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Souls of the Night – Vol 3
41.
The following piece of music accompanies the first part of the chapter (Lyrics at the end) :
Youtube or Spotify: Little Do You Know || Alex & Sierra
watch?v=GP4okspbfMM&list=PLcwnbb50jmnQFTYoFKX3MDKPlq2rTScun&index=4
(3.04 min)
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The next day I walked until my feet hurt more than anything else, even more than my heart.
I started shortly after sunrise at home, where one of the guards had driven me after the disaster with Lexington. He hadn't asked any questions because "Mr. Wyvern" had certainly instructed him, but his eyes through the rearview mirror were hard and piercing as if he was fighting with himself not to drive me to the nearest hospital or police station. I didn't care what he thought, I knew what this looked like, after all I wasn't stupid (not anymore now that I'd been catapulted miles out of my moon drunken stupor). I cried the five minute drive home, I cried on the way to my front door which the man also walked me to, I cried as I breathlessly thanked him and then slammed the door in his face, I cried throughout the night alternately in my bed or on the bathroom floor.
I didn't throw up but it felt more natural to be there for hours. I should have thrown up. At the thought of my words. At the thought of HIS words. When I was finally too emotionally drained to continue hiccuping, crying or whimpering, I took a mechanical shower. I had taped up my bathroom mirror with newspaper and ignored the gargoyle-like horned blue-hued reflections in the bathroom fittings or windows of my apartment. I didn't want to be reminded of the echoes. I didn't even managed to be angry at them for causing all this, I just felt numb and empty after crying for so long. I dressed with my head low, loose pants that didn't press on my sore spots, sneakers, an undershirt and the fluffy bat sleeve poncho in my gargoyle skin shade of Prussian blue.
That helped quell the intense urge to pinch myself and bump into furniture to keep my human skin color nicely rendered. Not today. Because of this psycho shit, Lexington thought I would-I might have ... before I could finish the thought, I grabbed the big Elisa sunglasses she'd given me along with the first poncho and some bills (I'd left my purse with my wallet at work) and took off walking. I walked and walked and walked. Flatlands. Flatbush. Prospect Lefferts Gardens, Crown Hights, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Williamsburg, Greenpoint, through Astoria Park, crossing the East River, then across Randall and Wards Island (avoiding getting too close to the Manhattan Psychiatric Center - the way I looked, they would have kept me there ... or should they? Was that exactly where I was supposed to be?). In the evening, when the May sun no longer reached the streets between the skyscrapers, I found myself in one of the fancier blocks of Manhattan.
I was even past the point where my feet hurt so numb and sore they were. I had fallen back into an ancient coping strategy without thinking about it - because I had been avoiding thoughts all day. More than fifteen years ago, after Jussuf had outed me to my entire high school, my parents, the community, and incidentally gotten the particular teacher I'd written the love letter to back then fired, I'd walked too. I hadn't wanted to "run away" because I had known that I couldn't run away from the circumstances (the shock and disgust in my family, the whispering in the mosque, the malicious bullying from people in my school). I couldn't be comforted by the fact that we were about to take our exams because both Jussuf and part of my class would be going to the college I was supposed to go to, so the ordeal would continue. My reputation would even outrun me. Back then, the police had picked me up in White Plains after 15 hours - just before the Conneticut border. Not bad for an overweight teenager. A few years later, after the first "real" hard rapes by Jussuf, I was found more quickly because Jussuf himself had filed the missing persons report for his mentally unstable "foster brother", generously rounding up the hours I had spent with and under him to the necessary 24 hours and I was immediately taken to the psychiatric ward, from which HE of course rescued me as a loving "relative".
Now I was doing what I had wanted to avoid for as long as possible. I thought! Thoughts were bad, thoughts inevitably led to memories and Jussuf, my family AND Lexington were not good memories right now. And what did thinking make me do? It made me cry! I stood at an intersection in Manhattan and started sniffling again under my sunglasses. My lower lip was trembling and I felt like I was about to collapse. Just the thought of going to the Eyrie Building nearby was devastating me right now, I wasn't ready for a face-to-face, I wouldn't be collected enough, I'd just cry and stutter around like an idiot again.
I knew Lex would listen to me, maybe even believe me, but not if I couldn't get the whole story out in even halfway intelligible sentences and every pitying look from him or rightfully questioning comment stomped me into the ground so hard I couldn't get my message through. So no Eyrie Building, no clan, no work today (of course not), and yes, I had enough money to get a ride back to the Flatlands but what was I supposed to do but continue to be alone with my thoughts. Being alone in times of emotional instability could be poison - that's what Davis had said.
