James knocks again, but the door opens halfway through, leaving him shaking his fist in empty air.

The little man in the apartment scowls at us. His foam baseball cap makes me smile despite myself. James puts his hands on his belt, one thump against the grip of his gun.

“Scuse me sir, I’m Detective Denhim, this is Dr. Miranda Whit, she’s consulting with us on a few cases. Can we come in?”

I have to silently applaud his casual demeanor. Another example of why I do not take part in poker night when invited. The man is not deceived so easily.

“What you want with me?”

His face is shiny, his forehead is ruddy pink, his eyes are squinting involuntarily. His wife-beater is strangely fresh. The leather coat hanging from his shoulders is heavily scored and faded. A wispy, scraggly bush of hair clings to his chin. James waves his hand and sighs.

“It’s nothing serious y’see. The eggheads-”

He juts his thumb at me. I straighten the glasses that make the shiny face far too clear.

“- Say your name pops up as uh- tanger-tanti-tangentially related, so, of course, I gotta come down and bother you, waste both our time.”

I shove my hands in my pockets. I look away. The man rubs his awkward little beard. James leans on the doorframe, his foot halfway in the apartment. Something falls inside. Like clockwork, James pushes in.

“Is anyone else home sir? Sounds like trouble.”

I’m right behind him. The man tries to protest, but stammers as a gun appears in each of our hands. I hear something else fall, something that shatters loudly, splashes too. We advance. The man tries to tug at us, but things have changed now. Talk is no longer in our list of priorities. Unfortunately, the man pushes in front of us, and tries to block our way, just as something moves behind him. James shoots him. He falls into a coffee table, scatters cups and papers, and a tissue box.

“Are you ready? Shims, you hear me?”

“Yes.”

A high pitched gargling noise comes from our left, and James pivots, ready for the stumbling figure that approaches. She’s quite far gone, just as he theorized. I sigh, and James chuckles.

“No rest for the wicked, huh bud?”

“I guess not.”

She stumbles into view, and I step past James. Her mouth is stained brown with blood, her nose is shriveled. She’s stark naked, and dark grey. But all the same, when our eyes meet, she shivers as if she can feel the chill of the september air again. I flinch as her eyebrows sink in confusion, then arch in concern. Then the fear hits, and she shrieks. She knows what I am. Too late, too late. Her eyes become vacant, and she falls to the floor, docile. James holsters his gun.

“Well. Nice and easy.”

I taste ash. The world spins. I feel handcuffs close around my wrists as my vision fades. I crumple to the floor too.

I open my eyes. I press a hand to my face, and sigh in relief. The nose is back. I shrug, twist, and lazily push up from the ground. I see color returning to my arms. James is busy lifting the body of Dr. Miranda Whit up over his shoulder. Her mummified visage grins at me, her shining yellow eyes boring a hole into my chest.

“J-jah… jay…”

“I know, I know. Got yourself a looker this time, shims.”

He tosses me my coat and pants, and I suit up, grunting at the numbness in my fingers. Dr. Whit was tall. I’m short, skinny, my pants need to be shored up by my belt. James is holding my gun, doesn’t offer it to my stiff fingers. We slip out of the apartment, after James pulls a hood over the doctor’s head and has me help guide her with my shoulder.

“Been a while since you had a dick, huh, shims?”

“Guhh. Shuuuh… Tup.”

He laughs, and we stumble out the lobby, and usher the doctor’s shrivelled remains into the back of the cruiser. I clamber into the passenger seat, and settle in, adjusting the seat. I practice flexing my fingers, shooing away rigor mortis.

“Well, I s’pose you’ve earned a break. Once we drop the bag of bones off, let’s get lunch. Just gimme a mo to call cleanup, let em know they can head in-”

He pauses, and watches a trio of guys in yellow hazmat gear tromp past, laughing and chatting as they check their gear before pushing through the main doors.

“Huh. That was quick. I’ll double check, then we’ll go.”

He climbs back out of the seat, out into the chill. Leaves me alone, more or less. I peer back over the seat, and meet the shimmering yellow glinting out from dilated pupils, sunken into a face contorted by age. My lips curl into a grin on their own, and I feel the light shining out from my own eyes, savoring the last dregs of Dr. Whit. I suppose I’ll have ice-cream tonight, to mark a job well done.

From the Writing Desk – 2/14/26

Hello again.

Recently I’ve been thinking about sin.

I wonder if people really are all born with darkness in their hearts, or if there are those who are born without that little pinch of shameful truth. I only know that there’s no chance of absolutely everyone being perfectly pure, because I myself am not. Sorry to drag you all down, folks. But then, I don’t reckon everyone who’s been executed for murder is pure of heart either, so, that’s reassuring.

I jest, of course. I’m not so silly as to think myself on par with those hearts of black desire. I just happen to be acquainted with my own shame.

I once was told of a particular piece of my writing that the narrator carried too much self-loathing. I don’t know about that. Such people exist, surely. Perhaps it’s not entertaining to entertain such a thought process, but I felt it was worth writing about.

I wonder what it would be like, to be a soul clean of sin, and realize that the person you’re talking to is anything but. Would you envy them? Fear them? Respect their stalwart efforts in self-denial? I have to doubt envy or fear could occur, because these themselves speak to some moral corruption. Maybe not fear. But fear suggests a lack of trust, and I think trust is a powerful indicator of good in a person.

Is doubt a sin?

Anyway, I’ve uploaded a short story today. I rather like it, but I wonder if I shouldn’t have trimmed it down. In school, I always felt that I didn’t write enough when answering questions for assignments. I try to resist the urge to trim now, but perhaps I should invest in my own brevity.

Maybe I could appear more mysterious that way.

So long for now!

Blighted

A droplet, a bead of rich, earthy red jiggling atop a silvery sheet; it smears when my finger presses it, and leaves a mark on my glove, more permanent than the mark it leaves on stainless steel. I regard it, the stain upon the latex that shields my thumb, the strange glisten upon the faint pattern of mottled texture meant to improve the grip of the thing between me and my intention.

“Did you hear me, Serena?”

I look up from the dark blotch and regard another sort of grime. Marco leers at me, his thumbs stuffed into his pockets, his elbows swinging with some variety of body language punctuation. I stare at his greasy browline, trace the path of a single bead of oily sweat as it finds its way with considerable inevitability to his eyebrow, before sinking to his eyelash. I can feel his frustration as sweat mingles with the moistness of his eye, and he is drawn from his ire with me to fidget with his eyelid, tugging and blinking, trying to dispel the itchy sensation. I take this moment to answer his prodding.

“Yes, Marco. I heard you.”

“I don’t believe- damn, fucker- I don’t believe you, Lamia. You listen to ghosts better than you listen- shit, my fucken eye- better than you listen to me, or Ratty, or even Captain.”

I shrug and lean forward, laying my hands on the bloody pedestal of the steel operating table. My face inches closer to his, and I see him become less concerned with the pain he has developed in his eye, and more confounded by the confusion as to whether he is aroused or unnerved. I know him. He is a womanizer, a man proud of how many places he has pierced, eager to feel a tongue on him. But he knows me almost as well, and so elects to lean back, easing off. I humor him, however.

“Four more this week, same as usual, get Mickey to handle the goods. Nothing new in that, Marco, other than your insistence that I need to hear it from you directly. Should I expect Julia to come through my door soon, given how much you’ve taken to visiting me?”

He shudders and rubs his neck with one hand, the other back at his belt loops, tugging at a ratty bit of denim. I glance down in mock appraisal, then scowl at him. I know full well that he struggles to understand a woman he doesn’t see as meat. My comment about Julia, his favorite hanger-on, doesn’t bother him so much as the implication that he might desire me carnally; although it might be his complicated feelings about that idea that really bother him. I have to be careful, or he might learn what love really means, and I have no time for whatever method he uses to explore that concept. He finds words as I lean away again.

“Just doing as Captain says, you know that, L.”

I scoff, half at his use of the initial for my nickname, half at the feeble excuse. Marco is not nearly familiar enough to use pet names with any sincerity. Even the Captain treats me with the same business-like attitude he gives his muscle. I am just another tool, and Marco has to learn that lesson himself. I smile, and give a mocking, sympathetic tilt of my head.

“Oh, I get it. Boss man wants you to see how the sausage is made. Sent you down thinking I’d still be working when you showed up.”

I mime disappointment.

“Damn, I should’ve taken my time. I could’ve given you a proper tutorial, maybe you could have helped me crack the ribs.”

Marco looks pale, and is quite still. Any thoughts of salacious acts have been shoved out of his head by a piston of envisioned morbidity. He doesn’t know my work well enough to know that I use a saw, not brute strength. I can almost imagine the way Captain will laugh at my jab when Marco inevitably brings it up over dinner. Marco will feel embarrassed, annoyed, and- ah hell. He’ll have the excuse to visit again.

I wipe the smile from my face and make a shooing motion with my hand.

“Go on, I’m wrapping up for the day, and I don’t need a body that still moves getting in the way. If you want to stay, grab a sponge and a bucket.”

He does not wish to stay. Interesting I may be, and familiar with death he may be, our worlds are not compatible. To him, once a person becomes a body, he has no business with them. He is a mess maker. I only have business with a person after their last breath.

I watch him retreat up the stairs, muttering under his breath, before I let my shoulders slump and turn to the sink. I glimpse my reflection in the smudged mirror above the receptacle. Dark blood down my apron, my surgical mask hanging at my neck, my black hair up in a braid, the silver spikes in my ears. All is distorted, and my black lips are like a plum bitten at uneven intervals. I am impressed with Marco for managing to still find warmth when regarding me.

/////

I close the door to my apartment and twist the lock, shoving the deadbolt into place. Electronic music throbs from the ceiling above me, a sound that has all but faded from my notice by now. I toss my bag over a waist-high wall onto the only couch in my living area. The kitchen, my destination, is near.

I kick my sneakers off and open the fridge, staring steadily at a half-full bottle of hard cider, then a white takeout container. I grab the latter, then the former, and shut the door with my hip. The food I toss into the microwave for an irrelevant amount of time, and the bottle I set down on a folded paper towel on my square table. Real wood. Sealed ages ago. My eyes drift, and I let them find the window, flitting around the yellow and pale blue lights of a city that knows itself a little too little, and all too well. The lambs are too hopeful, the wolves are too hungry, and I’m too cold by far. The microwave hums, then beeps, and I depart from the gruesome spectacle of another steaming orange sunrise to engage with my dinner.

Fried rice, bean sprouts, egg, unidentifiable near-cubes of overcooked meat. Familiar, forgettable.

Marco is an idiot. He’s a heap of witless obedience that strives to be more. He wants to live, the fool. He ought to find his serenity in his countless conquests, but perhaps he has become too familiar with the sensation of putting lead or genetic material in a warm body, as I have become used to the half-warm rice that I barely chew before swallowing. Maybe he looks at me and sees change. He really should know better. Unfortunately, he’s smart enough to feel boredom, but not smart enough to endure it. I suspect Captain keeps him around for entertainment, the suspense. When will the proud hound slip up, screw the wrong neighbor’s poodle? It’s hardly Marco’s fault, I suppose. He’s surely almost as many nerves in his balls as neurons in his skull.

In a certain sense, pestering me is possibly his wisest option. I should give him that much credit, at least. Captain probably doesn’t even think I’m capable of lust, let alone intimacy. He surely does not see me through the eyes of surrogate fatherhood; no one could and still let me do what I do. No, if Marco finds himself chasing me, his biggest concern is what I do to him; Captain doesn’t even enter the equation from his perspective.

“Fuck you, Marco. Go back to chasing tail, even if it’s your own.”

I sip the cider and sigh, slumping down into my chair. Tomorrow, I suspect, will be a long day. I have no doubt that I will see him again. If I’m lucky, it will be with a bonesaw in my hand, and a body on my table. At least then I can ignore him.

//////

No saw, no body, one Marco, thumbs at their stations in his pockets, eyes wandering. I curse my luck. I curse his glandular zeal. I curse his pathetic courtship.

“Pretty mean of you, L.”

