Bruno had decided that he definitely needed to get out of Casita. So, he'd set himself a challenge of leaving at least once every two days. He still had yet to muster up the courage to go into town by himself so he'd mostly walk the outskirts or spend a little time in the forest. He mostly went out at night and he was perfectly aware about how that was cheating but that wasn't about to stop him from doing it. Felix had been the most successful at dragging him into town. Bruno knew that the more often he went into town the better he'd start feeling about it. Just because he knew that didn't stop his brain from screaming no at the thought. That's what happened every time.
Someone would ask if he'd accompany them into town for some reason or another and Bruno would crumble under their gaze.
"Yeah, a-alirght, si." His mouth would go.
While his brain went. "Estúpido payaso bastardo, ¿qué crees que estás haciendo? ¡Dios mío, ¿qué te pasa?! ¡Detente ahora mismo, sal, ve, corre! Por el amor de dios no!"
His mouth almost always won. Especially if it was Felix because the man didn't even give his brain enough time to start talking. Nine times out of the ten the man never even asked. Bruno would just somehow find himself in town, wondering what in the world just happened. He really couldn't figure out if he actually liked Felix. He wasn't overly fond of being manhandled into being social. But Frida really liked him too. Along with Alondra and so of course Allegre followed right behind her best friend and what was he supposed to do about that? Would they be upset if he decided he wasn't fond of Felix? If he got overly frustrated with the man would his rats get mad at him?
Bruno was slowly beginning to realize exactly how manipulative Felix could be. Although it was completely clear that the man did actually like his rats, no pretending there and Bruno thought that was hilarious seeing as how Pepa reacted to them. He idly wondered if it had started any arguments aside from the surprise meeting of Coqueta but he really couldn't blame his hermana on that one. She had said no rats, in fact the family had said no rats and yet he still walks in with fourteen rats on his person. He could've at least said something.
Things like that are one of the reasons he avoids town. He often doesn't think ahead and forgets that something that might be normal for him is very unusual for other people. He's also bad at saying the wrong thing although Mirabel would beg to differ. She always said that, in the moment where she was consumed by anger, he'd said exactly what needed to be said to put things into perspective. She like to joke that he needed a translator and maybe he did. He also avoids town because rats are very opportunistic feeders and a few of them were much sneakier than the others. He winced as he thought back to the disaster of a day when Aleece snuck into one of his pockets. She was the last rat he wanted to take into town because, she likes to hoard things. She likes to hoard shiny things in particular.
So, Bruno had spent a good three hours chasing down a rat who had stolen a woman's wedding ring, shouting angrily and lecturing the animal throughout the entire chase. He hadn't been able to show his face for weeks after that. Although, from what he's been told, people mostly commented on his ridiculous agility despite the fact that he was fifty years old. Although Pepa had just been astounded the entire time, unsure of what to do because it had been her idea to get him into town in the first place. Her jaw dropped when she saw a flicker of emerald in his eyes before catching a serving tray someone had dropped from being startled by Aleece and settling it on the table without having spilled a thing. All without slowing his stride at all.
Dios mio her brother was insane.
That had only been one incident!
There had been another time where he had gotten into a little confrontation with one of the villagers. Not all of them had changed their minds on things and it really wasn't that bad so, he didn't ell anyone. Actually the main reason that he never told anyone was because Estella, who could be far too overprotective, and Indigo, who'd always been a tad aggressive, had darted out from beneath his ruana and up the man's pant legs. Bruno did know what to do there. Two of his rats decided to run up a person's pant legs to terrorize them because they had been being mean to Bruno. His jaw opened and closed as he raised and lowered a finger, trying to figure out how to deal with this situation.
He hadn't heard all of the people laughing until he'd managed to wrangle the two creatures and was scrambling for an apology with one wriggling, hissing rat in each hand.
