VIII.
"Excuse me, sir." The bouncer gripped John Allerdyce on the shoulder with a force that seemed excessive. He bristled, turning back to face the man, eye level with muscles that quivered and strained beneath a tight black t-shirt. John swallowed heavily. He was a fighting drunk, yes, but he wasn't suicidal.
"Hey, how you going?" John could feel his tongue stumble over the words, heavy and clumsy.
"Well, our bartender, Paige, was just telling me you were being a bit rude to her." Paige... it rang of the medieval era, of cracked leather bindings and ink wells and parchment. He struggled to remember if he had even bothered to ask her name, came up with only fog.
"Nah, it was just a bit of a lark. I didn't mean to cause any trouble."
"That's good to hear." He slid the remainder of John's drink away from him. "I think it's for the best if you—"
"Got going? Already on it." This was not the first bar he'd been kicked out of. He knew the drill. When he was sure the bouncer had gone back in, he took a leak on the side of the building. It was oddly satisfying. Bow down to Pyro, puny mortals, or ye shall know the wraith of my mighty urine of vengeance.
Mmm, he was going to get the greasiest burger on the walk home. Cheese and onions and bee--wait, damn. It was times like this that he missed home; no one here understood how essential to a post-pub stumble a burger with beetroot was. Heh...root. No one understood what that was slang for, either. Though it made things infinitely more hilarious for him. How did that song go? 'Root, root, root for the ball team'? I always root for my ball team. Pffahaha, I'm so witty. I should write these things down. He often did, but inevitably they were either not very funny or totally indecipherable the next morning.
John was halfway down the block, weaving and muttering, when he realized he'd left his coat on the back of the stool. Frantically, he was on his knees, emptying his pockets onto the sidewalk: wallet, keys, receipts, change, no, no, no, no, yes... his lighter. He sighed in relief, pressing the cool nicked metal into his palm. It was just a coat. He could live without it for a few weeks, until this had blown over and he could go back there and apologize for his behaviour –a handsome face and eloquent faux sincerity could work wonders in a situation like this. The cold never bothered him much anyway. His lighter though, he needed.
He remembered the unfinished cigarette from earlier and pressed it now between his lips, taking a seat on the curb next to his scattered belongings. His ungainly thumb took several tries to produce a flame from the flint wheel. He had yet to exhale the first drag when they approached him, seemingly out of nowhere. John should have heard them: three hoods, barely out of their teens. They weren't exactly infused with ninja stealth.
"Hey man, give us your wallet."
John grinned widely, leaning back lazily on his palms, the cigarette dangling from his mouth. "Nah, I really don't think I'm going to do that." It was always a crap shoot in Genosha; you never really knew what kind of power you would run into. But odds were generally in his favour—a lot of things were flammable. "You best be on your way before someone gets hurt."
"Like you." The guy chuckled at what he clearly thought was a formidable display of witticism. "We're not fucking around here."
"Ooo, very tough. A for effort." He could already feel the tip of his cigarette burning brighter, hotter. Since his mutation had manifested, no one hurt him. No one would ever hurt him again. His smile was cold malice. "The thing is, kiddo, I'm not fucking around here either."
He had his father on the ground in seconds, fists swinging, knees digging into his chest. Three years and a growth spurt had given John the upper hand or, at the very least, made them more evenly matched. "This is all your fault. You killed her, you fucking killed her!" His voice was strangled and unnaturally high.
"Easy, kiddo, please. I know you're upset but you're not being rational. Just calm down." Deliberate, slow, patronizing, infuriating.
"I will not calm down! She's dead. Don't you understand that?" Hot wet tears spilled down his cheeks, anger momentarily displaced by crushing grief. His father saw the advantage, pinned John firmly by the arm.
"Shh, easy."
He thrashed wildly against him. His father increased the pressure of his hold slightly, and white hot rage consumed John, flaring with the embers in the ashtray. And suddenly he was sixteen and he was thirteen and he was five, and his mother was crying and she was laughing and she was dying and there was nothing he could do, and his father was eating ice-cream with him and he was hugging him and he was pushing a lit cigar into his arm. And his arm was on fire and his arm was on fire and his arm was fire and his arm was on fire. Blood screamed through his brain, burning him alive, throbbing in his ears with each spasm of his heart. There was other screaming too, far away, and now John was cold, he was so cold.
So he turned up the heat... the screaming stopped eventually.
VII.
"Another." The bartender would no longer meet his eye as she poured. He said something to her. Couldn't really remember what. Everything was shifting now, happening too fast and too slow at once. He was trying to spark some of his charm from earlier in the night. Her look was equal parts pity and revulsion.
