As I made the purchase, I caught sight of the contents of my wallet and realized that I was running low on funds. Since the encounter with T-Built that had ended in his death, I’d been sitting on a sizable wad of cash that would have otherwise been handed over. With Candy and I no longer (enslaved) working with the Carrion Crew, we’d seen no reason not to consider that money ours—we had worked for it, after all—and, with our otherwise frugal lifestyle acting as a sort of instinctual budget, I’d been surprised how long the few hundred bucks had lasted.
Then again, I thought as I handed over a few bills to pay for the keychain, I haven’t exactly been forced to spend much since…
I sighed at myself, deciding that it wasn’t fair to keep making Jace pay for everything, and I began to consider what sort of work I might be able to find so that I could help out.
The remainder of the trip back home was spent in equal parts of thought between this and the subject of Jace and, hopefully, making things better. As I exited the cab and started for the elevator that would take me up to Jace’s condo, I had to pause, taking a deep breath as I tried to fight the sudden growing dread that I’d begun to feel all over again. Holding the bag with the keychain a little tighter, I forced myself forward.
Onward and upward, I thought.
****
As the doors open, I was startled at how dark the apartment was. Stepping through, I moved my hand to the wall, finding the switch and flipped it on. The bright fluorescents assaulted my eyes and I had to blink a few times before finally adjusting to the new lit room. I glanced over, seeing Jace sitting at the dining room table, a large near-empty bottle of Vodka standing beside him.
“Jace?” I whispered, not wanting to startle him.
He hadn’t even looked my way.
Growing more concerned, I moved towards him, wanting to make sure he was alright. That’s when he looked at me. His eyes were cold like they had been. I froze in the middle of the room, terrified at the look he gave me.
“Where were you?” he asked, his voice just as cold as his expression.
“I… I was with Danny,” I stammered.
“After,” he spat. “I spoke to Danny. He said you turned down a ride home and went off more than two hours ago!”
My eyes widened at that, and I realized with dawning horror that I’d let the time get away from me in my hunt to find him a present. “I…” I fought to find the words, wanting desperately to make things right but feeling paralyzed by his voice; his eyes.
“So I’ll ask again, Mia:” he was whispering, but it seemed to grind like shale clattering down a rocky surface, “where were you?”
“… a place fer everythin’ an’ everythin’ in its place,” Danny’s words chimed back at me, seeming to accuse me of interrupting the order of things.
And how had little Jace responded when somebody had come along to disrupt the order of things?
“Why are you so mad?” I whimpered, shaking my head in disbelief. “You… the way you just left me this morning. I just had to… I felt so alone, Jace.”
“You and me both,” he grumbled, looking away.
I frowned at that, feeling wounded by those words. “You left me here,” I reminded him. “Why should it matter if I left, too?”
“Because you know I have no one else to go to,” he shot back, glaring.
“And I have someone else to go to?” I challenged.
His eyes burned with fury, and I watched him wrestling with himself. He seemed to lose the battle, a part of him seeming to sink while another swelled. “Let’s not pretend”—there was a strange slowness to how the words were delivered, and I remembered hearing stories of people recounting attacks as though they’d happened in slow-motion—“that you didn’t make an entire career for some time out of having lots of ‘someones’ to go to, Mia.”
I felt my breath snag in my throat. The inflection he’d put on his name felt painfully parallel to the one that T-Built used to put on the word “whore” whenever he spoke to me or Candy.
“And… and what’s that supposed to mean?” I fought to hold myself upright despite every muscle begging to be let go from the demands to keep me upright. I had to be strong.
I had to be…
Everything was wrong.
In the back of my mind, I heard Mack’s laughter.
The threat of tears began to form in my eyes and I clenched them shut, refusing to cry right now. I didn’t want to be weak right now. I wanted to be strong, had to be strong. For myself. For us.
There was an us still, right?