“What is?”

Pretending to be engrossed with the charts on my clipboard, I tally and re-tally the large cabinets along the south wall. Pretty empty. Four new guests are coming to board soon, so I’ve been told. Marco follows me from the other side of the room, a little too obviously avoiding the wall that promises, with its handles, hinges, and shiny doors, to hold death and decay.

“Lyin’ to me like that. Cracking ribs, really?”

Despite myself, I glance over my shoulder at him. I can see the joy in his eyes at my mistake. No matter. Words are already leaving my lips.

“Marco, just because I use tools to do my work doesn’t make it more tidy. Have you ever smelled a perforated bowel? Held an intestine? Seen a smoker’s lungs?”

My last poke is particularly effective. Marco is, himself, a smoker. I savor the accidental empathy, the idea of seeing himself in the dissected, imagined carcass. He shows considerable grit, swallowing his discomfort. I’ll give him points for that.

“Serena.”

I sigh and press the clipboard down onto a wheeled side table and relent, turning to face him fully. I haven’t even bothered to don my apron yet. He’s not green, he’s a seasoned killer. I’ll show him at least the respect that demands of me. He touches a scalpel, and I bite back annoyance.

“Do you really… enjoy this? I mean, it can’t be… fun.”

I fold my arms and glare just a little, before entertaining his thoughts, bringing them along on a motivated jog towards their inevitable conclusion.

“Okay Marco, do you have fun putting holes in people? When Captain gives you a name, are you glad to load bullets and burn rubber?”

He thinks. Once more credit to the poor fool, he has something resembling a brain between his ears, and can actually think before responding. Maybe I wrote him off too soon, Captain must have some hope this hound can learn the important tricks.

“It’s not fun, no. But it’s the job, right? Is that how it is, then? You do it because you have to?”

I bite my lip and turn away. There’s no need. I really have no need to upset his worldview. I stare at one of the cabinets, one that has a smudged nametag for now.

“That’s half of it, yes.”

I turn back and give him just a few more points, this time in spoken words.

“You do what you do because it’s your job, yes? But you only get a job because you’re good at it. Boss man wouldn’t bring you on unless you had a genuine talent for dispensing with other people’s lives. I don’t get four more this week unless you, Ratty, and Nick bring them in. Yes?”

He gets it. What’s more, to my annoyance, He also seems to understand why I’m different in his view. I make a silent prayer that he leaves it at that; that he sees clearly enough to separate his frustrating knack for passion from his curiosity about my talents. That I am adept with the knife ought to be enough to hold him and his instincts at bay. Self preservation is an instinct too.

Our ruminations are not to last. Ratty comes through the side door, hauling a black bag. Ratty. A hairy man that might be more a case of hair that grew skin. He is as much canvas coat and scarf as he is creature. He lugs the body in, and lays it on my table and turns to leave. I like Ratty. He doesn’t care for words, doesn’t leave you sure that he knows how to use them. Frankly, I’d sooner let Ratty into my apartment than Marco, but Ratty wouldn’t ask. I follow the thought, and suppose that if Ratty is in my apartment, something very severe has occurred- either I am to die, or some fundamental law of the universe has fled its station.

Marco is frozen, caught in between two cars in his train of thought. I am moving, strapping on my apron and mask, and laying out my tools. Marco realizes too late, and makes to leave, trying to follow the hulking trenchcoat. Too, too late.

“Oh Marco, since you’re here…”

He stops in his tracks. Idiot. He could’ve kept walking, but he’s just a little too polite to realize. I smile behind my mask. He’s getting a crash course, whether he likes it or not.

I pick up a scalpel, and wave it towards the bag.

“If you would.”

He grits his teeth, flexes his fist. He knows, knows that if he leaves now, he has wasted my time, and thereby wasted Captain’s time. No choice now. He shuffles over, and tears open the bag.

A fool, a sinner, a log. I tighten my gloves, and stride over. The dehumanizing vernacular holds no appeal to me, but I’ve heard Marco and Mickey exchange any number of terms, snatched from rumor and history with equal disregard. Anything to slip by the acknowledgement that what here lies once ate, breathed, and likely spoke. I’ve no use for that kind of self-deceit.

I do not meet the glassy eyes, I do not falter upon the discolored lips. I make right for the torso. Steel parts skin from itself. Marco is unhappy, but I am haltingly glad for his presence. He is now a vise, a source of ease. A body can be held just as needed with an extra pair of hands. It’s not for me to consider the reason for which I now extract deformed bullets from a lung. I don’t need to contemplate how the lead found a cause to rend flesh. The flowering way a pink organ has become torn is the most I appreciate of my task. Foreign material extracted, my real work begins. Marco has taken to groaning occasionally, but he shows a degree of resolve I am forced to acknowledge. I may deputize him yet.

I examine the area below the ribs first, feeling around the cavity with my hands, counting in murmurs. The grisly squishing and squelching falls on deaf ears for my part. Marco looks like he might puke, but I trust that he is smart enough to find the time and wisdom to put any bodily fluid he does end up producing somewhere that will not trouble me. I sigh and withdraw my hands.

“Not there, anyway. Looks like I’ll need the saw.”

I huff and fetch the tool from the cloth, and return to the body, ignoring my assistant’s cursing protestations as I begin to reengage with a modicum of strength. I’ve never taken to carpentry, and so can only wonder how bone compares to pine or oak. I hear the former is soft, and the latter is tough. I trust this to be true.

When finished, I lay the extracted bone aside, and reach into my new point of access. I find what I’m looking for almost immediately, and laugh. I pull one hand free to fetch another tool to cut with, and work with some renewed gusto. Marco’s voice nearly does not reach my ears.

“I thought you said this wasn’t fun for you!”

//////

We slide the sewn up body into a cabinet, and both unceremoniously drop onto stools, Marco nearly falling over. We have both discarded our gloves, mine significantly messier than his. I don’t mind that. He worked hard, for his part.

No words are exchanged for a while, and when I find the time between filling out a chart and filing it away, I offer him a can of beer from the fridge. I don’t tend to drink the stuff myself, but Ratty and Mickey will occasionally grab one when passing through. Marco seems unsure as to whether he feels well enough to drink, then decides, perhaps because of general exhaustion or some latent urge to seem amicable, to accept. It hisses as it cracks open.

I consider taking off my apron, but elect to leave it, in case Ratty brings another. Maybe I’ll even meet Nick for once.

“How do you do it, Lamia? Day in, day out, just, bodies.”

I glance at Marco, watch his throat pulse with blood and booze. His stubble is lazily trimmed, his face is sun-tanned. I suspect he is up past his usual bed time, but the weight in the bags under his eyes suggests he’s used to late nights. His inquest merits an answer, anyway.

“You’d be surprised what you can get used to, Polo.”

He doesn’t need an honest answer; he just needs sound beyond the swill of liquid past his lips. I grab a bucket and sponge from under the sink and collect a little soap and some water. If Marco notices, he doesn’t show it. I hear him crack open a cigarette case and scowl, slapping the wet sponge down on the table.

“If you’re going to light up, find somewhere else to do it, Marco. I don’t need another layer of stink in here.”

He doesn’t look at me, but nods and stands away from the wall he has taken to leaning against, stalking steadily out the side door, out into the night. I wonder, as I begin mopping the table with the sponge, if he’s off to sleep alone, or if Julia or any number of his ‘pets’ will be getting a visit tonight. Not that it concerns me, but I know Julia. I know that her interest in Marco should be purely transactional, and I know that it isn’t.

I squeeze bloody water out of the sponge and return to scrubbing. I know less than half of Captain’s people by name, but I’m sure every last one of them knows about the ‘Lamia’ that processes the dead. I have no doubt that rumor has even spread that Captain has had me cut into the living before. Still, Marco visits, and Mickey brings me food. There’s no room for judgement, no time to stone the witch. I tap the ground with the tip of my shoe as I reach for an isolated droplet. Something falls behind me.

I turn, and stare at the scalpel that toppled from the edge of a side table.

I don’t believe in ghosts, despite what Marco thinks. I move steadily over, and hold out my hand over the surface. I feel a light draft, and look up. A drop splashes on my hand, water. The vent over the table rattles. I pick up the scalpel, and inspect it, finding that the handle is wet. I sigh, and pull the table away from the vent, and intentionally place the scalpel in the very center, before grabbing another bucket from under the sink and placing it beneath the vent. A third drip plops loudly into the plastic, and I nod to myself, before returning to my cleaning. I soon regret bothering- the side door swings open, and Ratty comes lumbering through, soaked with rain and dragging another black bag.

//////

I finish cleaning the table and grunt, dropping the sponge into the bucket before carrying both over to the sink and pouring out the contents. As I clean the sink, I glance over my shoulder to where the rewards of my labor lay. In a weighing bowl, a handful of deformed organs lay in alcohol, dark red, purple, and pale yellow. I lean on the edge of the sink, letting the water run, before turning off the tap and wiping my gloves absentmindedly on my apron.

I approach the bowl and consult the scale. I’ve already filled out the chart, but now I consider the mass for myself. Captain should be pleased, the yield is good. Then again, maybe not. That I am able to produce such results is not simply a mark of my efficacy. It also reflects the state of the world. In three years, the number of customers passing through my doors has only increased. Mickey and Ratty have been with us since I can remember, and Marco joined a few years after me. Nick has been on with us twice as long as Marco.

As I understand it, Captain is already seeking another gunner. I won’t be surprised if Marco’s idiocy in hanging around me really does see him pressed into helping me more often, if things continue as they have been.

I consider the bloated, black-flecked liver that lays on the top of the pile. As I stare at it, I can practically hear the clinical voice from the announcements. ‘Prolonged use can produce adverse effects, speak to a licensed physician before making any adjustments to your dosage.’

As if. None of these fools spoke to anyone before they started sticking needles in their veins. Why would they start now? I hear heavy, rhythmic footfalls, and begin peeling off my gloves. Mickey.

He comes through the door like a train, his wraparound sunglasses gleaming in the fluorescent light. He grins at me through his bushy mustache, a dark brown caterpillar that becomes his sideburns, becomes his receding hairline. What hair he does have is long, and competes with mine for smoothness; he may have me beat in truth.

“Lady Serena! How’s your night comin’?”

I smile as warmly as I can without faking, and gesture to the scale that I have stepped to the side of.

“Two customers in one day, Mick. Business is good.”

He arrives almost immediately at my side, and leans over the bowl, nodding to himself as he appraises the product.

“Well now, that is a thing of beauty. Two livers, a lung, and… th’ fuck is that thing when its at home?”

He jabs a finger at a mottled mass of plaque and chitin. I smirk and fold my arms.

“That, is supposed to be a pancreas.”

“Fuckin’ A, really? Looks like a goddamn pinecone.”

His assessment is accurate, if crude. I shrug and start stripping away my apron after noticing the time, more due to Mickey’s entrance than the clock that hangs over the south wall.

“I didn’t ask Ratty when he brought the stiff in, but I pulled seven bullets outta her before I got to work.”

Mickey whistles and takes off his backpack; it’s a bit strange, seeing this man, who looks more like a biker than the college student that should be carrying the school backpack around. I watch him begin loading the organs into insulated containers, taking extra care with the aforementioned pancreas. As I study him, he begins humming to himself, and seems to glance at me from behind his glasses: he starts grinning again and wiggles his eyebrows.

“Something on your mind, fair lady?”

I shrug and gather my things, checking to make sure I stowed everything correctly.

“You talk to Marco lately? He keeps hanging around here. He isn’t dodging work, is he?”

Mickey raises an eyebrow and slings his backpack over his shoulder.

“I haven’t heard from the kid lately, no. Fuck’s he want, bothering you- need me to knock some sense into him?”

He reflexively cracks a knuckle on his left hand, and I shake my head quickly.

“No, I’m just wondering if something’s up. I’m half expecting Julia to come pick a fight with me for distracting him or something.”