"You should be. It's your fault." He'd read a lot near the end, knew all about carcinogens, tobacco smoke.
VI.
"Straight."
His father sat down heavily, resting his cigar in the ashtray. "Oh, kiddo, I'm so sorry."
V.
"Another please."
"Mum's dead. Lung cancer." Saying it out loud made him sick to his stomach.
The bile burned in his chest. He crouched unstably on the filthy tiles, pushing against the stall wall for support, waiting for the wave of nausea to cease. He always felt better after he'd thrown up.
IV.
"Another whiskey on the rocks, sweet."
"John, what are you doing here?"
III.
He rolled the whiskey over the ice cubes, trying to savour instead of guzzle. John had been here for less than an hour, and was on pace to end up like the man lolling his head droopily at the end of the bar. He could already feel the buzzing warmth spreading from his chest into his thoughts. She grinned at John as she passed the man, on her way to serve another patron. "Looks like I'll be calling a cab for somebody tonight."
There were different kinds of drunks in the world, pairs of dichotomies which were equally likely: the loud or the quiet, the bold or the cowardly, and, naturally, the ones who loved the world or the ones who loathed everyone. John was an angry drunk when it came right down to it--his mutation wasn't the only thing that was genetic. Of course, the latter group was also divided into those who fought fairly and those who went after people who couldn't properly defend themselves. That's where the heredity stopped. John would never hurt a woman, a child.
He often wondered about how he had formed as a person, stunted and empty and un-whole as he was, the old 'nature vs. nurture' debate. How many of his choices were conscious? How much of his personality was determined by nucleotides, by how he was raised? In the end, did it really matter? Environment or genetics, ingrained emotional intelligence or random sequences of DNA, it seemed that everyone was doomed to repeat their parents' mistakes.
He drained his glass.
John ran his fingers over the slightly raised scar on his forearm, circular and shiny. The night he had gotten it, almost three years ago now, he knew it was going to be bad. His father had come home late again, smelling like black liquorice and stale tobacco. Thirteen years had taught John that this smell meant trouble, meant screaming and crying, meant his mother in heavy makeup and sunglasses for weeks, meant cowering under his bed until the horrible thumping noises stopped.
"Don't tell me how to spend my money." John tucked his knees closer to his chest, lying on the dusty carpet beneath the box spring. They were in the hall now, right outside his room. "I deserve this. I work hard and all I get is shit from you." He was slurring.
The unmistakable sound of a fist hitting soft flesh. "Please, don't do this." John clamped his hands over his ears, heard everything.
"Now you're going to tell me what to do, too? Like you own this house? Like you provide for this family?" The wall rattled as his mother's body hit the wall. "Hell, I don't even know if that bastard kid is mine."
"How can you say that?"
The catch gave way when she was thrown into his door. Through the gap at the bottom of the duvet, he could see her sprawled on the floor, dark blood obscuring her features. John couldn't take it. It was one thing to see her the next morning, to hear it in the other room. This was heartbreakingly different. "Leave her alone or I'll...!" He didn't know what he would do. Something to make this stop. Oh God, it had to stop. His mother closed her eyes, disappointment in him colouring her expression. He had broken their deal of silence, his promise to stay out of the way when his father got like this. She was trying to protect him. He needed to protect her.
"Or you'll what?" A massive hand wrapped around his wrist, hauling him from under the bed with a swift jerk. A popping noise. Shooting pain tore through his shoulder. And suddenly, staring into his father's cold face, embers glowing like a menacing eye from the end of the cigar, John remembered. "There's the little shit." That his father was a full grown man, that he was only thirteen, that there was nothing he could do to stop this. His father had gone after him once before. He was maybe five then. The bright blue cast he'd had to wear all summer. Getting ice-cream after. 'Sorry, kiddo, sometimes dads do bad things too. But I love you. I do.' The arguments he wasn't supposed to hear, didn't understand. 'Please, don't go, sweet. It was a onetime thing. I've been under a lot of pressure at work, and I snapped. And I'm so, so sorry. I promise you, this will not happen again.' 'If you touch him, I swear to God...He is a child! A child!' 'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I love you. I love you both. Please, sweet, don't go.' Far worse, he couldn't force out the good memories, staring at that harsh smirk. This only happened a few awful nights a year. He was still the man who taught him how to ride a bike, took him to footy games, talked to him about girls and his problems at school.