“You’re smarter than that, Mia,” Jace challenged, folding his arms over his chest. “You and I both know that whores aren’t as stupid as everyone says.”
The words hit me like a punch to the stomach.
Somehow I avoided folding over in agony; somehow I kept the tears locked up behind my eyes.
“J-Jace, what’s going on with you?” I pleaded. “Please, you can tell me.”
“Why? So you can have more power over me?” he demanded, seething now. I could almost see another face behind his eyes—almost—spouting words at him, driving his thoughts into…
Depression. Forests. Rape.
You’re fooling yourself, Mia. He isn’t like that; isn’t like you. Only you’re fucked like that—only you; ONLY YOU!—and now he’s got your card. Your Jace has finally figured out that he can do better than some used-up slag and he’s not yours anymore. Not anymore!
If I heard my depression speaking to me in Mack’s voice, I wouldn’t realize it enough to admit it until later.
Until then, I had to at least carry myself out of there on my own two legs. Because there was no way Jace was going to do it for me…
“Power?” I spat back, refusing to let the hurt that was eating away my insides show. “What the hell are you even talking about? Do you even know?”
The venom in my voice was like gasoline for the fire in Jace’s eyes, and he seemed to swell up that much more from it. Still, somewhere deep, I could almost see a part of him struggling within the flames.
I wondered if he could see a part of me burning away within my own eyes.
Morbidly, I thought back to the fire that had almost killed us, and I wondered if this was just fate coming back around to finish the job.
“I was just an ease for you, wasn’t I?” Jace demanded. “Cozy up to the rival gang’s leader, let him slip it to you—pretend you give a fuck about him—and see if he couldn’t give you a better life? I mean, hell, I couldn’t really blame you,” he barked out a harsh laugh. “If I was a whore I’d probably do the same. Money, protection, and all you gotta do is what you were doing already: just put out, right? What’s one more dick in the sea of dicks that your life already existed as, right? One dick to free you from all others, in fact? Boy, oh boy, Mia, if I’d found myself in your shoes I’d be all over that one dick that could save me from all others. I’d almost—ALMOST!—feel sorry for you for following that logic…” he heaved and sucked in a monstrous breath of air, his face turning dark-red. I could already see he was about to shout, and I was hunching away from it before it even started. “BUT IT WAS MY DICK THAT YOU USED TO RUN! MINE! AND I’M NOBODY’S LIFE RAFT, ESPECIALLY NOT A STUPID, MANIPULATIVE WHO—”
Some force overtook me then, and I felt a sudden and morbid kinship to Jace’s own rage. Whatever dark force was driving his words was, at that moment, driving my body. My hand took flight without my mind commanding it, and I distantly wondered how much of what Jace was saying was just as mindless. I wouldn’t get to find out. The time for talk was over.
My hand came down hard enough on his face to stagger him. The sound echoed through the room and I realized too late that I was already crying. He stumbled back a step, two, and then dropped to a knee, his eyes wide and awed.
He looked horrified.
“Oh no…” he mumbled, seeming to say it more to himself. Then he looked back at me, tears in his own eyes. “Mia… shit, Mia, I’m so so—”
I missed the rest. I was crying, and I couldn’t bear the thought of him seeing me like that.
And so I ran.
EIGHT
~JACE~
My face still stung where Mia had hit me. Even after a few hours of riding around in circles, it still stung. It still stung because I’d been delivering a fresh slap, letting my own palm replay the process that Mia’s had, whenever I had the chance. I figured I deserved the reminder.
She might have been a manipulative whore, but…
I sighed, slapped myself again. This time just as much for the thought as for the reminder. Even after all that had happened—even after the painful truths that Mack had unloaded on me—I still couldn’t bring myself to think of her that way.
