Chapter 8 - Paper Fortune
In Night Vale nearly everything can be dangerous - especially questions.

In a foggy dream, Cecil was sitting on the side of Carlos's bed, busily scrawling away on a scrap of what looked like colorful wrapping paper. It had to be a dream, because he was using a pen - the first one Carlos had seen in weeks due to the reinstatement of the municipal ban. Cecil looked up suddenly, his amber eyes warm like honey in the late morning sunlight. His smile was vibrant as he reached over and ran his fingers through dark, messy curls, tucking them behind Carlos's ear. Cecil looked impossibly perfect in the morning light. "You're dreaming," he murmured. Carlos continued to watch in fascination as dexterous fingers folded the wrapping paper into a paper fortune like the ones all the girls used to make in middle school. A few quiet moments later, content with the result, Cecil turned back to Carlos, leaned in close and whispered, "Close your eyes, beautiful, wonderful Carlos." The scientist smiled widely as Cecil gently kissed the side of his forehead exactly where thinking always hurt the worst. In the same smooth motion, he set the fortune on the bedside table and rose to leave. He paused in the doorway to whisper a word that sounded like 'raspberry.'

"Hm?" Carlos yawned.

"Nothing," Cecil replied, one corner of his mouth tilting into a shy smile before he closed the door softly.

Carlos awoke with a thud as the bed spat him onto the floor. Between the blue glow in the room and the lack of sunlight outside, he was a bit disoriented. The swirling numbers on the wall clock read 1:38. Outside the window it was raining, but Carlos didn't want to know what it was raining, so he pushed himself to his feet and pulled the tall ivory curtains closed quickly. With a contented stretch, he looked around the room. Sheer curiosity got the better of him, and he wandered over to the bedside table. Sure enough, there sat the little paper fortune, neatly folded in bright paper patterned with reindeer and snowflakes. Self-consciously, his right hand traced along his forehead where Cecil's lips must have also really been. A warm shiver passed through him and he couldn't help smiling as he unfolded the fortune.

Good morning, Carlos!

I hope you slept well. I apologize for leaving so early to work. I would have called in sick, but just last week Station Management sent out a memo stating that all sick day requests must be accompanied by physical proof of severe maiming , death, or the H1N1 virus which they are attempting to keep from spreading as badly as it did last year. There is decaf coffee in the pot and a lovely avocado gazpacho in the fridge. Make yourself at home!

If you're gone by the time I get back, call me and let me know you're alright.
Cecil

Carlos carefully folded the note and was about to tuck it into his pocket when he remembered that his pocket wasn't actually his pocket. He glanced around and caught sight of his plaid shirt and jeans all freshly laundered and folded in a neat pile on the dresser. He held them up to his nose. They smelled wonderful, like jasmine and lavender. Tentatively, he held up the floppy sleeve of the burgundy hoodie he still wore and inhaled for comparison. It smelled like teakwood and Cecil. He decided a few more minutes of guilty pleasure wouldn't hurt. After all, Cecil never had to know. Carlos wandered out through the pristine open dining room. The kitchen was compact, but quaintly charming. It took a while of poking through the cupboards until he finally found a mug that wasn't filled with holes or adorned with a truly preposterous number of handles. It was small and the chipping paint depicted a horrifyingly grisly image of Little Red Riding Hood with a bloody axe above the slogan 'Fairytale Land – the actual happiest place on earth! - 1984', but again Carlos just shrugged and lifted the still-warm coffee pot. The liquid inside was thicker than coffee should be, but he took a sip and it tasted alright; he tried not to think too much about what was actually in it. He noticed that the sun was shining on this side of the house, so he leaned against the counter by the window and sipped his coffee slowly. It was astounding how much a good night of sleep could do for one's outlook. He felt more normal and at ease than he had in the almost-twelve months since arriving in town. After he finished a second mug of the coffee-like substance, Carlos found himself wandering to the living room window, curious to see if it was still raining on this side of the house. Viscous pools of a brownish liquid and the occasional soggy donut freckled the cobblestone street. Carlos watched as Old Woman Josie ambled along the sidewalk, mouth stuffed with saturated pastries. She spotted him in the window and shot him a wink accompanied by a friendly wave. Waving back amiably, he peered to the opposite curb where he had parked his car last night behind Cecil's coupe. He realized with a shock that the entire opposite side of the street was different than it had been the night before. The previous night he had parked in a long line of parked cars, and noticed as he stepped around and onto the sidewalk that there was a lovely little gated park with a fountain that seemed to flow in impossible directions. Now as he blinked, he was stunned to see a row of slightly obsolescent houses abutting a completely empty curb.

