His eyes opened reluctantly, afraid of everything the world would reveal. The thrumming inside his head worsened as light greeted his retinas. With a heavy sigh, he pulled the covers back over his head.
"That's not going to work," someone assured him.
"What would you know?" he inquired from the confines his muffled cave.
"Out, now!" the fox screamed at him.
It was easier to comply with her orders than risk the screaming again. Slowly he retreated from his comforter, rolling his feet off the side of his bed. The ground felt surreal under his feet. He gripped the carpet with his toes, hoping he could claw his way to the bathroom.
Marcus hardly recognized the person that greeted him in the mirror. He had been disheveled the night before, now he may as well have been a homeless addict in a suit.
A voice followed him, "shower, now, cold."
Please stop, he wanted to beg, but couldn't find the strength. Peeling off the stench of the past two days in his suit felt nearly as good as vomiting in the toilet. If nothing else, he was appreciative that the fox was trying to help rather than rubbing his nose in it as he would have expected.
Every drop of cold water felt like a dagger, and the only thing keeping Marcus from howling in agony was the fact that he felt so miserable he was certain that would have hurt more.
"Good," the fox proclaimed when she found him drying off, "put these on."
He didn't have the strength to protest her barging in, or the oddly musty clothes she handed him. If nothing else they were comfortable, and a far cry from the suits that hung in his closet.
"You look like a vagrant," he assured himself as he took another look in the mirror.
The grey sweatshirt and black warmup pants made him look like one the elderly joggers he would often spy on his way to pick up Naugus early in the morning.
"Should I ask where you got these?" he said to the fox when she approached him with a Thermos in one hand and a pill in another.
She stayed silent as he sniffed the beverage.
It smells like coffee... but last time...
He grimaced as he took a sip, it was only half as bad as it had been two days ago.
"I read the directions this time," she assured him. "And this is for the headache."
"You can read?" he chuckled with as much enthusiasm as he could muster.
"Sarcasm doesn't suit you right now, honey."
Marcus was inclined to agree. The sound of his own voice hurt, everything hurt.
With another swig he swallowed his medicine.
"Come on," Fiona motioned for him to follow. "You're going to need some fresh air."
He grabbed his keys off the counter as he made a move to follow her.
"Leave those," she snapped at him. "You're still in no condition to drive."
Sipping his coffee Marcus did little more than follow the wagging tail of the vulpine in front of him until they found a seat across from one another on a subway.
"Where we going?" the kid asked.
The fox was silent, which was unusual to say the least. Normally she jumped at a chance to remind him of how spoiled or pathetic he was.
If there were ever a day to do that...
As the caffeine and painkiller began to settle in, Marcus found the strength to look up and take in his surroundings. They were on a downtown bound train, still a good ten stops outside Station Square.
"Already got coffee," he figured she was taking him to the diner on fourth again.
All she did was nod in agreement.
I think she's mad at me.
Which was odd because normally her personality was quite abrasive. To the casual observer the vixen was almost always mad, but Marcus was finally beginning to do exactly what Ixis had told him to do, shut up and listen to her, maybe I'll learn something.
Two can play this game, he decided as he stared over her shoulder and out the window.
Five stops later it became obvious the silence was bothering her, "That's not going to work," she proclaimed for a second time that morning.
"You're talking again," he pointed out.
He complexion stiffened visibly, "Why can't you just say thank you?"
"Thank you," he replied in as sincere of a tone as he could muster in his state.
The fox eyed him cautiously before removing herself from her perch, approaching the doors as they arrived at Station Square.
"Where we going?" he asked again as he struggled to remove himself from his own seat.
There was again, and perhaps predictably, no reply.
I guess she was right.. it didn't work.
The spry vulpine bound up each foothold looking light as a feather. Marcus on the other hand clung to the railing, pulling himself up each step with what felt like the last of his strength.
"Murray!" the fox shouted when she reached the center of the station's rotunda.
Marcus winced in pain as he tugged at his hood in attempt to keep the noise out. Through what little space remained, he watched as a bobcat looked up from his bucket and mop.
What does she want with this guy? He looks like a janitor.
The feline was frail to say the least, almost as if he might drop dead of old age at any moment.
"Fiona," the creature replied politely thru patched greying fur. "How are you?"
"Same mostly," the vixen replied as she slipped something into the cat's pocket. "You stay warm, okay?"
He purred gently, "So kind. And who's this?"
The vixen rolled her eyes at the question, "just another stray like us."
"Hmmmm," the cat pondered, "he certainly looks it."
Thanks...
"You could learn a lot from this one," the bobcat informed him., "She's a kind soul. There aren't many left like her."
"Don't listen to him," Fiona growled. "He's old and senile."
The cat chuckled as he returned to his work, "all bark and no bite."
I know for a fact that is not true...
"See you around, Murray," the fox shouted over her shoulder.
Marcus resumed his forward march as the vixen ducked into a side door.
"Where the hell are we going?" he called after her, knowing full well she wouldn't answer.
He watched as her tail disappeared around the corner at the far end of the corridor.
"Are we even allowed back here?" he hurried after her.
Marcus turned down the next hall to see the fox get on a elevator, "Hey, wait up!"
"Stairs are right there," the fox replied pointing at an adjacent door. "I'm going all the way to the top, meet you there."