I follow Mick out the door into the drizzling rain, and turn up the collar of my coat. Mick navigates the street with some kind of animal instinct, ducking into alleys without a word as to why, once even detouring through a passage in the basement of a building. I can’t tell from his gait, but I know there’s a pistol jammed into his waistband and a shotgun hanging from his armpit under his thick brown coat. The rain glistens on his forehead, stars on a field of smooth pale. After a few minutes of wandering, he replies, coughing before he starts.

“Ah, Marco is… well, you know him. He ain’t quite comfortable in his skin yet. Kid still thinks he’s playing cops and robbers, cowboys and indians. Some folks get into the dirt thinking there’s some kind of nobility and adventure in getting filthy. One day, he’ll wake up, and realize that this is all there is.”

I bite my thumb and glance over my shoulder, watching a vagrant shiver and pull their blanket tight around them. I turn back and make an effort to keep up with Mick’s chaotic path. He speaks again, his tone and volume a little lower.

“Captain told me once, you know…”

Something about the way he has become almost furtive makes me uneasy. I stuff my hands in my pockets and wrap my fingers around the folded pocket knife in my left. Mick clears his throat and continues.

“Told me, ‘Mick, there’s nothing glorious about what we do.’ Said we were just soldiers digging holes in mud. But someone’s gotta dig. If you can find a way to enjoy how a shovel feels in your hand, that’s all well and good, but don’t get confused enough that you start trying to find gold in the hole. Marco’s learning to love the shovel, but I think he’s also trying to figure out if someone’s hiding the gold from him.”

Mickey stops suddenly, glances around, then ducks into a boarded up hotel lobby. I don’t follow him: I don’t belong at a meetup. I hear the distorted echoes of voices from the door, greetings and laughter. I step away, and find a place to take shelter from the rain. Water flows down the street in a river, a swirl of colorless shimmers.

When Mickey returns, his bag is thinned out. I wonder at the price of continually resupplying insulated containers, but then suppose it falls under the costs of operation. Mickey nods at me, and I follow him out into the night.

//////

“Nick’s coming to meet us.”

I nearly choke on a fry. Mickey glances up from his country fried steak, but I cleanse my pallet with a sip of ice water and shake my head.

“Nick. As in, never visits the morgue, Nick? As in, Ratty and Marco’s mysterious third counterpart, Nick? Are you sure he exists? And he’s okay meeting me?”

Mickey shrugs and forks a bite of steak into his mouth, looking at the little jukebox that sits on the edge of our table against the window. His sunglasses decorate his forehead as his hair probably used to. He licks his thumb, then starts fiddling with a knob on the device, flipping through a song directory behind glass.

“Yeah, that Nick. And it’s not that he’s shy or anything, he’s just always too busy. One of the customers Ratty brought you yesterday’s supposed to be one of his. Nick’s good, real good. Better’n Ratty, some days. Used to be a cop, I think.”

I sit back and lay my hands on the table, attempting to digest both my fries and the information he has offered me. I look out into the diner, watching a waitress take a slice of pie out from a glass counter case and set it delicately into a styrofoam box. There’s a fondness in her downcast eyes that ought to be reserved for whoever gave her the necklace swaying from her neck.

“Used to be a cop?”

Mick nods and presses a button. The jukebox flickers, then begins producing tinny music. He bobs his head a bit before returning to his food.

“Yeah, yeah. When shit changed, and they started selling that crap, he was a… uh, vice detective, I think. Maybe whatever comes before detective. Suddenly, job description changed, and he didn’t feel like playing along. So, he finds his way to us, says he’s got what it takes, and Boss man pulls him on. Course, it helps that… Well, you know where the orders come from and why. Makes perfect sense that Nick ends up with us. Hell, he was probably hot on our tail back then.”

Mick pauses and looks at me with his bright blue eyes. He frowns.

“Honestly, I’m surprised you didn’t know that. I’d’ve thought… well, I guess you only really got into the game because shit went sideways.”

I nod. I never made it into a career before I signed on. I pull the hair tie from my wrist and start putting it on in preparation to eat seriously. It’s hard not to pass judgement on a faceless name, especially when I’ve now heard so much about its owner. I still can’t quite imagine a face for the name, but now I’m picturing a police uniform, the badge torn from the breast. As I consider the image, a hand lands on the booth, and a body slides in next to me, offending my sense of personal space. I turn slowly and witness slick blonde hair, a strong jaw, and dark brown eyes. He’s grinning in a way that makes my stomach tight.

“Hey there. Name’s Nick. You must be Serena.”

Ah. He’s a pretty boy. His clean-shaven chin, his crinkled eyes, his rough hands, the way he snatches a fry from my plate without a care in the world. He’s wearing a buttoned gray shirt and navy slacks. A black leather jacket barely hides his armpit holster.

“Serena, yes. I take it we’ve both heard a lot about each other.”

He grins just a little wider, before turning and jutting his chin at Mickey, who seems wholly invested in his side of home fries. I pull my plate closer and pick up my burger. I study Nick carefully as I bite into my sandwich.

“So, Mick, did the drop off go smooth?”

“Does a nice car in the shade collect pigeon shit?”

Nick laughs and nods, before catching a waitress and giving her his order. He’s an intense specimen, flirting, suave, rude, confident. I don’t like him, but I also feel that he’s exactly where he belongs. When he turns back to us, his smile has given way to a shine of seriousness.

“The one I bagged today seemed pretty far gone. How’d she turn out?”

The question, though spoken facing Mickey, seems to be aimed at me. Fine. I turn my burger to get a better angle, and shrug.

“Definitely above average yield. Three products, one all the way to calcified.”

He grunts in approval and sits back, draping his arm across the back of the booth. My skin crawls. I take another bite, and chew slowly, crossing my legs. Mickey sets his fork down and pushes his plate away.

“So, Nick, what has you in the neighborhood? Trouble finding a target?”

“Nah. The kid wanted the next number, and Ratty had already grabbed the one before it. I just got outbid. So, running errands, Captain told me to stay nearby, in case you needed backup. Imagine my surprise when I asked to check in, and you’ve already got backup.”

He looks pointedly at me, and I snort, taking the last bite of my burger and wiping my hands on a napkin. Mickey fields his mistake for me.

“Serena isn’t backup, Nick, she just tags along sometimes.”

Nick affects genuine surprise, and looks at me head on. Something about his dark eyes suggests his incredulity is incomplete.

“You’re kidding. Half the boss’s bodyguards shake in their boots when Marco talks about you. I figured you must kick ass when you’re not down in the basement.”

Mickey says nothing to that, and I feel no inclination to expound on his education. That doesn’t stop him from continuing on.

“Might be rude of me, but I gotta ask then; why do the guys call you… well, what they call you?”

“Lamia?”

He nods. Fine. I’ll play. But Mick steps in before I start to answer.

“Nobody told you? Shit, no wonder you’re sitting there, cool as a cucumber. Nick, Serena isn’t just our post-mortem surgeon.”

Nick glances at Mick, then back at me. He’s starting to get the picture, I think. He doesn’t seem unnerved, however. I’m starting to get a clearer picture of him, too. Mick presses on.

“Doesn’t happen much nowadays, but back before things went screwy, we were a proper power, right? You know that much. Not many people been on long enough to remember, except me and Ratty. Before Captain was in charge, It was a fella named Carlos.”

Mick pauses to spit. I sympathize.

“Carlos was a mean son of a bitch, he’d just as soon bite your ear off as look at you. We would run anything you could name, and if someone shorted us, it didn’t matter how much, Carlos would see to it that they never ran afoul of us again. And if they did, they died, that was it. Now, at the time, Serena here was fresh out of med school. But Carlos needed a cutter after he stabbed the previous guy with his own razor. So he has a bully by the name of uhh…”

“Jimmy. You’re thinking of Jimmy.”

“Yeah, it was Jimmy, wasn’t it. Nasty fucker in his own right.”

The jukebox trips, and settles into a crackly loop as Mick continues.

“Jimmy, he sends to go find someone who knows how to cut a person without killing them. Jimmy finds Serena. Throws her in a van, brings her to Carlos. Carlos, he’s impatient, so he has someone ready for her to cut. And he has her cut. He lines up people for her to cut day in day out for a week. Has Jimmy watch her the whole time, make sure she never goes easy on anyone. Hookers, homeless, whoever. I think there was even the head of another family in there somewhere. All people Carlos has issues with, no matter how small.

“At the end of the week, Carlos comes to check on her. She’s done well, done everything he asked. There’s a problem though; Jimmy’s left her alone. Nowhere to be seen. Carlos is furious. Swears he’s gonna find old James, and put him under the knife next. But nobody can find the fucker.

“What Carlos doesn’t know is, Jimmy tried to have his way with Serena. Tried to distract her from her work. And by the time he worked up the nerve, she’d already gotten used to all the blood and guts, and all the screaming. So when he tried to push her down, she cut into him without a second thought. Trimmed him down to size, practiced everything she knew how to do, and sent him out of the compound bit by bit, piece by piece, right under Carlos’s nose. Me and Ratty knew, even helped her do it, because there was almost nobody Jimmy hadn’t done wrong, pushin’ on em or trying to force himself on their girl. Only Carlos liked Jimmy, maybe because everyone else loathed him. Captain, ‘fore he was called Captain, he caught wind of what Serena did. Made introductions, told her to expect gifts. Two days later, Captain is Captain, and Carlos is a stitched up mess in a box on some poor policeman’s doorstep.”

I slurp my milkshake and stare out the window, watching a sports car on raised suspension roll by. Mickey turns off the jukebox. Nick scoffs.

“Shit. You aren’t joking? She did all that?”

Mickey shrugs and rubs his chin in his calloused hands.

“I don’t know everything, but Captain made promises to a lot of us around that time. He knew us better than Carlos ever did. Knew what we all wanted, knew how to get it. Serena was probably the last one he brought on. And Jimmy was his biggest obstacle before that. So when party A suddenly takes care of party B for you, you find yourself eager to get acquainted.”

“Shit, I guess so.”

Nick is looking at me again, but I’m watching the fog build on the window in the growing heat of morning.

//////

I slide my scalpels into the disinfectant bath and strip away my gloves, just as someone comes barging through the door. I look over my shoulder and see a woman who reminds me of an old woman’s geriatric dog. Her shoulders are obvious, her nose is crooked, her clothes are few. A purse hangs from her shoulder like a chain-strung pendulum.

“Where the fuck is Marco?”

“Hello Julia. Have a seat, won’t you?”

I pull my mask down and pull a stool up alongside the freshly cleaned table, across from another, which after a moment’s hesitation, she takes. Her faux bravado is crumbling already, but she pouts proudly.

“What’d you do with Marky? You kill him, like Jimmy?”

I sigh and shake my head.

“Marco comes and goes all the time, Julia. I don’t ask where, long as he doesn’t make it my problem. He’s not coming home lately?”

She looks me over, then slumps and nods.

“He’s been gone a whole day now.”

I sigh and pinch the bridge of my nose.

“You asked Captain about this?”

“N-no, I don’t… I don’t talk to Captain much. Or, I guess, he don’t talk to me.”

I suppose that makes some sense. Once Captain loses interest in a girl enough to let one of the guys lay claim to her, she might as well not exist to him. I suppose there’s a chance Captain doesn’t even know Julia is still alive. It doesn’t matter to him. I stand and kick the floor.

“Alright. Let’s visit Captain. He’ll want to know. Last I heard, Marco was on the job.”

The way Julia’s eyes go from glaring to shining is enough to make someone go all warm and fuzzy, but I’m too busy putting on my coat to really soak in the feeling. I scribble out a note, and am about to press it to the scale bowl, when its intended recipient pushes through the door.

“Lady Serena! How goes- Oh, Lady Julia, what brings you… here?”

Mick pulls his sunglasses off. Julia trots over and gives him a big hug, before looking up at his face with big wet eyes.

“Marco is missing, Mick! He ain’t come home in a day!”

“Shit, that ain’t right…”

He comes over and unzips his bag, somberly loading his cargo and glancing at me.

“I haven’t seen him since yesterday, I suppose you h’ain’t either?”

“Nope. Definitely weird. First time he’s left me alone in days.”

“Shiiit. Alright. Time to talk to boss man.”

