Descending the stairs, I find The House on Paper Street to be very busy and everyone at a post or running to and from a post in each of the rooms, going about their business. Angel Face sees me, puts his folders under his right arm and walks towards me.
"Everything's almost ready, sir, No hiccups -" There's a crash from the corner and a tall, broken nosed Monkey stands clutching a mop on one foot, the other raised out of the way of the large bucket of cleaning chemicals of his that's just fallen over - what are the odds on the timing? "A-almost ready. The house will be spotless and we can start working again" His permanently crooked smile stretches across his face and I can't help the stab of guilt at the back of my head that runs right down and through my stomach. I smile and nod and he returns to whatever he was doing beforehand.
That kid could have gone places. He was smart, and he was (stressing on the 'was' here) a pretty decent lookin' guy, but he's here; with me/Tyler, the Monkeys and sure fire way to get himself killed, arrested, or possibly worse: insane, like me. Shit, I'm surprised he's not traumatised, the way his face was just after that fight, the way his face was when it started to heal and how his face is now. It's not swollen, but he still can't really see out of his right eye, his cheek is rougher and a little tighter than his left, his mouth's still lopsided and some of his teeth are still missing. On the upside to that last one; he's getting false ones put in at some point on behalf of the Tyler Durden Monkey Health Insurance Plan.
I'm not allowed to help out, I discover, after I tried helping the mop bucket Monkey, when I tried to help with raking some of the loose, freshly cut grass in the back yard and finally when I tried to help organise some of the files. A few of the Monkeys disappeared for a while, came back and handed me a small bag of magazines and some beer. There was even a pack of skittles in there! I wasn't allowed to share them so I had to make it an order to 'take one if you wanted one'.
That much power. I know it isn't really much but still, c'mon! These guys have given up a lot to be here and to live like this, and they follow almost all of my commands.
The rest of my first week goes like this. The Monkeys are still cleaning and fixing up the house, I'm not allowed to help anyone and we've worked our way round the nearest Chinese take-away menu. I can't really complain about the fixing the house up thing, I mean, the place is dry – no leaks! The windows are all intact, though some were intentionally left out of this treatment, and the place looks like a- a place. There's still a bit to go but, it's looking more like a house than a dump. Although they've left the room Tyler and I found all those weird, first person novels about organs alone. For whatever reason. What's been plaguing me, though, is that Tyler hasn't shown up once. Or at least, that I know of. Angel Face has become my confidante, to an extent, I've told him to be honest with me at all times and to tell me if I am or have been acting weird, but he tells me I've been 'normal', nothing out of the ordinary.
I've been looking through the paper for a job. I'm getting bored. Restless. I'm not allowed to do anything in this house. All I've done is drink vodka from the bottle and wander about in my shorts and an old, tattered, grey housecoat and god-awful slippers. I tried to make a game out of telling the Monkey's they'd missed invisible, non-existent 'spots' and Angel Face had to come and distract me with a map of the city. Something about a new venue for Fight Club.
"Anywhere. Everywhere. Fuck it. I need something to do, give me this. I'll pick a place." I say, absent-mindedly, grabbing and slightly ripping the thin paper. He opens his mouth to disobey and question but stops himself. He nods, gets a set of car keys from a drawer and hands them to me.
"Sir, the car's out in the drive across the street. The map already has potential venues marked with 'x's and these" he hands a few small flash cards to me, "are the numbers and addresses of other places that aren't marked. As requested."
"Why do we need a new venue?" I ask looking intently at one of the cards; 'Methodist Church' being the two words that caught my attention.
"We need a larger venue. Our members have increased...you told us at the beginning of the week that we would be expanding as well."
We exchange a look that I'm still not too sure about. It was either a confirmation or a 'what the hell do you mean?' and 'why are you questioning me?' exchange. I left the kitchen and staggered upstairs to change.
I needed to get out.
I'd been out on the road for about two hours, looking for some dumb, old, abandoned Y when I parked the car and actually thought about what I was doing. I was looking for another place to have fight club. I was out. In a car. Looking for a new place. To have. Fight Club. Tyler's not real. But here I am, following his orders. Kinda.
"What the hell am I doing?" I bang my head down on the wheel. Eyes closed I try that slow breathing stuff again, the penguin I'd got real used to tell me to slide down the ice telling me to 'fuck off' made me jump back and bang my head against the headrest.
"You gotta loosen up, pal" Tyler chuckles between puffs of a cigarette when I freak and flail my arms in the seat. "So. This dump looks promisin'" he turns to me and grins that shit eating grin at me and gets out of the car. I gawk for a moment before I follow him. He's picking at the locks and chains – so in reality I'm the one picking at them – and before long he's in. We wander around the place. It's dark until he kicks at the wall beside the door and lights come on.
The place is huge.
I slowly turn round, looking at the whole of the hall, head up to the ceiling. When I level my head I see the quick flash of knuckles and feel the crunching pain of it connecting with my nose. Startled, I fall back. He's not real...but that felt really real.
"C'mon! Throw one! Hit me in the ear if you like!" he laughs a loud, obnoxious laugh and spreads his arms to the sides; leaving him open to whatever I throw at him. In a moment of adrenaline fuelled confusion, I lunge and swing my right arm for his chin. It connects. I feel it connect. I feel the stubble on his chin. I feel the breath over the kiss-shaped scar on my hand. He falls back a few steps and rubs his chin. He grins.
We spend the next hour or so fighting. Just like we had when we were outside Lou's. When we're finished we head back outside, refit the locks and get in the car. Tyler's driving. I'm still coming down from the euphoria.
Neither of us won that fight, we were both still standing, but the fact that we'd spent a whole hour battering lumps out of each other was worth it. Tyler was talking to me, but I couldn't hear him, I was still swimming in that orgasmic come down feeling to care to listen. Or to care about the fact that he wasn't real, that it was me behind the wheel and it was me who was talking to myself. "'Atta boy!" he says, "forget about that shit. What matters is that you and I, we gotta take care of those Monkeys. We're all they got".
It wasn't until I was back in bed at the house on Paper Street that I realised he had guilt-tripped me.
And it wasn't until the next morning that I realised I didn't care.
A/N: Sorry to those still following for the lengthy wait. Hopefully now that college is finished I'll have a bit more time for this.