The traffic light changed to green for pedestrian traffic but I just remained standing, got jostled several times as people squeezed past me, got two or three snarky city slicker comments but a lot more irritated looks. And suddenly ... I had warm little fingers in my hand. No, a child's hand had grabbed mine. I looked to the side and Vito was there. Vito Dracon. He was wearing a T-shirt with the angular gargoyle logo and his smile was so sweet and warm that I automatically burst into more tears. He pulled me to a fancy luxury car where Sonny was standing and stabbing me with looks (which I kind of didn't care about at the moment).
"Vito. I told you not to pick up hobos and lunatics. We don't have time to buy him a sandwich," he growled, and a fiber of my brain realized that he didn't recognize me in my human form.
"This is Nate, Uncle Sonny. He needs our help," Vito said as he yanked me toward the open back door of the car and tried to push me inside. Despite my weakness, I bucked. Somehow I was reluctant to let myself be kidnapped by gangster offspring (no matter how sweet) and the murderous enforcer of the Dracon Syndicate. Sonny stared at me open-mouthed for a moment before shutting his mouth in silent acceptance of the fact that I was who Vito thought I was. The honking behind the stationary car got worse, Sonny yelled at the drivers behind us to pass before raising the lapels of his blazer under which even I could see a gun holster from behind and the recommended action was actually performed by the drivers. Sonny turned around with a grim face to discuss further.
"I'm not leaving him here. Can't you see he's crying! We have to take care of him," Vito insisted grimly. And Sonny growled in frustration as he came over to us and grabbed me roughly by the back of the neck like a struggling kitten. I froze instantly and stared at him with wide eyes, which he probably even saw because my sunglasses had slipped down.
"You heard my mini-boss, buttercup. He's really his parents' offspring. So ... we'll take care of you." And with these more than ambiguous words, he pushed me into the car so that I almost crashed through the window on the other side. Vito slid into the back seat behind me, while Sonny claimed the driver's seat again. When I got up, Sonny stared at me with his most menacing look, making me cower in the high-quality seats.
"If you cause trouble back there, piss all over my seats in fear or even look at Vito askew, you'll have a hole in your skull - capisce?"
I nodded frantically and to my relief he turned around, fastened his seatbelt, started the engine and drove off.
Vito slid into the seat right next to me.
"Nate, you need to buckle up. When a car is driving, you always have to buckle up," the child patiently instructed me as he clicked his own seatbelt shut. I did the same, rubbing away the last of my tears so that I could see something in the semi-darkness of the car. Vito rummaged in his backpack with a bunch of cartoonish gargoyles on it, smiling and handing me a packet of tissues. I blew my nose, let out a shaky breath and realized for the first time as a modicum of mortal fear fell away from me (maybe I would die but not here because Sonny certainly didn't want to get the seats dirty) how sore my legs and feet were and how heavenly it felt to sit.
Vito grabbed my hand again and squeezed it, but said nothing more as the car drove off to God knows where in the evening sun. I was aware of the cell phone in my pants pocket, I'd already mustered the cognitive power to write in the team chat hours ago that I needed to take a day off, ignoring Lexington's solitary message in the other app. But it didn't occur to me to try to call whoever. Who was I supposed to call that could have helped me in time? And honestly... if the Dracons killed me today, I would finally stop hurting and getting hurt. I clutched Vito's hand, looked out of the window and let fate decide my future. I was too tired to fight, I was too weak to negotiate or plead. Once again, I let the stupor creep over me. What had Nash said?- I needed a I don't give a fuck attitude? Why not start now - or let it end this way.
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"Seriously Vito? Another one? We can't feed every bum in town," Graziella said with a sigh as she slid into the bench seat of the curtained off private section of the posh restaurant Sonny had driven Vito to. The child looked up from his portion of fried fish and potatoes (a dish that certainly wasn't on the menu because it was a bit ordinary, but that the child had gotten anyway because he was a Dracon and this was probably one of their stores. If he had wanted elephant stew, they would probably have had it on hand and served it).
I also raised my head and looked past my huge sundae with original Italian gelato to the local gangster bride. Even with my human nose I had smelled the woman beforehand. Vito was similarly wrapped in different scents as she was, but with her it was particularly intense and if I as a human already perceived it as a slap in the face then for gargoyles it had to be a sledgehammer to the nostrils and the related receptors in the brain. During our jacuzzi session, I didn't perceive it in the same way because of the perfumed water and my general dread of death. And now that I no longer had my sunglasses on, I was probably recognizable more easily. Graziella frowned fiercely, then stared at Sonny, who was eating roast rack of lamb with Polenta and green asparagus and cracked a smile.
