"Common Corey, focus! Where's your head?" Corey's obese manager said, interrupting her brooding thoughts. She blinked and slowly looked around at her surroundings. She saw a stainless steel counter, her hands wrapped in transparent rubber gloves, and a dozen slices of yellow cheese squares stacked in a star shaped pile. Her head concluded she was still at work.
As her hands thoughtlessly carried out their mundane tasks, her mind returned to the gray reflections that haunted her. She had lost count of how many days had gone by since Tony stormed from her apartment, leaving behind his venomous words and her shattered sense of self. She revisited the memory of that moment as if it was moving picture in her head, though she danced around it carefully, unwilling to fully immerse her thoughts on the pain she felt at that moment… The gut wrenching pain she felt as Tony's words pierced her guts and let her fantasies and self esteem bleed out onto the floor in an a puddle of liquid failure.
She pulled herself from the dark defeated thoughts for a moment, to remember what it felt like to be her… to be the Corey she wanted to be. Corey the vigilante, Corey the zebra. As her mind pulled the sparkly images of her masked self from her thoughts, she felt a dark mass of negative emotions ooze across them, created by Tony's eviscerating words and far more damning, her own realizations.
Though clouded with shades of doubt and insecurity, she recalled herself standing calm in the face of adversity. The memory sparkled in her troubled mind like a soiled gem half submerged in a muddy shore. Corey bit her bottom lip and closed her eyes tightly. She wished she could meditate on those memories, but she could only dwell on them briefly, before reality settled in.
Her fingers curled tightly into her own palm, as the face of the one who hurt her flashed in her mind. His orange fireball eyes bored into hers, and his words gleefully rushed to assault her, from his bared teeth and snarling lips. She closed her eyes until the feelings subsided, and waited until Tony's furious face faded from her mind.
She opened her eyes, and the darkness was replaced by the sterile florescent lighting, and the unfeeling stainless steel workplace. Her manager, thankfully, was nowhere to be seen. She heard his voice coming from the front, coaching the new cashier boy as he fumbled with the register.
She caught a glimpse of Alex from the corner of her eyes. Even the self absorbed blonde seemed to have noticed Corey's shift in mood over the last few days. Alex watched her in between sideways glances. She seemed curious rather then showing any concern for her well being. Which was just as well for Corey, she didnt want pity, not from Alex, not from anyone.
Pity wouldnt validate the woman she had become over the last few weeks. Sympathy wouldnt bring back the persona she had been nurturing inside of her. She had cared for her alter ego like a proud expectant mother, only to have it die in her womb and poison her thoughts.
After her colorless shift was over, she quickly gathered her things and shuffled out the back door. Her feet quickly lost their momentum as they carried her body towards the bus stop. "Miserable at work, miserable in her apartment, what's the difference?" She grit her teeth. She was not only miserable and pathetic, but painfully predictable and monotonous as well.
She clenched her teeth. She knew, that even time wouldnt cure this wound. Time could reshape mountains, destroy empires and swallow entire cultures and languages into abyss, but it would not outlast a circular rut. A repeating cycle of painful reflection and self abuse. Well, time would outlast the damage, but Corey would not.
She walked passed the bus stop and kept walking. She knew what a night at home would be like, what another day at work would feel like. She had to make a change. She didnt know where her body was taking her at first, but as she soon recognized the buildings and landmarks around her.
She stopped in front of the familiar ruined building, that contained the basement she had re purposed into her vigilante training ground. While it had once felt like a home away from home, she now felt uneasy and out of place. Though the open doorway she watched the lethargic movements of her hideouts new tenements, the junkys and homeless who languished away inside. She watched them, silently for a moment, before turning away.
Tony was not here. If he had been, the squatters wouldnt be lounging around so calmly. Each time they had reclaimed their little slice of downtown Miami, the homeless and druggies knew better then to face Tony's wrath. Yet each time Corey and Tony returned, so had the homeless ahead of them. It was as they were simply waiting for them to give up, that the effort of throwing them out and cleaning up their filth again and again would finally wear them down.
Corey grimaced. He willpower wasnt as strong as she thought it was. She had given up. First on her basement hideout, then on her dreams entirely. She looked down at her feet with crossed, unfocused eyes. Even back in the early days she had proven her worth. Not a damned thing.
She returned home… probably by taxi, though she didnt quite remember. Her mind was a gray blur when she found herself in her apartment. She stripped off her work shirt and bra, and stepped out of her jeans, leaving a line of clothes from her front door to her bedroom. She shuffled aimlessly towards the little comfort she had left, her warm bed.
