Page 45 of A Dance With Devils
My neck twists slowly, eyes watching as she gently puts books back on the cases. I don’t answer. What is there to talk about? It was real, though. With her, the sensations and needs were exceptionally real regardless of the lacking reality. That should be prized really, not abandoned. It should be harnessed and used, held close and valued for the rare gift it could offer me. But not now. Not with his thoughts of decency inside my head.
And especially not considering the flying I’m still contemplating.
She shouldn’t fly. She should live.
“Your grandfather?” she asks quietly. I keep staring, gaze trained on her face, as my body sinks further into the past with this atmosphere. “Are you alright?” My brow quirks under the question, mood unsure how to behave around it. “I could feel you, too. Still can.”
Mmm. The persistent effects of the pills as they haunt veins. I’m surprised my own sensation didn’t flood out with the rest of the blood I lost. I partly wish it had. Maybe then I’d be able to forget it and just live in this isolated world I choose. But I haven’t forgotten it. I can still feel it all over me, still remember every lingering touch of her hands and lips, still see her colours.
“I can get someone if …” she murmurs.
The words drain away to nothing but lost and unknown, just like those notes that echoed off the walls as she ran. I can hear them, too, sense their effect on me as if they’re just under the surface of my skin along with the blood bound back in. Maybe they’re waiting for me to come back to them, tempting me to play our song. I could do that for her. Play notes and feel. It's nice in here with her now – peaceful and passive. No orders to deliver. No chase to amuse myself with. No strategies to employ. And no disappointments to contend with. Just endless moments locked in the past.
“You should have gone by now,” I mutter, turning back to the window.
“And you shouldn’t be sad.”
A beleaguered chuckle falls from my lips, cheek turning so I can rest it and look her over again. “I’m not sad, little Alice. I’m broken. Go before I break you, too.”
She hovers for a few minutes, head tilting as if she’s trying to work out this mood of mine. She shouldn’t bother. It’s unreadable. Indecipherable. Even to me. It’s low and troubled, anxious and bleak. It’s not the lack of blood in my veins, nor the lack of fulfilment in my life, it’s the lack of – something. And it’s always here with me. I'm balanced on the edge of indifference, as if something is waiting in the background to spike unease into bottomless pits of lethargy. I’m best alone like this, regardless of Gray’s insistence that I shouldn’t be. Even death doesn’t appear feasible. At least not when there’s a chemist about to spoil my attempt.
“But we didn’t finish our hunt,” she suddenly says, brightly.
“We did. You won. Outwitted me.”
“No, you’ve given up.” She moves from leaning on the bookcase, silent feet padding across the floor until she’s in front of the window I was staring through. “That’s not the man I first met.”
“He’s not here anymore.”
“Where is he then?” she asks.
She sits in one of the other chairs, crossing her legs as if she’s bedding in for a conversation. There isn’t any conversation to have, and even if there was she shouldn’t be the one thinking about listening to it. It seems like she is, though, which, surprisingly enough, doesn’t piss me off or cause the rage that normally ensues when someone probes.
“He’s gone.”
There isn’t a response from her. Nor is there a quiver on her features or a confused gaze in return. She just looks at the bandages on my wrists. She sits there quietly in a room that is normally for me alone and watches me, as if trying to chase those pills we shared and bore her way into veins that barely run clean most of the time.
The thought makes me sigh and scrunch my hand into well-worn leather, trying to immerse myself into the one good man from my youth. He cared. He gave a damn about me and what I wanted. About the world, too. It’s why I do all this for others here now, maybe thinking that helping them makes my treacherous nature bearable. He introduced me to things, showed me how they worked and how to take them apart. You learn like that. Bit by bit. Cog by cog. People are no different than these binoculars in my lap.
My hands start unscrewing the lenses at the memories, breaking down the old casing until they’re nothing but bits and pieces in my fingers. And then I start putting them together again, occasionally blowing dust from the fissures and cracks. One bit out of place and it won't work, he'd say. Just like the world. That's the job that's coming for you. Balance, Malachi. Break it, and put it back together if you choose to. People will starve because of you,and they'll die because of you, too. That's the curse I'm giving you.
I glance up at her still watching me, thinking about that broken down house she lives in. Could be fixed, as could every other house in that derelict area. It could shine again, be made beautiful. It's not part of the greater strategy, though. The poor need to be poor. Without poverty there is no wealth, and without wealth to guide us, life disintegrates into chaos.
It's a shame. Things are honest, unlike people. They’re solid and dependable, regardless of age. And even then, when the bones of something are brittle and worn, they’re still not hiding anything. They don’t ask for anything. They don’t want for anything. They’re just there – inanimate and yet faithfully doing their best even in decay.
“There’s a purity in things that I’ve never found in another human,” I murmur, screwing the lenses back into place. “Things never disappoint. They are exactly what they seem to be. No pretence. No games. Honest.”
Still no words from her. I don’t even know if I want them. I like looking at her, though. Especially in this quiet. The binoculars come to my eyes, her face suddenly filling the view through them. Strong lines. Soft half smile, as if she’s suddenly shy under the scrutiny. Adorable in some respects. She wasn’t last night. She was rapid and anxious, as her body hovered under my dick for protection. I liked that. Still do. “Are you what you seem to be, little Alice?”
“What do I seem to be?”
“Frightened.” I drop the binoculars back into my lap, shoulders slumping further. “But not of me or any of this around you.”
A small smirk crosses her lips, and her legs pull up into the armchair. “Well, I can’t be expected to talk about that until I’ve had some coffee and food.” My hand pulls the cord on the wall behind this chair my grandfather sat in for hours, calling for a maid. “And I might tell you about it if you tell me about the wrists.”
“That’s another game.”
“No, it’s honesty. You give me something and I’ll give you something back. The bandages weren’t there last night. What happened?”
