Wet
Bree was a name.
Bree was me.
Bree was completely sopping wet all the way down to the bones because this eternal roof-thing called 'the sky' had been dumping nothing but buckets of water for the past two days. On end. Non-stop.
Why did I break into a house to get wet? I could have waited a day and done it risk-free. My world was now one gigantic shower with no off-switch. The thick gray clouds clogged the sky, obscuring my view of the city with their falling moisture. For all I knew half of this place, New York, had suddenly been eaten by them and no longer existed.
Huddling under the cardboard box I'd snitched from the alley had only worked for a little while. Then it soggied up and collapsed on me like a dying breath and I had to wiggle out from under it. My clothes soaked up a ton of water from the roof. They clung to me, heavy and wet, enclosing me and sticking my wings to my back.
At first I'd hated it. By now I was resigned to it. Once you're all the way saturated, you really don't care about a little more water because you can't possibly get any wetter.
Not to be ironic or anything, but this really put a damper on the situation. I wanted to fly. I wanted to learn. Ever since I'd picked a name, my life had suddenly become more important to me. Decisions mattered, and their outcomes steadily reassured me.
If I could name myself, then I could fly. If I could fly, I could find the others. If I could find the others, I'd be so much better off.
Unfortunately, they could have flown right through the city and I wouldn't have seen them in this miserable weather. There wasn't much I could do but sit there and watch the drops pour down in an endless torrent and enjoy how wet I was.
Food was more plentiful when it rained, I learned. Not as many people were out, so not as many people traded the green bills for food, and more of it ended up in my favorite dumpster a couple allies down. I liked it the best because it was easy to open and not many people were ever around. Especially in the driving rain.
Aside from short wet trips to scavenge day-old munchies, my wings and I spent most of the time wrapped in a too-small trash bag that crudely served to keep most of the streaming water off. It got light out, then dark, then light again. Sometimes I slept in fits of shivering anxiety. I was cold and steadily getting more afraid which each passing breath, although I couldn't have told you why. I hadn't heard that voice in days.
Maybe it was because I didn't know where that voice was. Maybe that was why I kept watching the skies, hoping for the Maximum to come find me before that voice did.
I'd periodically take a break from my hunched position, standing and stretching and kicking water across the roof. My wings felt like wet sheets. I was never going to fly if I couldn't dry out.
Which made me really twitchy. I wanted to learn. I wanted to get out of here. I wanted to remain free. I wanted to remain Bree.
Free and Bree. Both high and far from dry.