She stopped as she first entered her room and slowly turned towards her wall, the collage of all things Jacket, the labor of love, the first physical manifestation of her fantasies. Her eyes stung with the bitter pain of tears beginning to well and drip from her eyelids. Her hand darted foreword and gripped the picture of her and her military unit, the picture she had pathetically altered. She yanked it from the wall, tearing a jagged line where the push pin had secured it to the wall, and began to crumple it in her hand.
Just as her hand began to squeeze, to compress the crumpled photo into a dense, ruined ball, the strength in her hand gave out. She held the crumpled photo in her hand with a gentle grip, trying to force her tears back inside of her head. When her eyes were finally dry (and riddled with painful red veins) she moved closer to the wall and flattened the photo against it with her fingertips. She pinned the damaged photo back to its original spot on the wall and took a step back.
It was crumpled and ugly, but still there, much like her tattered delusions. She smiled bitterly. She wasnt sure if this was anything to be pleased with but she relished the moment anyway. Deep down, she knew it most likely wasnt a victory as much as the inability to let go… but she at least was choosing to see it as a win, and that in itself was a victory.
The next day at work was just as soul rending as the last. The day after that was even worse. She didnt even pretend to be ok anymore, what was the worst they could do to her, fire her? It would just be an excuse to curl up in her bed and stay there. She preformed her expected duties, as if someone had injected liquid metal into her limbs. Her hands were slow and clumsy, her feet awkward and indecisive.
How she felt now was the exact opposite of how she did when she had flown to Tony's aid at their big hit. The surge of adrenaline and speed felt like high octane fuel exploding through every vein. The sense of power and physical prowess as she stood over the gunman was immensely pleasurable, as was the sensation of his bones breaking at the end of her pipe. Those feelings were growing all the more distant with each passing day, replaced by the sensation of being trapped in the one place she could never retreat from. Her own mind.
She heard the noises come from the managers lips, but her mind didnt make sense of them right away. It couldnt, it was to lost and damaged to translate the sounds into words. She continued to stare down at her work space, as the noises grew louder. She felt his hand on her shoulder as he forcefully turned her around to face him. She looked at him, but she couldnt see him. She felt a sickening feeling in her gut, as she felt the unstoppable tide begin to flow from her. She tightly closed her eyes, and grit her teeth in concentration, but it was far to late. Warm, miserable tears poured from her clenched eyelids against her will. She was not only shedding tears in front of her manager, in front of the other co workers, she was openly weeping. Sorrow, humiliation, and pain flowed from her in those tears, she no longer bothered to fight it.
After what felt like an eternity, the tears finally slowed, her weeping replaced by choking cries and sniffles. She regained enough of her composure to feel ashamed for sobbing in front of her coworkers and did her best to try and force herself to stop. She sucked in gasping breaths from her clenched teeth, and let out trembling breaths, keeping her eyes down at her feet and away from the manager.
Her manager stood before her like a statue, frozen in intense awkwardness. She practically felt his discomfort emanate from his body like like radioactive waves. It was then at her lowest that she felt something very surprising.
Her manager's hand reached out and gently squeezed her arm. She slowly brought her blurry gaze up at the portly man, her mind still dizzy from the release of pent up emotions. To her surprise, the manager looked genuinely concerned. His hand gently ran up and down the side of her arm as he carefully chose his words. "Why dont you take the rest of the week off, with pay. Come back when your ready." The manager said gingerly.
Corey blinked and stared at him for a few moments before nodding her head in a jerky motion. The manager smiled awkwardly and let his hand drop from Corey's arm, letting his hands fidget together in front of him. "Good, you gotta take care of yourself… if you cant do that, you wont be able to do much of anything. So… yea, take care of yourself Corey." The manager said with a little grimace and a nod.
Corey took her managers advice. She left the restaurant behind her and took to the streets. She didnt know why, but her feet were taking her back to that place, the ruined basement she gave up without so much as a fight. Perhaps her feet, and her subconsciousness were punishing her by rubbing her nose in her failure. She grit her teeth and kept walking, a slave to her own mind.