His head was already beginning to spin again as he realized that he wasn't safe from Night Vale after all, not even here in the oasis of Cecil's seemingly normal townhouse. His stomach grumbled a complaint, reminding him that he hadn't eaten in longer than he could recall. He shivered and hugged his arms to his body. How Cecil could exist in such perpetual cold and yet still feel the need to wear layers out into the sunbaked desert, Carlos couldn't understand. Hurrying to the kitchen, he set his mug in the sink and scrounged through cupboards until he found what appeared to be some sort of berry muffin. He smelled it to make sure it was still good and decided to take it with him back to Cecil's bedroom where he could at least bundle in the blankets to warm up a bit. On the way he was met with even more reminders he hadn't noticed the previous night of just how off things were, even within the fragile normality he felt around Cecil. The photo frames on the dresser contained nothing but blurry, out-of-focus shots of scenery as if the people or focal objects in the foreground had been removed. The wall the bed was situated against seemed strangely permeable, Carlos discovered, as he misjudged the distance to the light switch and accidentally slipped his hand straight through. Even the pale blueish glow didn't seem to originate from any particular light source as much as it simply existed in the room. Carlos let out a frustrated grunt as he climbed back into the bed, flopping down against a pillow and pulling the blanket up over his head as if it would somehow block out the fact that the world had once again ceased to make any sense.

The sound of knocking on the door woke the scientist from a restless dream. He sat up with a bolt, unaware he had even fallen asleep. His glasses were cocked to one side, his hair matted where it had been unceremoniously squished against the bed frame. The unexpected nap had left him dreadfully disoriented. The sun seemed to be in the wrong side of the sky, and the clock on the wall read 7:23, though he had learned not to trust clocks most of the time.

"Carlos?" Cecil asked quietly. "Are you awake?" Carlos glanced down, realizing with sudden horror that he was still wearing Cecil's clothes. He swore under his breath.

"Just a second," he replied, hastily tugging the blankets up on the bed, which growled at him in response. He ran a hand through his hair in a futile attempt to tame it and adjusted his glasses before opening the door. Cecil smiled at him cheerily, not seeming to notice just how much of a mess Carlos was at the moment.

"Good morning," Cecil announced brightly. Carlos's eyes widened, and Cecil's smile vanished. "I didn't wake you did I? I know you're tired, I was going to let you sleep, but then I saw you'd been up for coffee and-" his smooth voice stuttered, which sounded unusual, though adorable. He sighed quickly. "Do you want pancakes?" Carlos shut his eyes, feeling his cheeks flush at the realization.

"I'm sorry, Cecil," he apologized, covering his face with a hand. "I feel terrible. I didn't intend to fall asleep again, and now I've overstayed and put you on the couch two nights running." Cecil laughed unexpectedly, dropping his head and allowing his shoulders to shake slightly.

"It's not really morning, Carlos. You've only been here one day." He grinned, cocking his head to one side and biting his lower lip adoringly.

"But it's 7, and you just offered me pancakes," Carlos explained weakly.

"Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. I just didn't want you to miss it." Carlos was sure he was blushing as he stared at the floor intently. "I'm glad you stayed, though," Cecil offered after a moment.

"My car disappeared. I think the whole street disappeared," Carlos mumbled. Cecil let out a breathy sigh.

"It's Tuesday, isn't it? It always seems to come one day too early in the week. All the same, I'm glad you're still here." Carlos glanced up at that, offering a semblance of a smile. "Anyway, pancakes?" Cecil asked again, clasping his hands behind his back.