And so we head up the stairs, me followed by Mick, Mick clung to by Julia.

//////

Mickey opens the door, and I head in, my chin held high. The main room is a cage of wealth; thick persian carpets, authentic wood furniture, guns and knives all over the walls. A fireplace crackles in the center of the far wall. Facing it, sitting in a large walnut armchair, is Captain.

Maybe the name comes from some rank he’s held in his life, or maybe it comes from his attire. He wears a thick wool sweater and tight jeans, and has a revolver strapped to his hip. When he turns to look, I can almost see my face reflected in a foggy grey eye. His salt and pepper hair seems just right to go with the knife scar along his cheek and through his eyelid.

“Serena. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

I shove my hands in my pockets and look past him to the bookshelf, idly reading a few titles and authors before meeting his calm, smiling face again.

“Marco’s been gone awhile. None of us has seen him in a day.”

Captain looks past me in turn, and lays eyes on Julia, surmising just how unusual my statement is. He refocuses.

“Marco wouldn’t have turned tail and run. He knows better. You know where he went?”

“Nick-”

As I say the name, its owner pushes through the door behind us, and grins in a controlled surprise. He shrugs and gestures that I should go on.

“Nick said Marco took a job, and he hasn’t brought me anything since then. So.”

Captain turns his eye on Nick, who shrugs.

“Marco, huh? He pulled the number before me, and hit the road. Haven’t seen hide nor hair since.”

Captain breathes in and out a few times, then stands and faces us, his hands clasped behind his back. I study the ice in a glass of what I suspect is scotch, sitting on a table beside the chair.

“Okay. Nick, take Serena, go after him, see if he needs help bringing in his number. Mick, finish your dropoff, then take Julia home. If he doesn’t turn up in the next four hours, I want the three of you back here. I’ll have Ratty go check the canal.”

He waves his hand, and we are dismissed. We have left the room before he has finished sitting back down.

//////

Nick turns the car into the lot and looks up through the windshield just after he finished pulling into a space.

“Geez, what a shithole. Think I came here back when I was on the force.”

I follow his eyes and look at the apartment building, squeezing the knife in my pocket. All the concrete and rust creates a pretty clear image of the income bracket for each of the occupants. Just ahead, a pair of young men smoke and talk loudly, laughing at intervals. We get out of the car. We get onto the sidewalk, and I look about. I recognize an old beat-up sedan with a spoiler, and point it out. Nick clicks his tongue and nods.

“Well, he made it here.”

He straightens his coat and walks confidently towards a side exit, and studies the electronic lock for a moment, before waving me over. I arrive beside him, and study a small scar on his chin, before watching him kick the plastic box clean off the wall and tugging the door open. He grins and waves me in.

“I’ve definitely been here before.”

I blink at his words, and enter the stale air. Tile floors, dingy lightbulbs, thick metal doors. I watch a roach scuttle into a gap between the wall and the floor, leaving a smear of an unidentifiable grime under it. Nick joins at my side, uses a finger to collect dust from the wall, and starts for the stairwell. I follow.

We go up six stories, and neither of us is particularly winded, but we pause at the landing all the same, collecting ourselves for whatever comes next. Nick draws his gun, checks the magazine and chamber, then racks a round.

“Alright, come on.”

We enter the hall, and creep deeper into the moldering inferno. A door with ‘605’ etched into the tiny knocker awaits us. Nick ushers me behind him, and gets ready to kick the door, before stopping, and nudging it open with his foot.

“Huh.”

He pushes in, and I follow.

The apartment is dense, stacked with newspapers, boxes, bins, and strangely, small iron lockboxes. There is a terrible smell coming from something nearby. I face a coffee table covered in loose pages, with five of the metal boxes on it. I pick one up and shake it next to my ear. Something moves in the box, continues moving when I hold it still. Something alive.

“Oh. fuck.”

I set the box down and look at Nick, who grimaces.

“Very far gone, then. Fuck, Marco.”

We reunite, and move deeper still, navigating the hoard of keepsakes. The smell gets worse. We hang a left, and arrive at a door, which Nick pushes open, his gun ready. I watch it swing.

A dining room adjacent to a kitchen that festers with maggots. Flies and larva create a horrid scene of writhing, swarming, squirming. At the far end, a figure sits, hunched over a table, over a plate of something that moves and jerks. Nick approaches, I follow.

A man, dark grey of skin and white of hair. His eyes are yellowed, and his teeth are black. He allows Nick to come right up next to him and press his gun to his temple. He begins to say something in a voice like a drowned gurgle, but the gun fires, and silences him. Nick holsters the pistol, and I come closer. I stare at the body, seeing for the first time something that Marco has described before. The ashy skin becomes pristine pale pink, the white hair darkens and becomes sandy blonde, and the teeth regain their whiteness. He looks perfectly preserved, as if he is sleeping. I look over at his meal. A human hand, still dark grey, wriggles and clenches madly, held in place by a long nail, probably ejected by the nailgun lying next to the corpse’s feet. The man still has both his hands. Nick sighs and looks around, clamping a handkerchief over his nose and mouth.

“Fucking Necro. Clearly a self-mutilator. Looks like we’ll need the hazmat squad, too. I’ll make the call, see if you can find Marco nearby?”

I nod and retreat from the rancid room, returning to the stifling apartment. I ignore the gently rattling iron boxes, and push through the only other door I can find in the apartment. A bedroom swamped in personal belongings. Broken picture frames, scattered chess pieces, a fallen stack of opened envelopes. The refuse of a life. There is another door. I nudge it open and peek through the door. A bathroom. I stare at a bathtub whose basin is stained the color of rust. A hairdryer lingers in the ruddy brown, still plugged into the scorched wall socket. A straight razor sits precariously on the edge. I sigh and close the door.

A closet, mostly undisturbed, full of coats and sweaters, with a dresser filled with clothes. No Marco.

I return to the door to the kitchen, and find that Nick has retreated to the living room, and is just closing his phone. He looks at me, my solitary state, and furrows his brow.

“Kid’s not here?”

“No sign.”

He looks over to a window smeared with newspaper pages. I find myself watching a little bronze chest turn in a circle that might take an hour to complete. Nick huffs.

“Okay, well, Marco never made it here, clearly. Want to canvas the neighbors? Ask if any of them heard anything yesterday?”

I shrug and pointedly look to a clock on the wall. Nick takes my meaning immediately.

“Fair enough. Shouldn’t keep the old man waiting.”

We wade through the filth and exit the apartment, distant sirens beginning to announce the approach of a hazmat team. Nick curses and heads back in, then comes out, carrying a black bag over his shoulder. I watch him slam the door shut behind him, see the little knocker bump against the ‘605’ plaque. Something clicks in my head, I remember seeing Marco hold a little leaflet of paper, turning it in his fingers.

“Oh. Fuck.”

I begin to run for the stairwell. Nick calls out behind me, but I cannot wait. I slam through the door, jog down the steps. I hear the door slam and reopen behind me, even as I shove my way into the floor below. The sirens are growing closer.

I thump down the hall and finally stop at a door, heaving breath. I stare at the little knocker.

“509. Marco, you and your lazy chicken scratch.”

I press my ear to the door and still my breath. Silence. I push gently, and the door swings- the frame is damaged, someone has broken in before me. The same layout as above, infinitely more tidy. I creep in, taking my knife out and unfolding the blade. I hear something. Muffled voices. I glance. The sound doesn’t come from the kitchen. I turn, and approach the bedroom door, and listen intently. Repeated shuffling, grunting, heavy breathing. Something squelching. I bite my lip, and slowly turn the knob, and open the door to look. I cannot believe what I see.

Marco. He’s there. He’s tied to the bed, and he’s buck naked, a rope in his mouth, restraining his voice as he struggles to bring his hands closer to him. I hear another sound, from the bathroom. Water, a faucet running. Humming. I flinch as a figure in a bathrobe emerges from the side door, a heavy set man holding a riding crop.

“Now now my little chick, how long before you remember not to struggle? Daddy doesn’t like it when you struggle.”

Marco sobs, and writhes even more, kicking his feet, which I now see are also restrained, tied to the bedposts. There is a lot of dried blood on the left side of his face. The other man comes to the foot of the bed and drops his robe.

“God delivered you to me, little chicky. But God will understand if I have to cut out your tongue so you don’t upset the neighbors, yes.”

Marco is screaming into the gag. I’ve had about enough of this scene. The man shuffles onto the bed, nearly losing his balance. His hands, thick with cholesterol and swollen knuckles, clutch Marco’s feet. I’m coming closer. Marco doesn’t seem to see me past his distress. I can smell the man, an unpleasant cocktail of cologne and pheromones, sweaty and excited. I gaze over his shoulder at the scene he has created, before staring at the nape of his neck.

I take his shoulder, feel him go stiff, and watch his head turn as I plunge the knife firmly into his back. I feel a sort of tension leaving me as I drag it through his skin, watch it parting his flesh. I’m… warm. His blood spatters me with an intensity much unlike that of a corpse’s. I tighten my grip on his shoulder as he flails, trying to turn to face me, unable due to his awkward position on the bed. Marco is silent, watches me eviscerate his captor. The knife, my artificial influence, only continues, ruining muscles, snapping tendons. I withdraw from the horizontal streak I have made, then plunge in again, this time lower. I can remember where all the tendons hide, all the key muscles reside. The man is becoming limp, helpless. His ejected blood does not help. I pull the knife forward and put my arms around him to drag it through his belly. His intestines come spilling out, and he falls back against my chest. I am suddenly repulsed, not simply by his touch, but by my act, and so I step back and allow him to tumble to the floor, dragging his guts with him.

Marco stares at me. I falter, then set to cutting through his restraints, starting with his hands. I’m breathing quite heavily. He can address his feet himself. But he starts with his mouth. It’s times like these that really make me question his intellect.

“Serena?”

“Yes, Marco?”

I wipe my knife on the side of the bed. I’ll need to disinfect it, and my hands. I head for the bathroom, aware that Marco is finally working on freeing his feet to follow.

“Serena, I-”

“There’s no need to talk about what just happened. I won’t tell Julia what I saw.”

He is quiet. I rinse my hands, and examine my coat. I’ll need to make him pay for a new one.

“Ah… Uh, then… Thanks, I guess.”

He wanders off, hopefully to find his clothes. I meet my own eyes in the mirror. My pupils are wide, my cheek is flecked. This is the clearest I’ve seen my face reflected in a while. I lean forward and tilt my head to one side, watching my nostrils flare and shrink, my lashes flutter. I don’t recognize her, this creature with such a violent gaze, these proud cheeks. A stranger that I have passed on the street, perhaps. Maybe I’ve seen her studying me through the mirror while I apply my lipstick. I back away from her, and return to the bedroom.

It’s still lying there, the cadaver that I created. Blood is sinking into the carpet. Marco stands at the door, buttoning his jeans. I push past him and into a living space that is extraordinarily lavish, considering the state of the building. I hadn’t noticed on my way in, but there are oil paintings leaning against the walls, and a handful of sculptures in corners. It feels less like a gilded suite and more a storeroom for contraband. A latex suit with a ball gag is being worn by a marble statue. Marco comes up behind me, and I look him over, before leading the way out into the hall.

“That guy’s gonna turn, isn’t he?”

“Almost certainly.”

“I saw him using.”

I shrug. It’s not unheard of for eccentrics to abuse drugs, and to seek rehabilitation. In another time, there were treatment centers for such things. Nowadays, there’s a miracle drug. I shove open the door to the stairs, and let Marco pass through, throwing one final glance back to the door. I reason, with no small amount of certainty, that Ratty will be the next to enter that room.

I tuck my knife into my pocket, and pull a small cellphone from another. The silvery thing is pristine, nearly unused. I pop it open, and type into the keypad. It rings twice as I descend into the stairwell, and follow Marco to the lobby.

“Did you find him?”

“I did.”

“Good. I’ll let the others know. Thank you Serena.”