As sickeningly cathartic as it was for Corey to kick herself when she was down, apart of her believed it was for another reason her feet were dragging her back there. Her teeth clattered against one another, as a chill swept through her body, despite the hot and humid day. She realized what it was that was driving her, what hidden secret she had tucked away. Hope…
She yearned to stand before the front of her building, to see that the bum population had been forcefully migrated, to step into the filthy basement and find Tony waiting for her as if nothing had happened… She still hadnt forgiven Tony, and she doubted if she ever could. Apart of her wanted an apology, before she would even consider taking him back… but she knew the chances of Tony doing something like that would be practically impossible. Even if he felt genuine remorse for what he said and did, he would rather die then admit any wrong doing.
She smiled softly to herself. She had grown to understand the big brute far more then she ever thought she would. He was brutish, single minded, selfish and self absorbed… yet here she was, hoping against all odds, to find him waiting for her, to take her back as if she was the one who left him. She couldnt help but laugh at how preposterous it all was. The more she thought about it, the closer she got to her secret basement, the more she chided herself on the idiocy of her own logic.
The Junkys, homeless and otherwise, were lounging about in their drug veiled bliss. They were doing what Corey should have been, numbing their pain through any means necessary. She let her wavering gaze drop to her feet, as the welling of tears returned. She closed her eyes and didnt open them until the moment of weakness had passed. Eventually she turned away from the ruined house and returned to the path from which she came. She kept her eyes down at the street in front of her feet and never looked back.
She found herself in her apartment once again. Her body was still operating on its own, her mind was to busy sifting through mental baggage to be bothered to handle mundane tasks like walking to the kitchen and feeding herself. She knew she must have been starving, she hadnt eaten anything all day, and the only thing she could recall nibbling on the day before, was the turkey sandwich she had brought brought from home.
She glanced at the telephone next to the couch where she sat. After a brief struggle with lethargy, she managed to muster the effort to reach for the phone to order a pizza. Just as her fingertips brushed against the smooth plastic receiver, she heard a tiny rap against her door. She paused, and strained her hearing. She wasnt expecting visitors, and unless they found a new break through in pizza ordering technology, it wasnt a delivery man. She waited until she heard it again, a timid knock on her door, starting slow and quiet for the first two raps, slowly building up into three clearly audible knocks.
Corey set the phone down and rose from the couch. She cautiously slunk towards the door. She checked the peephole, but couldnt see anything but a black shroud. Whoever was behind the door was standing to close, and all she could see was the figures dark shirt. She reached for the lock on the door hesitantly with one hand, while the other reached out to the handle of her aluminum bat. She slid the deadlock back and opened the door carefully peeking around the cracked doorway. Her eyes widened in surprise, and her fingers released the handle of the bat.
Tony stood before her in the doorway, his head hung down at an angle, his eyes avoiding direct contact. She waited with baited breath, her eyes still frozen with astonishment. Tony opened his mouth to speak, before reconsidering. He kept his own eyes low, slowly trailing up Corey's form until they cautiously peered down into her expectant gaze.
Finally he spoke. "It felt… like everything I wanted and more… I was king of the universe, I was god of man, I was… power incarnate." Tony said out of the corner of his mouth and teeth, his eyes staring off to the side, pained and reluctant. Corey moved her curious gaze from each of his orange hazel eyes, to the grimace on his lips, as he struggled finish his sentiment. "It was everything I wanted… but when it was all over, I just felt… I dont know… empty, and fucking sick to my stomach. All that was left was that… fuckingscumbag on the ground, the blood on my hands. It still feels fucking weird." Tony said softly, his jaw relaxing for the first time since he arrived.
She stood in front of Tony for what felt like an eternity. Apart of her wanted to throw open the door and hug the big brute, and the other wanted to press him for an apology, or at least for more information. Eventually she took a step back and opened the door. No sooner then she had, Tony pushed his way inside gruffly, heading straight for the couch where he sat down, staring at the blank tv. Corey watched him silently for a few moments before closing and locking the door.
The rest of the night was surreal to Corey. Tony was behaving in the most agreeable manner she had ever witnessed, he was nearly pleasant. Whenever he scoffed at her questions and ideas, his taunts were only slightly cruel and cutting. Still, she could see him making an effort, and she couldnt help but feel flattered at the special treatment.
A light bulb lit up above her head as she remembered something. Tony glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, raising a brow inquisitively, as she sprung to her feet suddenly, and darted into her room. Tony waited, his arms stretched out over the back of the couch, his knees wide apart, taking up as much space as humanly possible. Corey returned, her zebra mask back on its rightful place, over her face, and holding Tony's belongings in her hands.