"Alright, just let me get dressed," the scientist replied. Cecil nodded and bounced off to the kitchen. Carlos quickly dressed back in his own clothing, grateful to be wearing sleeves that didn't dangle awkwardly past his fingertips. He left Cecil's clothes outside the door and wandered out to the kitchen where he found the radio host mixing up a thick batter in a plastic dish.

"I hope you don't mind it's made with rice flour. They started selling it a few weeks ago down at the Ralph's and I can't quite say I've gotten used to using it, though I've perfected a few recipes here and there. Do you like cardamom in your pancakes?" Carlos shrugged. "You will," Cecil assured him, reaching down and producing a frying pan. He placed it on an open burner and turned to pull two plates from the cupboard next to the fridge. Carlos wondered if Cecil cooked often, but he felt somehow strange asking the man personal questions.

"Thanks," he said finally as he leaned against the countertop next to the stove. Cecil looked up at him curiously, as if he didn't understand what he could have possibly done to merit gratitude. "For letting me stay here, for the clothes, and for making these," the scientist nodded towards the batter shape Cecil was drawing in the pan using the tip of a spoon. Cecil just shrugged off the comment, but Carlos could tell the man was flushing slightly even as he focused intently on his edible art project. In a single graceful motion, he flipped the shape, which Carlos now realized was an angelfish, and began tracing a new shape in the opposite side of the pan. Cecil looked flawlessly composed as usual in a sweater vest of sky blue. His sleeves were rolled to the elbows however, revealing intricately twisted indigo tattoos that crept most of the way to his wrists. Carlos hadn't taken Cecil to be the tattoo type; suddenly the cardigans and long sleeves made slightly more sense. Some of the shapes appeared to be tentacles that reminded Carlos vaguely of the HP Lovecraft novels he used to read for every book report in the fifth grade. He wanted to ask when Cecil had gotten the tattoos, if they had any significance, how far up his arms they went, maybe even spread across his shoulders… The scientist let out an amused snort at the growing list of personal questions he refused to ask.

"How are you feeling today? Any better?" Cecil asked, looking away from his creations only long enough to flash a bright smile. Carlos nodded, his eyes still strangely drawn to watching Cecil's slender hands carefully work away at the pancakes. There was something mesmerizing about the way he moved, as if every simple motion had some grander meaning. "It's amazing how much a good night of sleep can change your outlook," Cecil agreed, flipping another shape – an iguana – onto the plate. They were quiet for a long time. Carlos was content to watch Cecil work as giraffe after squirrel after octopus were flipped out onto the growing menagerie of pancakes. He was just flipping a perfectly browned soaring falcon to its second side when he finally spoke again, his voice shifting slightly into a more serious tone. "Have you thought any more about what I told you last night?" He asked the question without looking away from the pan. Carlos studied his face carefully, not exactly sure what he meant. Cecil glanced over at him before turning his attention back to the pancake, prodding at the edge with a spatula. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure," Carlos replied.

"When you say you lost your scientists to insanity, what do you mean? Do you mean you physically lost them? Or that you found them wandering in the desert driven mad and incoherent?" Cecil's tone was neither condescending nor sardonic, simply curious.

"Neither, I guess," Carlos admitted, crossing his arms defensively across his chest out of habit. "I guess what I meant is that there are basic tenets that we in the scientific field hold to. Beliefs. For example: the belief that everything is explainable. That there is a fact behind every mystery." He stared as Cecil carefully laid the falcon on the top of the pancake stack. "Night Vale started to get to them though. Almost half of them stopped showing up one-by-one. The rest just quit looking, quit trying. I would have them file reports on their findings, and when prompted for causes, they would simply write 'Because it just is.' And when asked for a description of processes or methods, they would answer 'It doesn't actually matter.'" Cecil carefully divided the pancakes between the two plates, first setting the iguana with the hawk and angelfish and then hesitating and swapping it with the squirrel. He handed the hawk plate to Carlos and led him to the rectangular dining room table.

"Is that such a bad thing?" he asked, seating Carlos at the end and scooting his own chair closer to the corner.