"Look at the big man now. Pathetic." He wrenched his arm again; the room pulsed with the throbbing in his shoulder, blurred from the tears. "I'll give you something to cry about, kiddo." The press of the lit cigar into his forearm, the searing pain, the smell of burnt skin. He was sobbing now, his breath coming in hitches and gasps, his head swimming.
"Get the fuck out of the house now." His mother at the bedroom door with a butcher's knife. Miss Scarlett in the conservatory with the candlestick. Everything went dark.
His father had come back in the morning, collected his things, shamed like he always was the day after. He had spent the night in a hotel...John had spent it in the E.R. She hadn't pressed charges, but she wouldn't let him come back this time. He had left them the house. John shook with rage as she kissed him goodbye.
The sound of keys in the lock snapped him back to the present, to his father's home, still shaking with emotion. This had been a long time coming.
II.
John idly peeled the label off of the bottle neck. He needed a cigarette. It was a filthy habit he never should have taken up, but at least he had cut back. He only smoked when he drank. He smiled wryly to himself. And he only drank every day.
"Can I get you something else?" She was attentive and flirting openly, if not a bit shyly, now. After the Sambucca, she had discovered he was a generous tipper. He was sure his charm didn't hurt either.
"I'd love a whiskey." He leaned in conspiratorially. "But you know what I would like even more?"
"W--what?" It really was delightful how flushed he could make her.
"A cig."
She recovered quickly. John wasn't going to force her hand so early in the night, only two drinks in. She didn't disappoint him, reaching into her apron pocket and pulling out a pack of Virginia Slims. Ugh, menthol. Still, beggars, choosers, etc. "Sure, there you go."
He clicked his tongue disapprovingly, extracting one from the shiny foil, "Nice girl like you shouldn't be smoking, you know. These are bad for you."
"Well, that's a bit hypocritical." She smiled at him.
John tucked the cigarette behind his ear, rising from the barstool. He winked. "Nah, it's fine. I'm bad for you too."
Outside, the air was crisp and still. He shielded the cigarette as he lit it, the motion so habitual it didn't matter that there was no wind. The spicy, earthy, sweetness filled his mouth--tainted somewhat with the mint, but still--ambrosial. He exhaled hard, watching the smoke drift upwards in the streetlight. "Sorry, Mum." She would've killed him if she saw this, if she saw a lot of the things he did now. She would've killed him, but she would've understood.
The shiny Zippo lay beside him on the sofa cushion, the lighter gleaming in the moonlight coming through the large bay window of his father's living room. Out of the corner of his eye, if he unfocused and tilted his head just so, it could almost be his mother lighting it. 'Just to remember him,' she'd say when he caught her pulling it out of the nightstand drawer, waxing nostalgic.
The cancer had been swift and vicious, spreading from her lungs, the result of second-hand smoke and abnormalities in transcription at the cellular level. Environment or genetics? They'd had no money for hospitals, for chemo, not since his father left. It didn't matter anyway; it was terminal by the time they found it. She had been beautiful--blonde and round and kind. At the end, he barely recognized her.
The corpse had begun to stink after a day, sickeningly sweet and overpowering. His eyes stung, couldn't focus-- staring at that grotesque thing that was never her, that couldn't be her. He did not sleep, huddled hard into the corner of her bedroom; it was better not to. Every time he closed his eyes he could see her: alive and happy, sick and wasting away with nothing he could do about it. This rotting monster in her bed was better than both. It wasn't her.
Three days before he moved. He smelled of piss and sweat and puke and shit, sitting in the tub as quarter sized drops from the showerhead soaked him almost instantly. John awoke hours later, naked, shivering, the bathroom dark and the shower still on.
"Fire, police, or ambulance?"
"Ambulance." The voice wasn't his. It was too hollow, too flat.
"Can I get your name, please, son?" Son. His throat swelled.
"It's John."
"And what's your emergency, John?"
"My mum is--she's-- I can't, I can't, I can't."
"Shh, it's okay, I need you to be calm for me, John. Is she hurt? I want you to make sure first that you get yourself out of any immediate danger, okay? Are you safe?"
He would never feel safe again. "Yes."
"Can you tell me what happened?"
The ambulance came first, no sirens, no pretence that there was anything to rescue. John sat silently on the porch as the paramedics wheeled her body out, idly flicking the lighter. It was easier to watch the flames. The Department of Community Services was next, a man with glasses and a paunch. He hated how he talked to him, talked down to him, like he was sick, like he was broken. He wanted to take John away from his home. A well placed kick to the shins and the element of surprise had downed him, had given John the opportunity he needed. John was weak and dizzy and shaky to the edge of collapse but the adrenaline kept him going. He knew these back alleys far better than the DoCS guy, than the paramedics. They couldn't keep up.
