Close Enough To Touch

Chapter Two - Breakfast with The Necromancer

 
      It only took a few hours until my body and mind seemed to be functioning normally, besides a little numbness here and there and the odd twitch of my nerves.

Otherwise, all was well. We cleaned up, it didn't take too long, and we burned everything. I sipped on my vodka the whole time and by dawn, I was ready to pass out.
      "I need to have a nap." I sighed and Wolfgang looked at me reproachfully.
      "Not yet my dear, we still have a few things that need to be taken care of. Not to mention the fact that we need to get out of here and back home." He explained apathetically as he picked up my briefcase that had my laptop and a few books in it and slung it over his shoulder.
     "Ohh God...what else do we have to do?" I complained.
     "We need to go get breakfast." He answered with a grin.
     "Sweet, finally something I can get excited about...But I'm just so tired though. And drunk. I'm also very drunk." I slurred, rubbing my eyes, trying to keep them open.
     "Don't do that...and coffee. Coffee is the solution, let's leave shall we?" Wolf retorted.
     "Yes, sir," I answered back.

 We walked out of the garage and into the cold, November dawn.
I blinked against the brightness as the sun snuck its way through the tree branches covered with snow. The sound of early birds chirping and water drops as the snow melted was pleasant to my ears. Everything sounded so crisp and clear like I was hearing it all for the first time.
     "Wow," I said in hushed wonder, completely in awe of everything around me like a small child in a very big world.
     "Wow." Wolfgang agreed. We stood, motionless, looking around us at the peaceful calm of the countryside. Nothing was moving beside the birds and the slight breeze through the trees. I turned to look at Wolf standing beside me, looking up at the cloudless sky above us.

     "Can other people see you too? Or is it just me?" I asked curiously. He smiled slightly and looked at me,
     "They can see me, yes...but most will see something different. And most of them will find me unsettling, they won't make eye contact and they'll feel something that disturbs them." He answered, turning away as he finished the sentence and walked towards my car, a rusty and haggard '91 blue Dodge shadow sitting in the driveway. "At least, that's what I've read. Guess we'll find out soon enough."
I stood for a moment contemplating, then followed. He opened the trunk and lifted my briefcase into the back and closed the door.
     "What do you mean?" I asked.
     "Get in," he said, "I'll explain on the way."
I did as was asked of me and buckled my seat belt, shivering from the cold. Wolfgang started the car and blasted the heat to warm me up. He didn't seem bothered by the cold at all.

     "You see, I am a manifestation of fear and superstition, basically. Everything dark that lives in people manifests in different ways all the time A bump in the night, a shadow on the wall, a reoccurring nightmare. The deepest darkest fears that most people have manifest all the time. For example, when a person is going up a flight of stairs and feels anxiety, like something is going to chase them up and they run. They sort of know nothing is there, but at the same time, they sort of don't. The thing is, more often than not, there is something there, they just refuse to believe it and assume they're crazy instead of turning to look."

      "Also, they don't know exactly what is there, but if they had a clear image in their head of what it was and believed it was truly there then if they turned around...well." He explained with a tilt of his head and a strange smile.
We backed out of the driveway and turned onto the 'road' that looks more like a walking path than anything else, and headed for town. It was a good 20-minute drive from the little blue house my mom had been living in for almost 10 years. She was away that weekend, spending time with my grandma while my grandpa was gone hunting for a week with my Uncle. It had all been such perfect timing for what needed to be done.

I was thinking about what Wolf had said, fear manifested, and as if he had read my mind he continued explaining.
      "Everyone is afraid of something, but most often the fear isn't of something itself it's of the unknown. Death, for example. People fear death more than anything else purely because it's a huge unknown. The dark, that's the same thing, and death is essentially the darkest possible thing imaginable. A complete absence of light and sound and touch. Its nothing. That scares people.
When people look at me, they will feel that fear of the unknown.
They won't be able to pinpoint why they don't like me because they just don't know. And, at the same time, people who know that it's the unknown that they fear and not something else, they will feel more comfortable around me than others."

I contemplated, looking out the window. I had a headache and after all the vodka I think I skipped past being drunk and dove straight into being hungover. I still couldn't get over the fact that Wolf was there, sitting beside me, driving my car. And, you know, that I was dead a few hours ago. The whole thing that I literally killed myself, believing entirely that he would somehow be there to save me. It was absolutely insane.

I got distracted from the conversation, and I was curious to see how people would react around him, and even more curious how I would explain his presence to my friends and the people who I had told all about him so many times. That would be an interesting experience, but moreover, I was very curious about who he really was. If he was just a variation of me like I had always thought he was, but he seemed so much more...full, I suppose.
Like, the things I hadn't ever thought about him had come to exist on their own, he was exactly how I knew he would be. But also, so much more.

I turned and looked away from the window and at the man driving my car,
     "Do you have a license?" I asked.
     "Of course, do you?" He replied with a smirk, knowing full well that I didn't.
     "You have I.D.?" I asked.
     "Dammit, woman you know I have I.D. you ordered it months ago on that website where people buy fake I.D.s...and drugs...and prostitutes oddly enough" He answered in an intrigued tone. Explaining the internet to him in my head had been hard enough on its own, let alone the dark web.
But I remembered immediately, I had ordered him UK Identification prior to our plans of trying to bring him out of my dreams and into reality.
     "I think they are called mail-order brides Wolf...I need a nap." I admitted as I went to rub my eyes again.
     "Don't rub your eyes you're just going to make it worse!" He snapped bluntly. To which I had some immediate concerns.
    "What are you talking about? Make what worse?" I asked as I pulled down the mirror hidden behind the sun visor. "Holy fuck!"