"Well, yes," Carlos answered simply. "We're here to find answers. It's a very bad thing to give up on the entire purpose of our research. I told them as much one day, and I told them anyone who didn't see the point in trying to discover solid answers was free to leave. What was left of my team walked out the door that day." He poked at the angelfish with the tip of his fork. "Now it's just me and a strange breathing that emanates from my apartment." Cecil nodded understandingly as he swallowed a bite of the iguana.

"How do you know you're not wrong?" he asked nonchalantly as he separated one of the iguanas legs carefully from the body.

"What?" Carlos was slightly offended by the question even though he didn't fully understand it.

"How do you know you're not wrong?" Cecil repeated simply, adding a smile to soften the question. It wasn't much help, aside from seeming very out of place. "Maybe they didn't give up. Maybe they just…stopped asking the wrong questions," Cecil shrugged.

"The questions aren't wrong, Cecil. Questioning things, the need to know, pure curiosity – it's the very framework of science itself," Carlos explained as simply as he could. He knew Cecil wasn't purposefully being unkind, so he tried his best to be patient.

"Alright, but if you keep asking the wrong questions, you're going to kill yourself one of these days," Cecil cautioned with a shake of his head.

"I'm fairly certain you can't die of frustration," Carlos commented dryly. Cecil sighed and set his fork down, staring at the table for a moment.

"Carlos, have you ever heard the story of curiosity and the cat?" he asked finally.

"Curiosity killed the cat," Carlos replied flatly. After all he'd been through, he wasn't in the mood for a lecture on the merits of caution and the safety of going through life ignorantly blissful.

"Carlos," Cecil said peevishly, crinkling his forehead in disapproval. "You spoiled the ending." He huffed. "And anyway curiosity did not kill the cat, not immediately. The cat was first abducted by secret police, a bag was placed over its head, and it was then tortured and interrogated for information it may or may not have actually known before it was placed against a brick wall and executed by firing squad." Cecil dramatically sliced the head off the giraffe-shaped pancake as he finished the story. Carlos stared down wide-eyed at his untouched stack of pancakes, suddenly very thankful none of them were cats. Cecil sighed again, looking back up at Carlos with more patience. "If you keep asking the wrong questions, you're going to kill yourself," he repeated gently, carefully emphasizing each word. Carlos nodded, suddenly slightly frightened by the intensity in Cecil's vermilion eyes. "Besides, like I said last night, some things we're not able to know. And some things you shouldn't question because knowing doesn't matter. You'll only drive yourself crazy trying to find out reasons why, when all along all you were meant to do was merely acknowledge that it happened." It was startling how quickly Cecil seemed to slip from his terrifyingly foreboding radio persona back into the effervescently charming, quirky man who folded paper fortunes and wore ugly sweaters.

"So what are the right questions then?" Carlos asked, his voice sounding scratchy and hoarse. Cecil's strangely worded warning had shaken him slightly, and he found himself feeling almost as afraid of knowing as he already was of not knowing. Cecil thought for a moment, pushing the last bite of the giraffe around his plate.

"The right question is 'What do you believe?'" His eyes were unblinking, pale lavender and remarkably clear as he waited for a response. Carlos looked away, feeling oddly exposed.

"What do I believe?" he repeated with a short laugh. "I don't believe half the things I see every day." He squeezed his eyes shut, willing away the ever-present sense of insanity that crept at the edges of his consciousness.

"Maybe you should," Cecil replied quietly. Carlos shook his head.

"How?" He looked back up at Cecil, already beginning to feel the crushing sensation of drowning that had accompanied his every waking moment the past few weeks. Cecil reached out a hand and rested it on Carlos's unconscious white-knuckled death grip on his fork. The muscles relaxed immediately at the soothing touch, allowing the fork to clatter softly to the tabletop.

"Give me one evening, and I'll show you. Do you trust me?" Carlos nodded because he did trust Cecil, despite every logical nerve in his body telling him not to. Cecil nodded too, rolling down his sleeves and buttoning the cuffs. "Finish your pancakes, I'll walk you to your car."

End Notes: I know canonically the glow cloud (all hail!) only rains dead animals, but I can't help my strange attraction to normal Night Vale clouds raining random objects that change every time as well. And Cecil smells like the teakwood & mahogany candles at B&BW and you can't convince me otherwise.
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