She threw his leather finger-less gloves at Tony first. He caught one of them, but the other one smacked against his chest and fell onto his lap. Tony glanced down at them and nodded in recollection before slipping them on. Corey waited until he tightened the straps of his gloves before lifting up the other item he left behind. His bloodied tiger mask. She moved her arm to give it a small underhand toss, but it felt somehow disrespectful to her, so she instead walked in front of the big man, and held it out to him. Corey noticed Tony's left eye flinch as he saw the mask, before he hardened his expressions and snatched it from her hand. He muttered thanks under his breath and pulled it over his head.
"Fits like a glove." He said nonchalantly, shifting the eye holes to line up. Her heart soared hearing those words leave Tony's lips. She was half expecting some kind of dialogue on if they truly wanted to continue there… game, experience, relationship?
Corey blinked under her mask. What exactly was it she and Tony shared? It wasnt a game, it was far more real to Corey then anything else in her life. Work, her nonexistent love life, her friends and family, they didnt even come close. She couldnt call it a shared fantasy either, when they had quickly worked to make it into reality. All it really was… was her and Tony, a relationship of sorts.
Corey eyed tony out of the corner of her eyes. She was pretty sure she didnt feel any romantic feelings towards him, non that surpassed a simple animal attraction to his Olympian form. Truthfully, he was a very hard man to endure, yet she had learned how to avoid his jagged edges, and how to exploit his flaws to help make conversation and planning tolerable. She even enjoyed dancing around Tony's edges and belligerent quirks to some degree. She liked whatever it was she had with Tony and she decided to leave it at that for now.
Corey ordered a pizza while Tony downed the two beers she had in the fridge before walking behind the couch to do one handed push ups. Corey smirked and leaned back to look over at his form thrusting up and down. It felt like the incident had never happened. She felt a warm glow inside of her chest as she rose from the couch. She was as terrified as she was giddy, but that wasnt going to stop her. She had already let negative thinking nearly rob her already, she would never put Corey the zebra into a cage again… but for that Corey to truly come to life, she needed to be reborn. She needed an experience, no simple conversation would do. She needed her turn to kill someone.
She walked over to Tony, looking down at him as he pushed his body up and down with one hand, his other tucked behind the small of his back. He didnt look at her, but looked straight down, focused on his movements. She watched him for awhile, before she turned and sat her rump down on his shoulder, gently pressing half of her weight down, before lifting her feet from the ground to fully sit on Tony's hard, muscular back and shoulders. Tony's action came to a stop as she did this, but he kept his eyes down on the floor. After only a few moments he continued his exercise, hoisting Corey up into the air with his powerful movements. Corey smiled to herself at the roughness of his actions. The added weight of her body was little more then a challenge to Tony, and he cared not if her ride on his back was gentle or not.
Her smile slowly faded as she began to word her next statement, and the anxiety began to flicker in the pits of her stomach once again. She had something important to say, and she had to say it, now while the momentum was still there. "I know it wasnt exactly how you imagined it… or it was, but it also wasnt…" Corey frowned. "Off to a great start..." Tony slowed his actions as he listened, turning his head towards her. Corey continued. "I have to find out what its like Tony… I need to find out for myself." She said. Tony hoisted her up a bit as he switched arms suddenly, and continued with his exercise. "You did almost everything I did." Tony said frankly. Corey crossed her arms and looked down at her knees in thought. "Not everything…" Corey said softly.
Tony scoffed and shook his head, continuing his push ups even rougher then before. Corey used her feet to stabilize herself, to avoid slipping off. "You can laugh all you want, but you know what its like, and I dont…" Corey said firmly. Tony didnt respond, he just kept up his pace. Corey had lost count of how many times the big brute had bobbed her up and down by now, but Tony showed little signs of tiring.
Corey hesitated for awhile, before whispering. "Would you ever want to do it again…?" Corey asked gently. Tony grunted, shook his shoulders, knocking She from his back and back onto her feet. She turned around and watched him straighten back up. He looked off to the side for a few moments, before turning his fire orange eyes towards her, a familiar intensity rekindled inside his fierce gaze. "I couldnt stop thinking about it… It was a hell of a crash, but that was nothing compared to the rush of the action. No way in hell we're stopping now." Tony said firmly. The corners of Corey's lips twitched as they turned into a broad smile. "Alright… lets do this then. No more holding back this time." Corey said, thrusting her hands into the pockets of her Dolphins starter jacket. "This time we'll kill them all."