He was at his father's house in less than an hour; letting himself in through an open window. He wasn't supposed to know about this place, know that his father was still in the city. His mother had asked him to let it be when he walked out the door, that it was better for the both of them. John had gone looking for him the day his mother had been diagnosed, found the address, saw the familiar car out front, and lost his nerve. He now sat on the sofa, waiting.
John inhaled nothing; his cigarette had gone out. He ashed with a flick of his fingers, tucking the half butt into the flip-lid of his lighter for later.
I.
"Flaming sambucca please, top-shelf." John pulled up a stool and met the bartender's eyes. The first drink of the night was always special. The roll of liquor across your tongue, the slight suppression of gag that numbed as the night progressed, a reminder your body screamed that this was poison to you, this was toxic. Everything was toxic though, even water. It was never the substance; it was always the dose that was fatal. "How you going tonight, sweet?"
She was cute. She was new. Some part of John's mind wondered vaguely if instantly recognizing staffing changes meant that he came here too often. The rest of it was focused intently on the quick blush which spread across her cheeks, the bashful redirection of her gaze to the lacquered surface of the bar.
"Um...pardon? How am I going where?"
John bit his lip in the perfect caricature of chagrin. Oh heavens, I am ever so apologetic that my unnervingly sexy accent has confused you. "Sorry, sometimes the old expressions just slip out. I meant to say, 'How are you doing?'" He shrugged good-naturedly, his eyes sparkling. "Still sounds wrong to me."
He knew exactly what he was doing, laying on the colloquialisms far thicker than usual. The English language was John's game; he had been a journalist and part-time novelist before he came to Genosha. After his capture by the MRD, Mystique had lured him in with a promise of front page by-lines and editorial sway. The Daily Genoshan had been a joke: all fluff pieces, none of the grit he craved. There was scintillating journalism in Genosha, buried paper trails and links to the Senator and hidden cells for insurgents, but none of that ever made it past the desk of the Editor in Chief. He was packing his bags after submitting an inflammatory--har har--resignation letter, when he'd been approached by the big boss himself. Magneto's tone had made John think that if he didn't take the offered job as security detail lackey, he'd end up in one of those cells he'd wanted to report on so badly. Self-preservation was a lesson he had learned early on. Apparently Magneto saw something in him that he didn't.
"I like your accent." They always do, sweet. "Are you English?" She smiled at him.
John grimaced. "Australian."
He could actually see her shoulders sink—he'd thought that was just an expression. "I'm sorry." Her eyes were back down, the blush deeper and creeping to her ears. She turned back to the bar line, selecting white sambucca and carefully filling a shot glass. This was not his regular drink, but he couldn't resist the urge to show off a bit. He was in a dangerous mood. The pungent anise took him back to his father in an instant. "That was stupid of me, you're probably offended."
"Nah, don't take it too hard, you're only off by about 300 years. Almost everyone was British then. Besides, the Brits are a good people. Now, if you'd called me Canadian, we'd have a problem."
She laughed. "Who hates Canada?" She was talking to him now, letting down the guard, the shyness. He was in.
"Have you ever been to Canada? They put their milk in bags. Not jugs, not glass, these squishy, floppy, plastic bags. That right there is reason enough to be suspicious. And don't get me started on their unnatural fixation with 'rolling up the rim.'"
"Mhm?" She was digging around behind the bar, missing his banter. John figured that he had about four hours of carefully rehearsed witty 'off the cusp' quips built up in his flirt bank, enough to get them to come home with him. Girls these days always seemed to think that sleeping with someone because of their wit was somehow superior to falling for their magnificent biceps (not that he didn't have those too.) They were both just a means to an end for John. Eventually the banter ran out and he feigned sleep while she put on last night's clothes and crept out of his apartment in the early hours of the morning.
"What are you looking for?"
"I know we have matches but I can't seem to find them. I'm new here." She knit her brows apologetically, digging now into her apron pocket with frustration. "And apparently my roommate stole my lighter. Again. Do you have a light?"
Do I ever. "Sure." She was not a roses woman. Rose women were classic, stately, almost harsh in their beauty. Orchids... no, too exotic for her. He flicked his well worn Zippo over the glass in one swift movement, the brief shapeless flame shifting into a daisy before he extinguished it. She was suitably delighted. This was so easy it was almost unfair.
He slammed down the shot.
John's father would be home soon. His stomach twitched with giddy, nervous excitement. It had been almost three years since he had seen him. He was looking forward to their reunion.