"Wanted to surprise you, boss."
"I hate it when you try to be surprising," she grumbled, eyeing me coolly.
"Being human hasn't done you any good, buttercup," she murmured thoughtfully and I bowed my head again in shame and continued spooning. Vito's attitude to ice cream and sadness was the same as Heather's, but yes... Who could really be devastated in the midst of a huge delicious batch of pistachio, chocolate, vanilla, raspberry, cinnamon, green apple, cookie and Raffaelo ice cream with caramel sauce and colorful sprinkles (Vito had ordered for me). I would eat as much ice cream as I could and then get myself shot.
"He was crying, mamma. Really hard and a lot. In the middle of the street. We couldn't just leave him there. He needed some ice cream," Vito explained.
Graziella's features softened. She reached over Sonny and lovingly rubbed a few crumbs from the corner of her child's mouth.
"Okay. All right. Let's feed the wimpy ex-gargoyle. I can't kill him if you look at me like that. But he's not coming home with us."
She said and I felt my eyes widen because they still could kill me if Vito stopped looking at her and because it sounded like it was an option to take me home with them like a stray mutt. At that moment I heard someone walking briskly towards us.
"Bahhh! The traffic is terrible. We need a venue closer to my company," grumbled the woman, who pushed the curtain aside and dropped down next to Graziella without noticing me. Then, grumbling, she picked up the map and delved into it.
"I've ordered the usual meal, of course, but I really feel like getting tipsy today, so I think I'll have-"
As a horrified whimper unintentionally escaped my throat, Domenika Destine (aka. Dominique Destine, aka Demona, aka the immortal, magically gifted mass murderer cursed to be a part-time human) looked up. We both stared at each other, me with my mouth open and her with a look of hatred and suspicion. Before she smiled kind of nastily.
"Well look at you, in general I consider humans unattractive, but you look particularly shagged out, Sharif. Trouble at the Cloud Castle?" she mumbled as I grabbed a serving dish before any more of my last mouthful of ice cream could ooze out of my open mouth.
I just kept staring from Graziella to her and back again, nailed down by the overwhelming presence of three top predators in the jungle of New York City.
Graziella Dracon smiled broadly and although Destine and Dracon didn't look anything alike apart from both being very beautiful they seemed related. And that previous thought alone didn't make me laugh out loud at Graziella's words.
"Oh, obviously this one gets around a lot. We need to chat more about our more interesting encounters, dearest auntie."
At that moment, a waitress, presumably spooked in advance by Dracon and Destine's mere sight, poked her head through the curtain. Destine raised her hand without taking her eyes off me.
"What did I say about a little tipsy? I don't think it will be enough considering this illustrious company."
Again I emitted a whipped helpless gargoyle whimper, stared into my sundae ... and continued eating. If I kept my mouth nicely full, they wouldn't pry any secrets out of me that could harm the clan. If I was full of ice cream, they would have a huge mess when they cut me open, either with knives or claws. That was no reassurance but ... I still felt better about it. Vito's encouraging smile while he chewed on his fried fish probably helped too.
Thanks for reading, Q.T.
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.LYRICS:
Little Do You Know || Alex & Sierra
… Little do you know
How I'm breakin' while you fall asleep
Little do you know
I'm still haunted by the memories
Little do you know
I'm tryin' to pick myself up piece by piece
Little do you know
I need a little more time
… Underneath it all I'm held captive by the hole inside
I've been holding back for the fear that you might change your mind
I'm ready to forgive you, but forgettin' is a harder fight
Little do you know
I need a little more time
… I'll wait, I'll wait
I love you like you've never felt the pain
I'll wait
I promise you don't have to be afraid
I'll wait
Love is here and here to stay
So lay your head on me
… Little do you know
I know you're hurt while I'm sound asleep
Little do you know
All my mistakes are slowly drownin' me
Little do you know
I'm tryin' to make it better piece by piece
Little do you know I
I love you 'til the sun dies
… Oh wait, just wait
I love you like I've never felt the pain
Just wait
I love you like I've never been afraid
Just wait
Our love is here, and here to stay
So lay your head on me
… I'll wait (I'll wait), I'll wait (I'll wait)
I love you like you've never felt the pain
I'll wait (I'll wait)
I promise you don't have to be afraid
I'll wait
Love is here, and here to stay
So lay your head on me
… Lay your head on me
So lay your head on me
'Cause little do you know I
I love you 'til the sun dies