Not that she had any reason to know that. Not now, at least. As far as she was concerned that was exactly what I thought of her. It was practically what I’d said to her, after all. I’d been hurting—fucking festering on the inside, it felt like—and the moment I’d opened my mouth all of that pain—all of that rot—came pouring out. There’d been a toxic landfill growing in my guts since my encounter with Mack, and the moment Mia dared to ask me what was wrong I’d gone and turned myself into a cannon to fire that toxicity at a force that would’ve knocked most girls flat on their ass.
And what did Mia do under that onslaught? She nearly knocked me flat on my ass…
And then she’d left.
Like she ought to, two parts of my brain thought at once before splitting off into individual parts:
Like she ought to, thought one part, a logical, more rational part; the part that kept reminding me to slap myself—the part that kept telling me I deserved the reminder of that pain. Because if this is how we’re going to act—if THAT’S how you’re going to talk to a girl who stepped back into that shit-shack apartment when it was on FIRE to save your dumb ass—then you don’t deserve to even see that sweet ass of hers as it saunters away for good!
And, my god, how I wanted that thought to be it. Because it was bad enough to remind myself I was an asshole, bad enough to think that I’d gone and let myself think the worst of her, bad enough that I’d let it get to that point. It was bad enough that I’d let that sniveling little pissant, Mack, convince me of something so… so…
But then there was that other part of my brain:
Like she ought to, that other part said to me, its shields raised, its swords bared, and every would-be free hand clutching something—anything!—to use as a weapon against somebody—anybody!—who dared to threaten me. Because everything Mack said made perfect sense, and that little trollop realized that you’re not gonna take it; that you’re not gonna let yourself be taken advantage of like that. You’ve been hurt before! You’ve been twisted and deformed by this shitty, miserable fucking world, and if you’re an asshole then it’s because that’s what you’ve had to turn into to survive! And why not? If she’s what this world’s gonna offer up now as a replacement for what’s been taken from you then maybe it’s better that she’s gone. She is, after all, just a manipulative fucking—
I slapped myself again.
I caught the driver of the car beside me, like me waiting at the red light, staring over at me. His eyebrow was arched, his face twisted into one part worry and one part confusion. He saw before him a madman seated on a roaring, fiery steel beast, sharing the road with him. He was afraid for what might happen when that light turned green.
He should be, I thought, once again hearing both sides of my brain sync up there.
He should be, said Logic, because you are clearly not well.
He should be, said Defense, because you don’t owe the world anything anymore.
Great, another part of me, a neutral part this time, thought, I’ve got a war between Logic and Defense waging in my head.
With a brain like ours, all three of “us” thought together, who needs the Crow Gang versus the Carrion Crew.
Still staring directly at the worried and confused driver stopped beside me, I raised my hand to myself again. This time I closed my hand, made a fist, and outright punched myself square in the jaw.
Something must have been knocked loose from it, because a solidly whole part of me then thought, That one’s for you, Mia.
Then the light turned, the angry red eye clocking out so that a green one could start its seconds-long shift, and my chopper carried me away. I couldn’t say for certain where I was going. I’d traveled this particular stretch of road close to a dozen times already in the random, nonsensically serpentine circle I’d been driving in since I’d left my condo. As bewildered and devil-may-care as I’d been then, I’d gained nothing in regards to senses or a mind for direction.
It’s finally happened, Logic mused. You’ve gone and lost it. Lost all of what little mind you had left. Now the paths you ride makes as much sense as the paths you think.
I sighed at that. Logic had a good point, but, then again, wasn’t that his purpose? I imagined him as a form of myself dressed in a snooty business suit with pretentiously treated and styled hair; a form of myself that I’d likely hate to love and love to hate. This, I thought, was ironic, because wasn’t that how I felt about myself already? Or maybe that was just Defense toying around in my subconscious, calling him a “nerd.” Certainly sounded like something he’d do. Defense, I figured, would thereby be the complete opposite, aesthetically speaking. He’d be dirty with grease and blood—As much your own as others’, Logic reminded me, trying to sway me from that path—and wearing more leather than any one man had any right to wear. He’d be sneering, always sneering, and his hair would be tussled from hours of masturbation, because Defense didn’t trust anyone enough to take them to bed with him. Defense would be scarred and scabbed with the wounds of loneliness, because so long as you kept to yourself you knew you could trust who you were with.