I looked like a zombie.
Like a terrifying, dead inside, living, breathing zombie.
My eyes were so bloodshot it was like I was wearing professional horror movie makeup. My irises were ringed in broken blood vessels that made it look like I had been punched in the face repeatedly and the dark circles under my eyes clearly spelled out 'INSOMNIAC' in big bold letters across my face.
That or possibly 'ADDICTED TO COCAINE' which was highly more offensive as I'm a recovering drug addict and I haven't touched that stuff in years nor do I plan to.
      "Yeah...I mean, I know you're not a fan of makeup and all that lady stuff, but this might be one of those times where you ought to try using some." Wolf advised. He was right, but the thought of the two of us at a restaurant eating bacon and eggs, looking the way we did, made me start laughing like an idiot.

Being unfamiliar with social interaction and all, Wolfgang glanced over at me with one eyebrow raised. He looked as though my laughter might be some kind of biological virus that may be highly contagious and should cause him to fear for his life. This, of course, made me laugh more.   
     "What are you doing? What is this and why are you doing it?" He asked cautiously. After I caught my breath I realized he had pulled the car into the parking lot of a shopper's drug mart, and this sent me back into a hopeless wreck of laughter at which point Wolf began sweating and reaching for the door handle.

     "What is happening to you?!" He proclaimed as he pushed his back up against the car door and climbed up onto the seat.
      "Ahhh! Oh my God, your face! Positively Gobsmacked there Mate?" I managed through my muffled laughs, trying my best at an English accent while drunk, and recently reanimated.
     "Oi, what in the bloody Hell was that?" He asked, still keeping his distance.
     "What? You pulled into the Shoppers parking lot because you want me to get make-up I assume...It's really that bad?" I asked. Wolfgang's face went instantly from shock and confusion to more shock and confusion as he turned to look out the window.
     "What? NO! I pulled into the closest place to pull into because I thought you'd gone and lost the plot! What were you doing?" He asked, beginning to feel completely out of sorts.
     "What? Laughing?" I asked.
     "Is that what that was? I mean, I've heard people laugh...a couple of times but...Mein Gott, I thought you were possessed by a merciless demon from Hell...Jesus." He admitted.

     "Jesus? Since when did he become a merciless demon from Hell exactly? I think I must have skipped that chapter." I asked, still recovering from the hilarity of his facial expression. He just gave me a very menacing look and grabbed the pack of cigarettes on the dash, lighting one furiously as I stared at him with a stupid smile on my face.
      "There's clearly a lot more you need to learn about people my dear," I said as I opened the car door and stepped out.
     "Hold on! Where are you going?" He asked in surprise.
     "To get makeup... obviously. You wanna come?" I replied. He looked at me, then at the building, and then back at me and just shook his head no, rather comically, still wide-eyed and confused. He had a lot to learn, I thought, as I walked into the store and got some cover-up and ginger ale, and a whole other pile of shit to shove on my face and hope for the best.

When I got back to the car, however, instead of Wolfgang sitting in the car's driver's seat, there was a black cat curled up, batting a paw at the keys in the ignition. Maybe I had missed something? Or it wasn't my car. Was I that fucking hammered??
I looked around and it was most certainly my car, there was no other beat-up old shit box of a Dodge Shadow to be seen, but when I turned back to look at the cat it was gone. Wolfgang sat in its place, looking through the window at me with a devious little sneer on his face. I got in, mouth hanging open.
   
     "Okay. I'm gonna need to know what the fuck just happened?" I said in all seriousness.
     "It seems there are a lot of things you need to learn about me too there my dear." He said happily.
     "Such as you can turn into a cat!?" I yelled in delight.
     "Yes...I certainly can, apparently."He replied.
     "What do you mean, apparently? Were you not aware of this!?"
     "Well, yeah, I knew. Sort of anyways, in theory, that it was a thing. I imagine I won't be able to do it forever, from what I've read. The more human I become, the less I'll be able to shape-shift. But I should be able to keep it up for a while. And I have a feeling that it'll come in very handy and be very entertaining. You'll see...first, breakfast. And put that shit on your face so you look less like a corpse I've freshly exhumed." He demanded...politely, but still demanded in his usual manner.

He started the car and we were off to Wimpy's for breakfast.
We got a booth table and ordered our food, then sat quietly staring at each other.
     "So..." I asked in a hushed tone, leaning forward with my elbow on the table and my head in my hand. Partly to be sneaky, partly because I was completely shitfaced at 9 o'clock in the morning in my hometown diner. "What else can you do?" Wolf snickered an evil something that maybe resembled a laugh.
     "Shall we have a little fun then?" He whispered, leaning across the table to me while he said it. For a brief second, I thought he was being suggestive. My eyes lit up and I got excited. He saw that and immediately knew my mind had gone straight into the gutter. Slouching his shoulders and raising one eyebrow at me he avoided playing into it.
     "Of course." I agreed with a hint of sadness.

The waitress had seated us and had then gone to grab a tea for Wolf and a coffee for me, but while her back was turned, a black cat appeared sitting comfortably in Wolf's seat. When she returned I suppose she assumed my partner had gone to use the facilities, but then when she placed the drinks down on the table, Wolf jumped up onto it and started lapping up his tea. The woman let out a little shriek and was then rendered speechless and immobile for a moment. She seemed to be having trouble deciding if she was gonna get in shit for a cat being in the restaurant, and wanting to pet his adorable little kitty head. That is until Wolf sat down on the table and lifted a paw to his mouth and looked up at her.
     "Bollocks, I've burnt my tongue! Could you be a dearie and fetch me a creamer or two?" He said perfectly. A perfectly speaking cat.
At this point, the waitress fled into the back kitchen to most likely tell the rest of the staff there was a talking cat in the restaurant.