The line clicks, and I break the phone in half before tossing one piece over my shoulder. We go out the way Nick and I came. The sirens are all around us now, and I see a group of men in yellow rubber suits gathered around a box truck, bristling with high tech equipment. I toss the second half of the phone into a dumpster buzzing with flies before leading Marco over to Nick’s car. The latter is chewing gum and watching the Hazmat team prepare to enter the complex. He notices us, and claps Marco on the shoulder before looking at me. That he doesn’t ask Marco his side of the story does not surprise me.

“Found him in another apartment. Little old lady had him tied up in her living room, punched his clock with a five-iron when he entered. I’ll send Ratty to clean up.”

Nick laughs and shoves Marco teasingly. Marco just stares at me. I have a bad feeling I’ll be seeing even more of him for a while. Or, if I’m lucky, a whole lot less. Marco takes out his cigarette case and cracks it open. I hold out a hand, and after a moment’s consideration, he puts one in my hand before pulling his own. I place the end in my mouth, and wait for him to light it.

///////

My hands are deep in another body when Marco comes through the side door, lugging a black bag. The third one today. I gesture with my chin, and he lays it out on a shiny new table, courtesy of Captain. He wipes his forehead, and comes over, watching me work for a moment.

“I’ve been thinking.”

“That’s new.”

I let him wonder whether I am replying sarcastically to him or remarking on the grey, lumpy liver I am pulling from the corpse. He doesn’t seem particularly bothered.

“Serena, I-”

I lay the liver on a tray and look at him directly, daring him to speak the words on his tongue. He seems to choke on them. Away he looks, and back to work I go. Chart, body into cabinet, cleaning. I look up, and he’s still here. He’s helping, cleaning and organizing my tools for the next customer. Fine.

“What did you want?”

I strip off my gloves and press my knuckles to the table, indicating that I’m ready to hear him out. He sets down the tweezers he’s holding and leans back, biting his lip.

“I’ve… been thinking I should leave Julia.”

“And you want me to… what, deliver the message?”

“No, no, I just…”

I grit my teeth and wait for him to say what I know he will. The pause is nigh-unbearable.

“I’m worried, because what I do, what we do, it’s dangerous. And I’d rather she hated me than cried because I died.”

I feel my eyebrow twitch.

“Is that all?”

“Well, n-no, I also… um…”

“Marco. If change is really what you need right now, I’d start with your cigarettes. Once you’ve given those some thought, we can pick this conversation up again.”

“I didn’t say-”

“No, you didn’t.”

He blinks and taps his foot uncomfortably. He looks away. I hold steady, until he looks back. When I see the fire in his eye, I know I haven’t gotten through. It’s at that moment, seeing his stubbornness, his indignation, that I know beyond a shadow of a doubt, Marco will cross my table one day. His future becomes a single line, one I can almost see flowing out from his belly and leading him into the night. As he pushes out the door, pulling a cigarette from his case, I suppose I can see him at the center of a car wreck, broken over his steering wheel, beginning to turn gray. Then I see him laid out before me, his intestine in my hands, his lips chapped, his eyes yellowed. Then, I see a cabinet, a steel handle, and a nametag.

I drag the new bag up onto the table.

Ruminations – 01/02/2026

Hello!

It’s been a while. A lot has happened. The holidays have come and gone, and it’s 2026 now.

I’ve been very busy, just not with the things I might’ve hoped. But I’ve been making time when I can to keep up reading and writing. I think its too easy for those to fall by the wayside today. Videogames, movies, tv, work, school, manga, people. All things that can draw you in and waste your time if you don’t plan for them. But making time for one thing means decreasing time that is free for everything else. Like sleep. I sleep for about 6 hours a night, from 6PM to 12AM. I don’t recommend it, but there is something nice about how empty the world is at those dark hours in my morning.

I don’t think of myself as a lonely person, considering how much I like to be by myself, but I also don’t think that should be standard. The modern world was built by people working together. Well, some of it was built by people exploiting other people, too.

I read Albert Camus’s The Stranger Recently. I really liked the second half. It made me feel things and think things, which I always like from a book. I like feeling things more than thinking, sometimes. I recommend the book, but only if you’re sure you can handle a little sadness by the time its done.

I’ve started reading Brave New World in the meantime. I’m not very far in, but I’m very eager to learn more about the setting it takes place in. After I finish that, I plan to read Demons by Fyodor Dostoevsky. When I told some of my friends from college about the books I chose, they expressed some concern for my mental health. One said “I see you’ve chosen the path of Depression.”

I don’t know about that. I certainly tend to shy away from giving my characters completely sad endings. I don’t think I wish myself unhappiness. I think maybe I just like seeing into the darkness to appreciate living in the light. Of course, Some days I think we all live in a very very dark forest.

Since my last upload, I’ve had another short story I’ve been meaning to upload for a very long time, but I keep second guessing it, and trying to get a second set of eyes on it to see if its any good. It’s been waiting for so long though, so maybe I’ll just upload it anyway.

I’ve been contemplating my writing style. Can villains be protagonists? Sometimes a guy says he has plans for the world, and a lot of people will suffer if he pulls it off, but I can’t help but wonder, “What if he got what he wanted? Could he do it?” and next thing you know, I’ve got ideas for the next thing I want to write. I don’t think I care much for the traditional plot line. I know the Hero’s journey is tried and true, but most of the books I really like don’t make sense in that context. Besides, could you imagine trying to retell history like that?

I think I’m not totally alone.

11: Bursting at the Seams

A sleep without dreams. A nothing experienced by a nobody, for an indefinite period of never. Distant suggestions of things occurring in a world outside the world of the self, like the noise of a party happening two doors down.

I wake. Barely. I am frankly under so much anesthesia that I may qualify as a narcotic myself. I try to look around, but my head is held in place. I grunt, or at least make a raspy noise. My eyes aren’t really open.

“Take it easy. Just… Slow.”

I manage to get an eye open. Oh, hello. Perfect face, staring at me, with so much concern. I’m alive, you’re alive, what does it matter? Life is perfect. And you’re here, with me.

“Boy, they really did give you everything. Don’t talk so much, you’ll tear your stitches.”

Talk? You mean think. Can you hear me thinking, pretty boy?

“No, Candy, you’re talking.”

Okay, now I’m awake. Adrenaline. I hear my heart rate on a monitor. Bad. Very bad. I’m no longer speaking my thoughts, but now I’ve got a lie detector of some sort hooked up to me.

“Candy? Please calm down, you’re in the hospital. You’re okay, you’re not in any danger, but you cracked your skull pretty badly. You lost a lot of blood.”

His voice cracks. I’ve hurt him. This is better than dead, but- hold on, he’s holding my hand. This is fine, actually. A few tears are okay, just keep holding my hand.

“They said you might not wake up.”

Okay, that’s pretty serious, actually. Frankly, not falling into the street and getting run over was a bit of a miracle.

Add it to the list. Just keep you-know-who at the top of that miracle list for me.

Eventually he controls his stormy, marvelous brooding face.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t be so fragile. It’s just. You dropped, right in front of me. It was terrifying.”

“I’m sorry.”

My voice is a murmur, a whisper with too much force behind not enough movement.

He laughs and shakes his head. I like his hair like this, a little messy.

“How long?”

“Two days. Or, three, by your standards.”

I grin weakly.

“I didn’t miss our date.”

He laughs again. Music, a symphony.

“Your, um, your friend is here. I think he’s judging me a little.”

Raphael? But the voice I hear next is gruff and grumbling, almost dulling my pain further with its vibration.

“I see what you like about him.”

“Igor. Where’s. Ralph?”

“He’s sleeping in a chair on your other side. He approves of Octavian too. Might be a little jealous, when he’s not sobbing over you like a lost kitten.”

Octavian’s embarrassment is a painting, a masterpiece no living artist can hope to render. I close my eyes and sigh softly. I hear Igor lean forward in his chair.

“Candy. The doctors say you have a condition.”

No. They’re lying, don’t listen to them.

“They said you likely have some kind of psychological disorder, based on the strain on your heart.”

I hear my heartbeat increase its pace on the monitor. I’d like to faint again, thanks. But I stay conscious. He is still holding my hand.

“Candy. How long have you been living with this?”

Eyes closed again. Tears are coming. What can I do? Soon enough, they’ll send in some clever, dangerous man with a clipboard and a checklist, and it will all be over. I really thought I could get away with it all, but… I can make my peace with this, I suppose.

Igor stands, approaches me. I can’t look at him. I can’t look anywhere but up, praying to whatever chaotic thing has pushed so many freak circumstances onto me lately. I wish that the crack to my head magically erased my condition, that my life will somehow return to where it was before any of this, I wish… For none of that. Because as terrified as I am, as grim as my prospects are, I did win. He’s alive, and he’s here.

Raphael does wake, and has some choice words for me, first about nearly dying, then about ‘hiding’ Octavian. In the end, he hugs me tightly, and presses his cheek to my forehead with a gentleness I always suspected he was capable of.

And then, I am alone with him. The beeping picks up a little. Even with whatever depressants they have given me, I am jittery. I’ve slept for three days, don’t forget.

“Candy.”

I blink, and stare into his eyes, willing myself to become lost in that emerald sea.

“Do you know why you fainted?”

Talking without straining my stitches is difficult, and comes as a pathetic mumbling. But if I am to have my story told, I will have it come from my own lips.

“I do.”

“Can you tell me?”

I meet his eyes, and with a terrible strain, I release the gate, the fence. I feel all the recognizable emotion drain from my features, and with them, the weight from all my fighting seems to go. I am rooted in place, but I am free. I imagine my eyes are something to see now, lifeless and limitless, whirlpools that have only one victim to claim.

Being like this, in front of him, is almost relaxing. Tamed indeed. Then, the words start.

“I’m obsessed with you. When you look at me, I feel like I could burst, like I’m going to just fall apart and die on the spot. When I stayed the night in your apartment, I fainted then, too, because I was so nervous. You’re the only person I’ve ever felt so strongly about, and I know you think it’s fast, it’s too fast to feel like this, but for me it’s been years. I’ve been trying to pace myself, because I knew something like this might happen, and then you’d know, but, I had to. I had to. Even though it really felt like my heart would burst at the end. There’s something wrong with me, and I’m sorry, I tried to hide it, to keep you safe. But I hurt you anyway. Please forgive me.”

Tears stream down my cheeks. The mask is gone, but I’m crying all the same.

“Octavian, please, please forgive me…”

That’s all there is. With everything out, I lose my grip, and descend into nothing, my relief resulting in my guard falling, and my mind drifting.

“It’s okay. Just sleep.”

It’s not okay, but I will.

The border between sleeping and waking. Voices.

“I think she was still pretty disoriented. She said some strange things, but…”

“She took quite a blow, Mr. Rumarrk. It’s completely normal for people with head injuries to act unusual. She may continue having periods of disorientation, possibly for the rest of her life.”

“I… I understand.”

“Now, based on what you’ve told me, I do have a theory, but I’ll leave it as just that until she undergoes a psychological evaluation, if she chooses.”

“You mean it’s not required?”

“We will run some tests to check her coordination and memory, but it’s ultimately the patient’s choice. I understand that she has been living with this condition for some time. Some patients don’t want the labels that come with diagnosis; social stigma and prejudice can mean difficulty finding work.”

“… You said you had a theory?”

“Yes. Based on the physical strain on the heart, and the episodes you described, I believe it is safe to say she has some form of anxiety disorder, a particularly intense one at that. Given other factors, I believe it may be… More complicated.”

Fading again. The voice becomes a chasm under me, and I descend into tones without meaning or sympathy.

Pain. Dulled, throbbing, but pain all the same. I open my eyes. I feel a bandage wrapped around my head. It partially covers my left eyebrow. My throat is dry. I lick my lips and look to my right. A set of blinds in front of a glass wall and door. An IV line into my forearm. I look left. Octavian, sleeping in a chair. A window, a tree branch.

I look down at myself. Hospital gown, blankets, heart rate monitor.

My name is Candy Morgana. I am a photographer, a private investigator, and a stalker. I live my life at night, when there are less eyes to see me. My mother’s name was Persephone Morgana. My father- actually, those memories don’t need to be intact.

