Invited

Thirteen - Wicken

I made sure to not go back to the trash compactor again during my shift. Even if Daniel's body was nothing more than a squashed cube of garbage and out of sight, the image of him lying there was still burned into my mind. How did I keep winding up in these kinds of messes? I was left with the difficult decision of whether to confront Layla or play dumb. Most of people I'd run into enjoyed my blunt honesty about life. Most of those people were not my bosses, though. I'd done my share of sticking it to the man back in the day until I learned the valuable lesson of picking and choosing my battles.

It was time for me to pick and choose what to do here. My first instinct was to run and keep running until I could find a place to hide for the rest of my life. There are only so many places you can flee to on a spaceship, unfortunately. Life had become a massive game of chess and I had to masterfully calculate my every move. Problem was I sucked at playing chess. Logical strategy was something I could do in a pinch, barely. My brain functioned better with straight up street smarts. On top of that, never being able to let my guard down became exhausting after a while.

Naturally, after work, I went straight to my room and laid down on my bed to sleep for a long, long time. Nancy was right, I did like to hole myself up away from everyone else. I preferred sleeping to socializing any day. If I didn't have to leave me room to eat too, I would only leave because I was forced to work. At least when I slept, I could pretend everything was okay and drift off to dream.

I didn't remember my dreams, but they had to be good if I woke up feeling relaxed and comforted. Almost as if my brain knew the future and was trying to tell me everything was going to work out fine. Sometimes when I curled up against my pillow, I imagined Chevelle was just off in the bathroom, doing her thing, and would be joining me again soon. The loneliness killed me on the Gorgachan ship. Perhaps having friends offered a slight solution, and yet, my biggest fear was if I got attached to anyone on Persistence, I would not want to leave. Having to say goodbye was becoming old fast. If I got too comfortable, I might give up hope, give up on Chevelle. Moving on from her was not something I ever wanted to do.

Pretty sure I slept through dinner. When I woke up, I checked the clock next to my bed and read 19:35. I had exactly twenty-five minutes to get ready for whatever gathering Nancy was having in her room. Can't say I was all too hungry, so not eating wasn't a huge deal. Thinking about all of my symptoms – lethargy, lack of appetite, lack of motivation – they all pointed to my being depressed. Fun. For some reason, I didn't particularly care.

I got out of bed and splashed some cold water on my face. My room was pretty dull. I had yet to do any decorating on the inside to make it feel like anything more than a glorified prison cell. Once I was more awake, I found something new to wear: fresh jeans that didn't smell like work and a plain red t-shirt that wasn't wrinkled from my nap. I ran a comb through my hair and headed out the door.

The good thing about Nancy's place was that it was just down the hall from me. Not having to walk across the whole ship was always a nice thing. The thing was huge, and I hadn't even gotten to see it all, just a handful of floors.

I knocked on Nancy's door. On the outside was a whiteboard with a bunch of messages written on it. The thing was painted blue, and hanging in small pots off to the sides were some small, red flowers. Homey, cute, very Nancy.

"Wicken!" She opened the door and clapped her hands with excitement. "I was beginning to wonder if you had changed your mind."

"About cheesecake? Never," I said, and stepped inside.

The small apartment was just as cute and cozy on the inside as it was on the outside. The blue motif continued, though the interior walls was a more subtle, light shade that reminded me of the sky, as opposed to the big bold color on the door. The bed had a navy spread over it and the bathroom door had a nice, oval shaped mirror hanging off of it. On the kitchenette counter were some more potted plants. I'm guessing she liked flowers. Nearby there was a small table with a handful of chairs for sitting. Not all too large or glamorous, which kind of surprised me since she did live with a Gorgachan. While they may have lived amongst the humans, there were rumors circulating about how some of the aliens had swanky penthouse like places to call home.