But that isn’t true now, Logic chimed, is it?
Shut up! Defense snarled.
But it had been hours since I’d last seen Mia. Hours out on my bike, heading nowhere, and all to myself. Hours with nobody but myself to talk to. With nobody else to fight, Defense had grown weak; left to bite like a feral dog at its own tail. And with the heat of battle behind me—the toxic cloud that had been churning in my guts purged—Logic was free to contemplate.
As one would expect—as I’d certainly expect—Logic was right. Defensiveness had gotten the better of me, gotten me to say some ugly things without much filter or reflection on what was said, and now that I was on my own—scarred and scabbed—it wanted to continue the fight all the same.
And, lucky for him, I seemed to be three Jaces in one: the good, the bad, and the random spectator. If it was just Defense all on his lonesome he might be stuck chasing his tail for all eternity, but with Logic and Neutral sitting across from him he could war it out all he liked; have a regular party all his own.
All on my own.
Jace, Neutral called out then, considering all this along with me, you’re fucking crazy.
My chopper sputtered a little then, and I saw that the gas meter had been on “E” for who-knew-how-long.
Riding on fumes, huh, girl? I thought, absently patting the fuel tank with my free hand while trying to ignore the painful truth in Neutral’s not-words. Then, sighing, I thought, Aren’t we all? and pulled into a gas station.
Heads turned my way as I coasted up beside a free pump, and I could almost imagine the worried and confused driver following my movements with his eyes and letting out a sigh of relief that the self-beating psycho on the fire-hog was no longer sharing his road. A deep, hot rage flashed up at my own thought of the random driver considering it “his” road, and I realized that Defense was so eager for a fight that he was willing to wage it with a fictional version of a person I’d only spotted in passing for a few seconds.
Turning off the chopper’s engine and swinging myself out of the seat, I decided that was a dangerous way to live.
Logic thought that was a good step in the r
ight direction.
Defense wasn’t thrilled with it.
Neutral wondered if this gas station had decent beef jerky.
****
The tank was full, my bladder was empty, and the saddlebag, for better or for worse, had close to thirty-bucks’ worth of beef jerky in it. Though I had no way of knowing if the prescription would work, I’d decided to self-medicate with leathery strips of black pepper, citrus-lime, and teriyaki flavored steak-wads.
That, and the cheapest, nastiest-looking liquor on the shelves.
Because what went better with black pepper, citrus-lime, and teriyaki anything than exhaust-heated cotton candy flavored alcohol?
I wasn’t sure what these purchases amounted to in the long run. Lord knew the cashier had given me a pretty funny look as he’d rung them up. Then, adding another twenty bucks’ worth of gasoline to the tab, the pockmarked little shit eyed the tank I’d specified, spotted my bike, and his face had edged a bit closer to something resembling the driver I’d been stopped beside at the light. I’d toyed with the idea of punching myself again—I was overdue for another “reminder” according to Logic—but decided against it. Between visiting the dank, smelly restroom and loading my arms with my goodies, feeling more and more dead inside with every step I took, I’d finally come to decide on a place to go.
It was not a happy place, and so it was not a happy decision. Truth be told—and Lord knew I couldn’t lie to the three thought-processes chattering in my head—it was a very exhausting decision to make.
And so, unhappy and exhausted—feeling still more and more dead as I ran through the motions—I didn’t have it in me to beat myself in front of a gawking twerp.
No time to hate myself later. I was already fully committed to hating myself now.
Still unsure of what the purchases amounted to (other than a truly heinous form of self-punishment), I dumped the proverbial medication into the saddlebags of my chopper, fueled up, and started off, reviewing my menu while I aimed myself for my morbid picnicking spot.
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