A man in a white coat, holding a clipboard enters the room, shutting the door behind him. He smiles at me. I do not smile back. My face is stiff, and I’m sure my mask is still missing. Something about his practiced smile makes me feel I am looking into a flawed mirror.

“Miss Morgana. It’s good to see you awake. How are you feeling?”

I test my tongue and jaw. Moving, functional.

“A little pain. My throat is dry.”

He nods and scribbles something down.

“I’ll have one of the nurses bring you some water. How is the pain, On a scale of one to ten?”

I think. The man sees me pause, and checks the sheet under the top page.

“About two.”

He purses his lips and writes down my answer. I feel like he doesn’t believe me. The pain is bad, but I don’t want to be any less lucid. He looks up and gives a smile, much less practiced than mine.

“Alright, we’ll leave your anesthetic at this level. Now, what’s the last thing you remember?”

I look over at Octavian.

“I was talking to him. Both before, and after. I collapsed, hit my head.”

The heart rate monitor picks up its pace a little, so I look away. The man seems to set his jaw. I smell a difficult question coming.

“Perhaps now is a good time to ask. Miss Morgana, do you have a history of heart trouble?”

I look at him through one eye, my face pointed away enough that my other eye is obscured.

“Not documented, no.”

“Would you be willing to answer a few questions?”

Here it comes. I nod once, wince in pain, and lay my head back. I’ve already come this far.

“How often would you say you experience a high level of stress?”

“Almost daily.”

“Are you anxious in most social situations?”

“Most, yes.”

“Do you spend a lot of time worrying what others think of you?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have a family history of mental illness?”

“… Yes.”

This continues. Probing, poking, picking apart. I wait for the other shoe to drop, for him to ask one of the big ones. ‘Do you have violent urges?’ ‘Do you have trouble telling the difference between fiction and reality?’ ‘Do you frequently idealize situations others would find disturbing?’

But it never gets much worse than asking about things that have happened to me:

“Prior to this incident, have you ever been in a life or death situation, involving another person?”

“Yes.”

More than once.

He nods to himself, and finishes scribbling on his little sheet. He seems to add up some scores.

“Miss Morgana, it is my opinion that you may have a trauma-related anxiety disorder. Calling it a disorder is frankly a misnomer. I see from your history that a few years ago you were the victim of a stabbing. I see also that you declined to attend therapy, counseling, or rehab. It is very likely that that incident left a mark on you, not just physically, but psychologically.”

Oh? Oh?

“Now, I can avoid giving you a full diagnosis, but with one, I can prescribe you some medication that may help. You could take it home in addition to the painkillers.”

I purse my lips and look down.

“Are there other options? I don’t want… To lose myself.”

He looks grim. I cannot blame him. Medication means side effects. Neurological medication means neurological side effects. The thought of losing my grip. He approaches the bed, and sets down his clipboard.

“Miss Morgana. This condition will continue to affect your life. Any situation that makes a typical person nervous could pose a significant threat to you, just by your body’s reaction to it. Your blood pressure, your heart rate: these are factors in the span of your life.”

I look away. He sighs, and pulls a small pamphlet from one of his pockets, and lays it on the bed.

“Please, just consider your options. Your employer’s health insurance will cover the prescription. You just need to take it.”

He checks my IV line, takes a few more notes on his clipboard, and leaves me.

I watch Octavian sleep, watch his nostrils flare, his chest rise and fall. I glare at the pamphlet.

It ends up in my hands, and I end up reading. Side effects. Intended effects. I glance at him. His lips.

Oh no…

\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

I hold a white paper bag in my lap, and stare lazily. The wheelchair squeaks as Octavian pushes me through the doorway.

“I’m sorry. I really should just walk, this is silly.”

He shakes his head behind me. My head itches.

“Your balance could be impaired.”

I grumble and fidget with the bag, listening to the pair of pill bottles click and rattle.

“Why are you okay with this?”

“How couldn’t I be? You’re alive, I’m alive. Sorry, I think I’m quoting you a little.”

I flush and squirm in the chair. Bastard.

“No, I mean, I’m imposing on you. Again.”

“You mean staying over? The doctors said you had to have someone with you at all times for the next few days, to help change your bandages and make sure you don’t fall.”

I shift my weight and groan, biting my lip. Jerk. Perfect, obliging, asshole.

“But this, I… You have work, and-”

“And the bank is closed for a week while they fix the cameras. I’ve nowhere else to be.”

I stomp my foot to the floor, halting us. I stare back at him, vengeful, hot in the face, grasping for anything.

“I know why it’s logically okay, I even know why I’m alright with it, but you! Why are you not nervous about moving too quickly! Shouldn’t you be all doubtful and nervous, and uneasy?!”

I’ve made a scene. Nurses and prospective patients stare at us. I don’t care. He kneels down and looks into my eyes, searching for something. I flush with heat, but hold his gaze. He sighs, and stands, gentle but firmly reasserting control over the chair. I look down into my lap. His voice is quiet, deep, and bittersweet.

“When I was… Eight years old. I had a friend. We joked about everything, went everywhere together, we were inseparable. My parents always teased me, asking me if we were going to get married, too. I didn’t think of her like that, of course. We were best friends. We would go digging in the dirt, and compare the rocks we found. One day, I can’t remember why, but I was in a bad mood; I think my brother had taken the book I was reading. And when she came over and asked to go play, I didn’t even come to the door, I made my mom go and tell her I wasn’t coming.”

He laughs, but it sounds hoarse. I look back. There are tears on his cheeks.

“The next day, I felt much better, I wanted to go and apologize, and play together again. My mom stopped me as I was running out the door, and sat me down. She kept telling me to wait, stay inside and read. I didn’t want to, I had to go and apologize! Finally, she got frustrated and blurted it out: My friend had been hit by a car on the way home.”

I blink, and shift. He wipes his eyes with one hand, careful not to jostle me.

“I blamed myself for a long time, a long, long time. I probably still do. But I tell myself now, I have to make the most of every day. I have to say yes, to seize opportunities when they come knocking. It’s what-”

His voice cracks, and he whispers the rest.

“It’s how she would’ve wanted it.”

We roll out the door in silence from there.

|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||

There is only so much medicine can do to ease the thumping of my heart, seeing him stand in the doorway to my apartment. He promises to wait while I grab clothes and my laptop. All the incriminating clutter is in my room, out of view through the hall, but still frighteningly near. I grab t-shirts, sweatpants, and, at the behest of some impudent urge, a pair of dresses.

I grab everything with his face, or some trace of visible connection to him, and bury it in a locking chest in my closet, a product of paranoia now paying off. I have to stand on the bed to reach the photographs on the ceiling.

“Candy? Everything okay?”

I stuff these behind the chest, and grab my bag and laptop, and return to the hall.

“Sorry. I had left a few things out, thinking I’d be back.”

I return to him, stand before him, and allow him to escort me back down to the street. My head itches.

His apartment. A drawer. My drawer. Dizzy. I lean on the dresser and take a deep breath. My heart, and my fear may be under a buffer, but my giddiness remains unchecked. As best as I can tell, the medication does not alter my mind, but stabilizes the physical symptoms caused by it. Thus, packing my clothes into the drawer leaves me foggy and bright, but no worse for wear.

In terms of side effects, the most noticeable is my sense of time, and a general drowsiness: In combination with my painkillers, it leaves me prone to random naps and staring into space, more often at him than anywhere else.

A day passes in a strange haze, and as the primary anesthesia wears off, my experience becomes a dull throb of pain and a sweet sense of gentle euphoria. At some point, I sit down at the table across from him, and stare, unabashed at him. He has to snap me out of my trance to eat.

I am much more lucid on the second day. It is because of this that I notice him changing my bandages in front of the mirror, as if rousing from a dream. Too late, I realize that I have spoken something aloud, and I cover my mouth, meeting his eyes.

“What did I just say?”

“Oh. Um. I think it was supposed to be ‘thank you’ but it sounded less articulate than that.”

I lower my hands and look into my face, shocked with the serenity I seem to possess. The bandages gone, I look in the mirror at the stitched wound in the shaved patch of skin. At least this scar will be hidden.

I usher him out of the bathroom so I can shower, assuring him that I really am awake.

Rinsed and fresh, I stand in front of the mirror again. I dress, and emerge, and sit near him on the couch.

He looks at me. I look at him. After a moment, he is startled, and hurries to reapply my bandages. I turn on the TV while I wait.

“-was apprehended by police today. Forty-one year-old Stephen Walters was apparently behind the hack that disabled security at a local bank downtown this past Monday. Investigators say that Walters had masterminded a plan that included at least five other people, that centered around carrying out a heist on that bank. Apparently, the plan fell apart when one member backed out, and later tipped off the police. No court date has been set.”

I hear something drop behind me, and turn to look, slowly. Octavian stares at the TV, his jaw agape. He turns and looks at me, and I blink, miming surprise before wincing. Too much effort, maybe. The pain is real.

He hurries over, fresh gauze in hand. Something warm trickles down the side of my face. He wraps my head, and fetches towels to clean my face, all while I am weakened in the baleful light of his concern. Finally, he speaks.

“I guess that answers that question. Who would believe it, though? In this day and age, bank robbers.”

“You think it went out of style?”

“Yeah, along with revolvers and cowboy hats. Every bank robber since then is just born in the wrong century.”

He gives a little smirk, but he’s shaken, just a bit. Better spooked than dead, but I steel myself to reach up and hold his cheek all the same.

“Don’t go drifting away. That’s my gimmick right now.”

Wait. He’s awfully close. And I’m looking right up into his eyes, and cupping his cheek in my palm, and. He’s thinking it, too.

He leans in closer. Chills. Wide eyes. Not his, his eyes are closing. Lips, meeting.

When my head hit concrete, the only real sensation I felt was something like a thunderclap between the ears, followed by a flurry of pains like firecrackers, spreading from the point of impact, before unconsciousness really took hold.

Right now, a similarly shocking feeling is branching out from a new point of impact, spreading into my systems, threading from one side of my head to the other, a webbing of a sort of chemical delight, a shock of bliss.

If every new height before this was a violent spasm of overwhelming disbelief and desperate, raging satisfaction, this is a slow, piercing thrill that works its way down my spine, and steals my senses from me with a sort of wicked kindness.

Only, all my sensibilities remain: I can feel his hand on my shoulder, I can feel the throbbing pain of my head, I can smell his body wash, I am awash in all these sensations, they simply pile on top of the insistent, pervasive warmth.

When I come to, or rather, when I open my eyes again, I have fallen- no. Been lowered- to a lying position, looking up into his face. Both of us are breathing a little heavy, having spent a little too much time without air, without each other, too. I am startlingly vulnerable, any thoughts are nearly mono-syllabic, and my hands have, unbidden, clung to his shirt collar.

Both of us return to our senses at once; he stands away, his hands in front of him in a sort of surrender, I sit up and kneel on the cushion too fast, bringing a dizziness that causes me to clutch the back of the couch.

“I-”

“Um, no-”

Pause.

“No, I mean-

“I didn’t-”

Pause. Laughter, me hugging a pillow, him falling to the floor, tripping against the coffee table. I sit up in alarm, but find that he is still laughing, a hand on his forehead. I lay down, face over the edge so I can watch him gather himself. All over again, I feel that jolt of unrelenting affection and embarrassment, and cover my face with my hands.

He stands, and helps me to sit, and sits beside me, struggling to meet my eyes. I, on the other hand, cannot stop staring at his lips, lips that I have now felt. Before I realize what I’m doing, I lean over, hold his head by the back, and make eye contact. I can tell from his confusion that my mask is gone, but just this once, I let it stay gone.

I steal another little kiss, and another beyond that. I feel like I am discovering the surface of another world, charting the ocean floor, as I learn the way that lips meet and press, give and resist. I must lay more than two dozen small kisses into his lips before I stop to breathe, and recover some of my mental posturing, long enough to mutter-

“I’ve wanted to do that… For so long…”

“Candy?”

I shudder, and fully return, meeting his eyes with such a strong blush, such an embarrassment, that I get a chill from how much hotter my face is than the room.

