It was raining and the drops were bitterly cold. It was always one of the first clues that winter was fast approaching. At times he contemplated taking cues from the birds and migrating south for the harsher months, but he was smart enough to know that shelter was far easier to find in the city than it would be anywhere else. As was food.

And tourists made for particularly easy prey that he wasn't sure he would survive without. His long, shaking fingers slid into the pink purse he had been eyeing for two blocks and emerged with a wallet. It was quickly transferred to his pocket and casually, he made his way across the street.

He waited until he was two blocks in the opposite direction to actually look at it, opening the nondescript black wallet and digging through it as though he had lost something.

The gift cards were worth keeping, credit cards would be deposited in the garbage bin. The girl that smiled back at him from the student ID was young. Wyoming. Only twenty dollars in cash and a small sprinkling of change. It was enough for a hot meal, at least, and he would content himself with that.

The wallet, emptied of everything that was of any use to him, was casually deposited into the next trash bin he passed by.

Erik couldn't say, for certain, that it was rain and not snow. It was ungodly cold, the wind seeming to whip straight through him. The already useless jacket he wore was damp and clung to him uncomfortably. With the small amount of money safely tucked away deep in his pocket, he set his eyes to search for somewhere where he could escape the steady drizzle. The subway was always an option and he had passed more than one night huddled there underground, his hood pulled low and chin to his chest as he took up unnoticed space on a bench, but the chill had settled deep into his bones and he knew that it wouldn't be enough. He needed to dry out, at the very least.

He was in a unique position. Erik had nothing and no one. There was no warm couch or hot shower awaiting him once a week if he simply knocked on the right door. Over the last winter, on a particularly bitter day, he had finally decided that he needed to humble himself and seek some sort of help before frostbite actually settled in.

The shelters turned him away. One particularly soft-hearted woman had offered him a windbreaker with the tips of her fingers and a halfway frightened apology. They couldn't accept a man with no ID and a mask, and he couldn't bring himself to remove it. If the mask frightened them into turning him out into subzero temperatures he didn't want to know what the face under it would lead them to do.

His fingers shook so badly that he struggled to unscrew the top of his little silver flask - one of his only possessions that he was fairly sure hadn't been stolen. He wasn't sure who it had belonged to, father, grandfather perhaps. He only knew that the sloppy initials etched into it weren't his own. It helped. He found that if he could maintain just the slightest buzz, it warmed him from the inside when he couldn't find a place to actually warm himself.

He screwed the cap back on, slipping it back into his jacket pocket, and when he looked up he froze in the center of the sidewalk.

Aimlessly he had wandered but when he looked up, he was met with four buzzing neon red letters. "JAZZ".

Someone pushed past him, their shoulder bumping his aggressively, and he told himself that if it wasn't so goddamn cold, he would have kept walking.

Almost on its own, his hand pulled the door open and he was entering the semi-familiar darkened lobby.

It was early yet and he loitered near the darkened corners, knowing that he would have to step back out. If he drew too much attention, he was sure that he would be kicked out before he could leave. So he allowed himself a few moments of luxury in the heated lobby, doing his best to keep his face turned away from passer-bys, and then he stepped back out into the miserable and near constant drizzle.

It wasn't quite as miserable as it had been. The rain slowed to a misty sort of drizzle, inescapable without walls, but light enough that it was more of an inconvenience than a threat. He wasn't sure why exactly his feet carried him around the block and back down the alleyway, he only knew that they did and he followed them, knowing that he had time to waste before he could dare to slip back inside the building.

It wasn't until he had nearly made it to that back door that he saw her and froze.

She was huddled back in the alleyway beside that very first nondescript door he had slipped through, puffing quietly on a cigarette. Her jacket was long, black, but he could see the teasing of a blue skirt trying to escape. Her hair had begun to frizz, the golden curls looking just a bit less silky than they had the week before. He would never know what possessed him to approach her instead of finding someplace else to linger.

"Smoking will ruin your voice."

"Frank Sinatra smoked a whole pack before his shows," she countered, shivering in the lingering drizzle of rain and pulling her jacket a little tighter. "Said it kept his voice smooth."

"Frank Sinatra is dead."

She took another slow, thoughtful drag and let the smoke wisp from between her wine colored lips. "If only we could all be so lucky," she mumbled. "What's your deal, anyway? I've seen you. Why are you always wearing that thing?"

She didn't have to gesture, as she so kindly did, for him to know that she was talking about his mask. He shifted on his feet. "Because I am hideously ugly underneath it," he answered honestly.

Her laugh was a huff and she tapped the ash off of her cigarette. "Yeah, me too," she said, seeming to watch him out of the corner of her eye. "I think mine would probably hurt more to take off though."

"You have a lovely voice."

That same frown he had seen the very first night made a reappearance, more contemplative than it was sad. "Thanks," she mumbled, taking yet another drag off of the white cigarette between her fingers. "You stalking me or something?"

There wasn't an ounce of fear to be found in her at the notion. She spoke the words as simply and easily as if she were discussing the weather. "Not yet," he answered, watching her as he shifted just a bit closer to her. "Simply admiring."

"Admiring," she echoed with a breathy laugh. "I'm thinking of quitting, you know."

"That would be a grave sin," he answered seriously. "It is your soul, and it brings me great joy, hearing you sing."

"I have no soul left," she answered, the words melancholic and serious. She took another shivering drag from her cigarette and finally fixed her pretty blue eyes on him, pillowing her head against the brick of the building as she looked up at him. "Tell me, do you come for my voice?" she murmured thoughtfully. "Or do you come to fantasize about my legs wrapped around your neck later?"

"I come for your sadness," he countered, brazenly plucking the burning cigarette from between her fingers. "And because I still hope to learn your name."

"Christine," she answered on a huff, unmoving. "Give it back."

Hi pinched the filter between his thumb and forefinger, holding it up between them and looking at the purple-red stain of her lipstick under his fingertips. "If you are going to quit something, it should be this," he said seriously. "It will kill you twice, Christine."

When she reached up and took it back, her fingers brushed against his. "And what's your name, then?"

"Erik."

"Erik," she murmured in return, her voice low. "I thank you for the unsolicited and unnecessary advice. We ladies can be quite silly sometimes. It's good to have a man around to keep us straight."

He might have found himself offended at her implication if she wasn't so close to him. There was something guarded in her eyes as she stared back at him unblinking.

"I think you lie," she said slowly. "I think if I fucked you right now, you would be gone come next week."

It was like she had stolen the breath from his lungs. When he laid his hand against the brick it wasn't to lean in on her, it was simply to keep himself upright. "You're wrong," he answered when his mind finally caught up with him.

"Am I?" she murmured, holding eye contact with him. "About what? You do want to fuck me, don't you, Erik?"

"You are a beautiful woman," he mumbled.

"And you would give me the sun, the stars and the moon," she said softly. "I've heard it all. My voice is lovely, and when I look out the next week, they're gone."

He swallowed, watching her breathlessly as her tongue darted out to wet her lips.

"I have to go, Erik," she said, her free hand pressing against his chest to push him away. "I'm here on Sundays. Every Sunday."

He took a step back, giving her room, and she took one more drag off of her cigarette before she tossed the burning thing toward the center of the alleyway.

"Maybe I'll see you."