The kid did his best to sprint, but not even on his best day would he have been able to make it, let alone on his worst.
The top! He stomped his feet in protest, Station Square is over fifty stories!
He mashed the call button knowing full well when she did finally reach her destination she'd make sure it wouldn't come back down.
"What the hell, Fiona!"
Throwing open the door to the stairwell in protest, Marcus began his ascent. With every step he invented a new word for the fox, determined to greet her as colorfully as he could when he found her again.
Why am I even following her around? Because she made me get up early? Because she made me take a cold shower? Because she made me coffee? Because I have nothing better to do? Because she's trying to help?
The first two sounded like torture, the third hardly counted as a good deed, while the fourth was a cop out. The last one, however, was up for some debate.
Because she's my friend, he reminded himself as odd as it felt to admit, perhaps my only one.
"But if she's my friend why is she being like this?" he said aloud, to no one.
Long pants and a sweatshirt were not the right attire for climbing this many stairs. He was only half way and already sweating profusely. When he did finally reach the top, he was drenched, too exhausted to be mad anymore. Opening the door to the roof, he walked past cooling towers that dwarfed him, their morning shadows shielding him from the sun. As he emerged from the forest of machinery, the city in all its glory came into view, each building silhouetted against a sky that grew bluer by the second.
There you are.
Fiona was perched on the side of a helicopter pad, her feet dangling over the edge with no regard for what was below. Climbing what he hoped were the last set of stairs for the day, Marcus made his way up the platform and across the yellow 'H' .
"What took ya'?" she asked as he approached, her tone void of emotion.
He wanted to be mad, but the truth was he did feel better.
"Long way down," he quipped as he found a seat next to her.
The fox hardly moved; her attention fixated somewhere in the distance.
"Thanks," he said again before taking another swig from his thermos.
"Don't mention it," the fox replied without shifting her gaze.
"Why does it feel like you're mad at me?"
"Because I don't understand why you chose to give up a life that I would have killed for," the exasperated fox nearly shouted. "A spoiled brat who's been handed everything by two parents who obviously care, runs away and gets upset when his life of crime isn't all that it's cracked up to be."
Marcus didn't have much to say to that. Parts of it were true, others not so much, I wanted fame, but not like this.
"You're the closest thing I have ever had to friend," she pleaded with him, "but we could not be more different. My parents were killed in front of me, I was thrown to the wolves, and it's only thanks to people like Ixis that I still exist. You on the other hand, you have a family, a home, money if you wanted it."
"And what do you think it means that I don't want any of that? That I chose to run away?"
"I thought I knew," Fiona confessed, "now I'm less certain."
"I've been trying to tell you that you don't know everything about me."
"In all the ways we're different," she ignored him, "there's one where we're the same. We didn't choose this for ourselves, it chose us. You don't want to be like him, like Naugus."
"No," he agreed, "I don't."
"I thought for sure you were just another wannabe, willing to do whatever it took to get ahead no matter what or who got in your way. I should have known you were telling the truth."
"Why didn't you believe me?"
"In a city full of lies, your ears can become deaf to the truth."
"You should put that on a tee-shirt," he couldn't help himself.
The fox's wry grin returned.
"Marcus," the vixen began but paused.
Did she just use my name again?
"You don't have to see yourself as a bad person just because you work for one. You don't have to hate this life you've made for yourself. Don't take on the burden of what Ixis chooses to do."
"Is that what Harry did?"
"In a way," the vixen sighed. "He brought it home with him, every day."
"And his family?"
"What about them?"
"What happened to them?"
The fox glared at him to ask if he were joking, "Even if you really don't know, I promise you do."
"Everyone acts as if there were no way I couldn't know, as it if it were some big thing all over the news..."
Then it hit him. It was a big thing. It had been all over the news. How did I never put it together? Is that why she brought me up here? Is this some kind of threat?
"Remember now?" the vixen heaved another heavy sigh, looking down to the streets below.
"Is this your way of scaring me?" he began to panic.
"The opposite actually," she assured him.
"How is bringing me up here, to this spot, supposed to do that?" Marcus stammered. "They closed the street for a week so they could clean it, Fiona!"
"This is where I come to remind myself what can happen if I let what others dictate who I am."
The kid double checked his footing, hoping she would continue unprovoked.
"It poisoned them. Their marriage. His wife couldn't take the person he'd become. She was disgusted with him, lived in fear of him. Imagine," the fox scoffed, "the one person you swear yourself to, is afraid to talk to you, touch you, look at you even. Harry was in no position to help her, even if he had tried... and he didn't. He along with everyone just assumed that she was going to leave him and take the kids with her, but I don't think that anyone thought she would do it like that."
There were so very few times in his life that Marcus found himself at a complete loss of words.
"Poor guy," the kid managed as he followed the fox's gaze to the street below.
"Showed up to work the next day."
"What?"
"Picked Naugus up like nothing had happened."
"How?"
"At that point he didn't know how to do anything else. He was broken. He'd go home and erase the day just like all the others."
Marcus eyed the vixen again, he wanted to tell her something, but couldn't put his finger on it.
"So you'll promise me, right?" she asked of him while turning away from his gaze. "Promise me you won't let Ixis' life poison yours."
That was a tall order considering how well he had fared thus far.
He replied anyway, "I promise."