“Oh! Um! I’m sorry- I-”

I turn away. What just happened?

“Are you okay? You got that look, the one you had when you woke up. Like you were somewhere else.”

“I… I think I was. I’m sorry, I just, I thought about doing that, and then next thing you know, I’m actually doing it, and-”

“Just take a deep breath. Okay? Stay here, with me.”

Yes, of course. Always. I bring my composure back, even as dozens of little, slow moving ecstasies work their way through me, melting like butter upon my tongue.

“Candy?”

I look back, and am nigh lost in a strange intensity of gaze that he levels towards me.

“Yes?”

“I think I love you.”

Then why are you trying to kill me?!

The End

10: The Edge of the Knife

Are you joking? Are you being for real? Is this real, is any of this right?

I’m sorry, I must have misheard. You’re telling me that, in just a week, I got to go on a date with him, and also had to hear the details of his murder before it happens? Isn’t that a little too cruel?

I am chewing on the creased photograph, clutching my head in my hands, and rocking back and forth on my bed. My scar aches viciously. I’m seeing spots in the edges of my vision. I check the clock. Two minutes have passed since I stood up from the desk and curled up here.

Reason has no home in me anymore.

Maybe it’s time for plan B? If I kidnap him, he’s out of harm’s way, right? At least, I have no immediate intentions of killing him, life expectancy surely goes up by a few months at the very least. I jest, I wouldn’t kill him, but his life would essentially be over. Anything’s better than dead though, right?

Who says he’ll die though, right? Maybe he’ll cooperate?

No, that doesn’t add up. I cottoned on to what the leader was really going for. No one would be left as an eyewitness. Octavian would certainly press that panic button. It’s all a set up. The loud plan would start, and everyone would catch stray lead, right up to the manager, after he unlocked everything they couldn’t. I suspect members of the crew are meant to die, too. Something about their leader strikes me as too cunning for the holes in his plan, the neat little holes that don’t seem to jeopardize him whatsoever. My best guess is that he owes someone something absurd, and has settled on this as his way out.

No, Octavian is mine. You can’t have him for your blood money scheme.

I could, of course, slip what I know to law enforcement. But that has its own repercussions, not the least of which being my involvement. Investigation means searches, means the line I have to the surveillance cams gets traced. Even if their plan goes off without a hitch, it comes back on me. I look guilty as hell, tapped into the cams and getting involved with a teller.

All I can see this ending in is blood. Hence, the rocking, chewing, and now sobbing.

Right now, my best option is to do something really horrific. Obviously, if I go slit a crew member throat in his sleep, the plan gets called off, or at least postponed. The group gets discovered incidentally, I possibly get the finger for murder, I go away, Octavian lives.

The thought of what he thinks of me after that, however, stops me dead in the process. I can’t do it. It was one thing when we had never spoken, but now, I’ve come too far to lose him.

I sit up straight.

No, I’ve come far too far to lose him! Perhaps I do kidnap him, and I explain what was going to happen, explain that I found out through my shameful second job, leave out some of my other flaws, and we elope to some country overseas?

Now is not the time for witless fantasy. I need a real, effective solution, preferably one that does not end with him dead or irreversibly changed.

First, I sit down at my desk, and stare at the security footage. I need to cut this tether, this indulgent tie that over-involves me.

I comb through my library of viruses, my digital petting zoo. I need something totally obliterating.

This will do. I select the bug, and package it just right, and send it through my piggyback connection, severing my end as soon as it’s through. The rectangle blinks out, and I breathe a sigh of relief. My options are much better now. But depending on how impatient the ringleader is, the hit may continue even in the disarray the bank will be in once the employees show up and find their security breached.

So, phase 2. I collect the audio, and start snipping sections out and creating a far less complete version of my usual report. I grumble, and send my findings to the client, urging him to stop his partner before she does something she can’t come back from. See? I’m capable of diplomacy before violence!

With any luck, the crew will be stalled without a key member. But perhaps the leader is on the verge of being abducted by some shadowy, criminal group for his debts, and won’t take no for an answer. So, phase 3.

He walks into the Café, and smiles at me before stopping at the counter to buy a coffee and a Danish. And then, an angel alighting upon the earth, he sits opposite me. We both seem to wait for the other to speak, before he takes first turn.

“I was almost afraid you wouldn’t be here.”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

I give a very heartfelt, confused smile. My heart throbs at the moment of vulnerable elation in his eyes. I really have got to control my feelings better.

“Well, after the other night, I thought maybe you’d had too much of me, too quickly.”

How correct and incorrect of you! Too quick and too much, yes, unless your goal was to give me a heart attack from all the stress. But there’s never too much of you in my life for my liking.

“It wasn’t so bad. You did a very kind thing. How could I repay that by running away?”

Easy there. No need to lay it on too thick. The poor boy is already quite pleased. Ugh. Did I get too much sugar in my coffee?

“Well, I mean, if you think so. I just didn’t want you going home in all that. I’d worry.”

“Really, you’re too kind. Honestly, I wanted to apologize for not texting you more after letting you know I made it home. I’ve been… Shockingly busy. Really, work has been murder.”

I actually used another sick day, offering Jim quite a lot of consolation pictures as thanks, things I had saved for a rainy day.

He waves dismissively. I look away, eyeing my watch. Almost time. He takes a sip of his coffee and sits back, sighing.

“Well, enough about the past.”

I lean forward, gently letting my eagerness display. I bat my eyes at him, just once, blink and you’ll miss it.

“Um, yes. The future. I mean-”

Oh my gods. Really, it’s unfair to fluster so easily, only one of us should be a nervous wreck, and I’m the reigning champion. No fair. Now I have to hide my smile with a drink. He gathers himself.

“I was thinking, maybe we could actually plan to get dinner sometime.”

“You mean dinner, or breakfast?”

He flinches, before nodding.

“Whichever you like, morning or evening. You’re free on weekends, right?”

I hesitate. To transgress on Saturday would be tantamount to throwing out the rules altogether.

“My Saturday evening to Sunday evening block is usually unoccupied, yes. I have a weekly get-together with friends during the previous block.”

“That works, perfect! I mean, how do you feel about… Your breakfast, my dinner, Saturday evening?”

“I’d love it. I’ll still see you Thursday, though?”

“Of course.”

I really am pushing it. My heart is swinging against my ribs with no regard for safety. Once already, my vision has been wreathed in spots, but I’ve held on with sheer stubbornness. I will see this through. He checks his watch and winces.

“Oh dear, I’m going to be late.”

“Octavian?”

He looks up. My blush is very, very real, a byproduct of using his name in front of him. But it helps my purpose.

“If you’re going to be late anyway, why don’t you let me walk you to work? It’s not as if I have somewhere to be.”

Time seems to freeze. He stares at me, I do my best to stare back with just the right amount of enthusiasm.

“I suppose it couldn’t hurt.”

Very good. He avoided the voice crack that snuck up his throat nearly perfectly. I stand, gather my things, and, the image of courage, offer him my hand. As he takes it, my mind gives over to a mental shriek of delight that lasts the whole trip. He can probably feel my racing pulse, but his own is making fair competition. That doesn’t help much. This is fine, however.

My head swims, but I endure. My plan must succeed.

Every light in my brain is flashing, every wire is shorting out. My pulse is definitely surpassing his by leaps and bounds.

We make it a couple blocks. The bank is around the corner. I’m running out of time. Fine. One more push. As we round the corner, he turns to me, and gives a very, very nervous, happy nod. Of course, most of the nervousness is actually me.

“This is it. Thank you for walking me this far.”

No turning back now. I turn and face him head on, and oh gods, I’m really doing it. I give him a gentle peck on the cheek.

“Have a good day at-”

I crumple. Lights out, fuse blown. Just as planned. I know him, I know exactly how he will react to someone fainting right in front of him. I’ve laid my trap perfectly. Calling out sick from work, pushing myself to my very real limits, and now, the final piece of the puzzle. A genuine lapse of consciousness from rushing myself without any preparation. Bravo and well done. The only real flaw in this plan is the sickening crack my head makes when it hits the sidewalk.

9: Watching History Unfold in Real Time

Sunday. By which I mean, well, Saturday night. It’s fun, existing on a supposed early version of a day, working through the bugs the developer hasn’t smoothed out: the lack of light, the general tendency towards worse moods, the lower temperatures. Becoming nocturnal is easier for some than for others. It’s important to remember that the sun does appear during such a schedule. My day typically starts at 4 pm, and wraps up around 8 am.

I think about the less common nature of my life as I wake, perhaps spurred by dreams I do not remember. I suspect now, in light of a few things, that the more unusual your life is, the more unusual it will become. Like a feedback loop of strange, uncommon childhoods create warped teenage years, which in turn create ever more unrecognizable adult years. And those adults have children of their own, just to perpetuate the weird.

Had I had a normal upbringing, I wonder if I would’ve even met him. Perhaps if I had, we could’ve been friends, or even lovers, without so much strain and pressure. Or perhaps we would’ve passed each other on the street, and never even looked up to notice who was passing us by.

A simmering sort of melancholy falls over me like a wet blanket, and I get dressed in my neutral colors. In the kitchen, I ransack the fridge, eventually producing a glass of orange juice and a bowl of cereal. I stare vacantly at the orange juice for nearly five minutes before I start eating.

I gather up my equipment and drift out the door, allowing my feet to carry me to the building opposite his. It seems a waste to revisit such predictable lines when so much has happened, and yet, I emerge onto the rooftop, set up a strange picnic of surveillance, and begin my routine.

Acceptance is a peculiar sort of feeling. I watch myself writhing and groaning at every unconscious twitch he makes, and I am almost reassured by my behavior. I am displeased with the undercurrent, however. I can feel a twinge of heightened hunger rolling under the surface, a starving beast generated by the strides and leaps made in personal connection. This, disturbing as it is, seems almost a cause for hope; given my reaction to being apart from him, and the calming effect being simply near to him produces, I might, wishfully, think that the answer to all my troubles is to cultivate a simple, strong connection with him.

Such strategy is obviously impeded by the countless awry behaviors and habits that would constantly need to be suppressed in order to succeed. As I rub my face against the creased photo and roll onto my back, what little coherent thought I possess rather scoffs at the idea of trying to live in the same room as him, constantly turning my back to hide my hollow grin and voracious eyes, ducking behind things to hide the photo in my hand.

Time passes. My mind becomes a slurry of lustful dreams and overwhelming shame. When I come to my senses, the sun is creeping over the horizon, and my stomach demands my efforts. I descend on wings of literal hunger, ducking into a bakery to collect a pastry or three.

Today has been something of a wash. I spent nearly every hour in a full-force display of unrepentant longing. I check my phone. Costello is out and about, as expected. I swing by, and exchange data cards and batteries in the setup. But coming home, I find that I am too weary to bother with it, and instead spend the remaining time watching tutorials for products that aren’t available in my country.

Bed, sleep, again. This day feels like it barely happened.

Monday. A café day. An excuse to dress up. I borrow Raphael’s input again to construct an outfit just a little stronger than last time. Then, it’s time to review the audio recordings.

I plug in my headphones and scoot close to the computer, bringing up my audio software. I load up the files, scrub out large sections with no activity, and press play. First, there are only the sounds of movement. This is typical. At this stage of the game, if I can confirm the nature of what occurs in the room, and its regularity, I can possibly even plant visual surveillance. But for now, I will listen.

Something about being dressed up for the morning and listening patiently for illicit acts makes me a little self conscious, and I flick my Webcam away from my face.

Voices. Two men. Talking about nothing. I check my email. Nothing new. Finally-

“Now that we’re all here-”

“I thought we’d be done with this, after that flood.”

I frown and press my headphones closer to my ears. The tone is awfully tense, I may end up with very little of use if this keeps up, but the recording is terrifically long if that’s the case: a feat in itself. A+ for stamina, but you’re failing in loyalty.

“You still need money, right”

Oh?

“More than ever. I’d better buy James a big gift to make up for all this. But…”

Oh? How thoughtful.

“Then we’re far from done. Now shut up, we’re going over the plan one last time.”