He rubbed his temples at the memories. Or, was he rubbing because of the pressure? His eyes widened. He'd just gotten in from a walk and he was exhausted, this was the worst time for this. He brought his fist up and cracked it against his head and sighed when the pressure faded. Julieta's leftovers would do just fine to deal with the lump he was sure to have. He had been making his way over to the kitchen when the pressure was back and far worse. It knocked him to his knees. It was like something was trying to burst out of his head. He grit his teeth and sucked in a few desperate breaths before standing on shaky legs and moving to the stairs.
His room. He had to get to his room. It just wouldn't do to have a vision out here. All kinds of things could go flying everywhere and he'd wake someone up. He'd probably wind up waking up his mamá since her door was not so soundproof. He slipped on the stairs and Casita caught him. He mumbled a thank you before, to avoid slipping again, crawled up the staircase. He gripped the handrail tightly as he stood and it took him a moment that, suddenly, he was on the far end of the hallway right by his room.
"Gracias Casita." He said before clearing his throat and all but ran though the door. He needed to fight this somehow. He needed to stop it. He smacked his head again and it did little to ease the symptoms of a vision. He snarled, turned, and slammed his head against the wall with a loud thud and stumbled, stars dancing in his vision. The pressure eased and he sighed as he slumped against the wall, cradling his head as the world spun. He took a deep breath, stood, and began making his way to his room when everything started to flare up again.
This was bad. This was insistent, and he didn't want to see it. Whatever it was, he didn't want to know. He immediately stopped and laid down. Sometimes that helped. Sometimes if he could just lay down and not do anything at all then the feeling would dissipate. He prayed that it would but he needed to try and keep his heart rate down. That was not something that Bruno was necessarily good at on a moments notice. This was bad. He felt awful and he just didn't want to do this. He didn't want to have to do this. It wasn't fair!
His head twitched, his hands shook, his eyes glowed green, and the winds formed a dome of sand around him. He tried to squint his eyes shut but what no one knew was that he couldn't close his eyes during a vision. He could blink, keeping the sand from obscuring his gaze but the best he could do was try and look away. He was already dizzy and the vision was strong. He couldn't quite think straight, so he just stared into the whirling sandstorm.
It had been fairly quick and after it was over he laid there in the sand gasping for breath.
"¡¿Qué clase de estúpida visión es esa?!" He bellowed through the throbbing in his head. "That's it?! I hate you!" He screamed at his gift kicking out at the sand.
He gave a long sigh. He'd seen the town and people roaming the streets. There was a shop selling plates glasses, vases, and jewlery across the street from the small restaurant in the village. A couple passed by the window. It looked like the man was telling a very animated story to the laughing woman by his side. He flung his arms out and gave a dramatic twirl that had been anything less than graceful. The man lost his footing and fell through the window into the shop, onto a shelf, that fell onto another shelf and it just spiraled down from there. No one was hurt and no real damage had been done and that was it.
"At least it wasn't a vision of some kid collecting flowers again." He growled before pushing himself to his feet and going to his bedroom. He flopped onto his bed and waited for the headache to subside before he managed to get any sleep.
The next day, after a few minutes, he began to see the vision differently. He thought about it long and hard. No one had gotten hurt and nothing really bad had come out of the situation. It was kind of a useless prophecy and those were so frustrating. His looked toward the ceiling, sitting in the living room after breakfast, and considered a few things before nodding and giving a quiet "hrm". He stood and made his way toward Casita's front door. He heard Felix call out behind him.
"Hey hermano where are you off to?"
"Town." Bruno responded and couldn't the smirk that developed on his face at the sudden silence of the house. Smirk still in place, he glanced back at Felix. "I have to find good seat to watch the show."
He walked out of the house and made it a few yards when people started yelling.
"Bruno?" Felix's voice quivered. "Bruno w-what do you mean?"
"Bruno!" Julieta yelled. "Bruno wait! What?"
"Bruno!" Pepa thundered.
He just kept walking. It was a nice day. Surely sitting outside a restaurant with a cup of coffee would be a great idea. After all, who knows what could happen?