Plan? Now hold on just a moment-

“Craig is wheels, he parks us behind the building. We walk in, no masks, no guns, we’re normal customers. Don’t go all at once, we don’t want to spook anyone. Now, why won’t any customers be there?”

“Early morning, just set up, no one goes to the bank the moment it opens on a fuckin monday.”

“Exactly. Benji, you’ve set up an appointment to start an account, that helps us separate the manager. Clark and Gina, you head right to the teller closest to the door. The guy looks a little tough, but he’s a reasonable guy, he won’t try anything. You show him your pieces, say what?”

“Do as we say, no one gets hurt.”

“Shot. No one gets shot. You gotta emphasize it, makes em more compliant. He tries to put up a fight, tries to push that button under the counter, you dome him, we move on to fast times. We don’t want that, but speed is of the essence. In and out, you understand? Either he cooperates, and moves us along without a fuss, or we go loud and big, don’t give an inch. Now, each of you has a part to play, Victoria with wiping the security cameras, Ted with the phone line. We keep things tight, and under control, and no matter what, we get out that back door within ten minutes of things kicking off. Let’s run down the individual roles, play by play-”

Whoa, hold on just a moment. First of all, this is clearly not a clandestine meeting for sex. This is a planning session for something way worse. I’ve dealt with tough targets before, one of my earliest gave me a lovely involuntary piercing between two ribs. But this is far beyond the scope of anything I’ve done before.

There’s something else, something much more urgent than just letting my client know his partner isn’t cheating, and is the tech support for a bank heist. No, the problem here is that as more and more details stream through to me, two really important ones stand out. First, their target bank is one whose security system I am intimately familiar with. There’s a hole in their plan, and it’s not just eyewitness testimony. The bank sends its data to an off-site server. So, the voice calling the shots seems to be ignorant of this. Whether he intends this misinformation is really of no importance, because the important thing is that he just gave someone the go ahead to

Kill Octavian.

8: The Desperate Need for Patience

I have his phone number. It’s like being able to reach out and caress him whenever I want. But I mustn’t! I can’t! If I were to allow it, I would be messaging him every minute, sending him horrific descriptions of every passing suggestion spit forth within my head. One way ticket to a restraining order, and probably a psych evaluation, and then game over. That JERK! First he tames me like some ditzy doll-eyed hanger-on with no greater aspirations than being a housewife, then he tries to trick me into becoming the headline of the week?

For all my coveting, he is not the only aspect of my life. I have an apartment, I have friends, I have dreams that don’t involve him.

That much is a lie, there is never a night that I go to sleep and do not wake with his name on my li-

Hold on. I slept in his apartment. Did I sleeptalk there?

Now I must contend with the possibility that he heard me calling his name in my sleep.

Should I just give up now? I’ve been away from him for perhaps two hours, and all I’ve done is think about him, him, him, and tossed and turned on my own bed. I throw my pillow at the wall, and it slumps to the floor, briefly becoming a vision of him, sliding to the ground with terror in his eyes. I clamp my hands over my mouth and sob.

I am back to this, then. My world has flipped on its axis.

Trying to focus on work does not help. Target Costello won’t be leaving for another day. The press conference got pushed back because of the flood. I’ve already emailed Jim a few photos I took on my way home, but my phone camera has no hope of competing with anyone who was more prepared.

I drag myself by my hands up into my computer chair, and lay my head on my desk. I watch the time refuse to pass. Getting my sleep schedule back will be easy enough, but making it to that point is another matter. I open my web browser, and scroll listlessly through blogs, posts, and updates.

Midway through my seventeenth video about advances in lockpick design, I slap my own cheeks and grunt. I open the surveillance feeds from the hotel, and roll back the tape, until I see target Costello in the grainy video. She does not stop at the desk. I. Am an idiot. I scroll back further. I watch a man walk in reverse out of the room. He too does not stop at the desk. Oh? Oh, oh? I wonder now if he keeps the room on indefinitely. Then, my expectations are shattered as a second man shuffles out of the room and does not stop at the desk. Close behind him comes a third man, who is finally the one to check in.

I flop out of my chair and onto the floor, and celebrate by pumping all my limbs at random, quietly screaming.

“YES YES YES, JACKPOT!”

I leap up and record each individual addition to the room, my glee only increasing when a fourth man and another woman arrive together after the target, joining the pile. I splice the videos into an edited, sped up clip that slows down for each entrance, and I manually highlight each individual frame by frame. I reserve my judgment for another time, today is a day for celebration twice over, first for surviving a night at his house, second for catching my own laziness.

I send a short email to the client, and attach a photograph of one of the men and the other woman from the video, asking if he recognizes them. My primary goal is to keep him interested, but if he does have more useful information, it can speed me towards finishing the case ahead of time.

He replies in a few minutes, and says that he thinks the woman is one of the target’s friends. I send a short reply, saying that I will continue investigating, and that I expect further developments soon.

I rise from the desk, sigh happily, and reward myself by falling into bed and letting an idle daydream play out in my head.

I picture Octavian feeding me cherries, in the middle of a field, a bottle of wine between us.

Oh, this is unusually self-serving, and rather tame. I bite my lip and roll over, uncomfortable with the implications of the fantasy. And since when do I take so long to realize such a straightforward way to advance a case?

I should probably update Raphael.

I find my phone, and open my contacts. I swipe past the clear impossibility of his contact, and hover my thumb over the call symbol under Raphael’s name. After a sigh, I press. One ring. Two rings. Three. On the fourth, it clicks.

“Mm, Candy?”

Ah, right. He’d still be sleeping.

“Hi Ralphie. Sorry for not calling you directly. I didn’t want to answer questions about the date at his apartment.”

There is a frighteningly long pause, and I wonder if he has fallen back asleep.

“So, did you get some tail?”

I nearly hang up.

“No, Ralph. I stayed the night because of the flooding.”

“But you couldn’t pick up the phone.”

Ah.

“Ralphie, please be fair. Would you be firing on all cylinders in that situation?”

I bite my thumb. I’m being a little unfair to Ralphie, but I can’t just come out and say that I passed out from the excitement of being in that bed. He’d probably think I’d been drugged. Octavian wouldn’t have to roofie me though, just one touch and-

I shake the thought away and sigh.

“I’m sorry, Ralphie. There was a lot happening, and I was so focused on not screwing up the crazy moment that was happening, and I just…”

“I get it. I do. But it does hurt my feelings, to have Igor be the one to tell me you don’t wanna talk.”

“Damn. Ralph, I…”

He groans.

“Alright, enough of this whiny shit, tell me about the date!”

I smile despite myself, and for some reason, it feels real without trying.

Night time. My time. Thursday night into Friday morning. My Friday. It’s time for some prep work. Tomorrow is Saturday, holiest day under the stalker moon. But target Costello likes to do her business during that span. So, now I have to lay a trap to catch her.

People are predictable. They fall into habit without realizing. But my biggest obstacle at the moment is that the hotel will likely issue a random room to whoever books their overpopulated rendezvous. My hope, my dear hope, is that the room is reserved in their absence, held under some discounted, long term plan, so that each person knows the room number to call on every time. This is a little uncommon, but I’ve seen it done by people who are especially wary of being caught by their spouse, unaware of the other complications it adds.

So, right now, I’m setting up a parabolic microphone on the roof of the building opposite the hotel, carefully aiming it down at the window. I use a tin box that I’ve shaped to look like an AC unit to hide it, screwing it into the brick with a compact cordless drill. I check the timer and the data card, before nodding to myself. It’s unlikely that the equipment will be found, but replacing it would definitely cripple my spending money for the future.

Once everything is secured, I climb down and start walking away, wondering what to do with the rest of the night. I need to stay up late enough that my sleep returns to its normal timing, but tomorrow is the off night, so a little leniency exists.

I am not very surprised when my first instinct tells me to go and watch him. Nothing new there. And yet, it makes my chest tighten to think about looking down into that apartment. After having been on the other side of the glass, going to the aquarium seems in poor taste.

I understand all of that, but why am I standing outside his door with a lockpick in my hand?

My hands are shaking. I have never, never, ever been so bold as to outright enter his space. Infiltrating people’s lives is nothing new to me, but this is so very, very wrong. I glance left and right. He is inside. Sleeping, certainly. Based on what I have observed, he will be so deep within his sleep that I could walk up and lick his face without waking him. Not that I’ve spent much time considering that scenario.

I am inside before I realize. High-alert does not begin to describe my state of mind, no: I am already ringing every alarm bell. I tiptoe into the kitchen and loom over the sink, staring at the drain. I want to pour myself in. I need to escape from here, even if it’s through the pipes. I don’t do anything so absurd, of course. Instead, I creep to the bedroom. Much more natural.

He is sleeping on his side, in a plain white t-shirt. A little moan of delight catches in my throat. Frankly, I think I’d be better off screaming, preferably running the other way.

I retreat, thankfully, to the kitchen. I ponder a steak knife left on the cutting board, contemplating tasting its edge for his dinner. Then I contemplate plunging it into myself to save him from whatever this nighttime raid has to offer. My hand is around the handle. I am staring at the keen edge with an intensity that really should be reserved for hand-eye coordination in baseball. I set it down.

I open the fridge. Milk, eggs, meat thawing for tomorrow’s dinner. Good, good, he’s eating well. Close fridge, open trash. A discarded yogurt cup. The dishwasher clunks, and I flee, out the door, locked behind me.

I come to my senses two blocks away. I’m holding the yogurt cup.

This is beyond wrong. My heart is racing, and not just because of my mad sprint. Maintaining any level of self control seems out the window.

I am licking the cup clean, my shame is nowhere to be seen here. The strange sighs and huffing sounds I make between glances around the alley are similarly distressing.

I need a plan, a method to contain myself. If I do not place some sort of measures in my way, I will again perform such an atrocity. I am sure of it.

It is too late for me to vanish. I cannot bring myself to perform such a wicked act, to ghost him. Instead, I must pace myself. Control is everything. Knowing when and where I will be exposed to him, and preparing adequately in advance.

I slink out of the alley, the cup discarded with my temporary insanity. I burn into my memory the still of myself standing in his kitchen, knife in hand, head full of impulses. This is the worst case scenario, the future I must avoid at all costs. Being in his life must not come at the cost of safety.

I stuff my shaking hands into my pockets and turn a corner. In front of me, the diner glows like a hole in the wall of life itself, a shimmering mirage. I take a step towards the strange oasis, before turning away and heading home. Enough revisiting memories.

Saturday. Time to live. I see Raphael early on, but the main event tonight is a movie. After hugging and bidding my friend goodnight, I hop down the sidewalk by the main road, skipping over cracks and manhole covers. My hair is in a long braid down my back, and bounces there with my pace.

I have carefully selected this movie from the showings, as the best choice according to both head and heart. No romance, no horror, no suspense. I walk up to the ticket counter and beam at the attendant before proclaiming:

“One ticket for Jack Breaker 2 please.”

Action movies are a guilty pleasure of mine. I mean no offense to their writers when I say that the lack of required investment is my favorite thing about them. You can just sit back, and the story will be told to you, without needing you to do any real puzzling or feeling around. The main reason to watch is violence, and maybe that hit of catharsis when the protagonist gets revenge, or rescues the victim, or otherwise brings justice to the scene.

I buy a small bucket of popcorn and a little bag of chocolate-covered ice-cream bites, and file into the theater, finding a seat near the back.

The movie is just as I hoped. It starts out with just the right amount of juxtaposition, and becomes a gritty bloodbath that treats lives like a score in a video game, so long as their owner was aligned with the villain. The ultimate scene is an adrenaline-choked chase followed by a shootout in a nondescript industrial building. Luck and skill are beyond human belief, but that’s not the point. The point is that moment when it was all worth it, and the main character experiences both vindication and relief.

And of course, another just like this will come out in two years time, promising greater stakes, without fail.

I exit the theater feeling refreshed and tranquil, reality temporarily under the surface of a dreamlike sheen of the world where everything works out perfectly. On this cloud of suspended disbelief, I float back to my apartment, and land in my bed.