Stained

Smoke

“I smoke in moderation, only one cigar at a time.”

–Mark Twain

           Avery collapsed on the bed and dust flew up around him. “Not the worst place we’ve been in.” He said as he rolled over and wrinkled his nose at the smell.

            “If you could see it you’d beg to differ.” I curled my lip in disgust and looked around and then set the small bag of the few things we had been able to keep on the bed. The bag had come from the last little town we had passed, the small amount of money we had came from that same town when we helped a couple people with work, and some food we had been able to find, and also the men we’d killed when we first escaped.

            “Well then I’m lucky. It smells terrible, it feels disgusting, I can practically taste how bad this place is, but I at least I don’t have to see it.” He grinned and clasped his hands behind his head.

            “Well, tomorrow morning we’re heading to the next town over to try and get to my friend before World Unification Day, so try and sleep. I know I won’t be able to, so I’ll take first watch. I want to get on the ferry over tomorrow, even if it probably won’t happen” I looked at the wall beside me with a hole that let me see into the next room, the TV had a crack that spider webbed across the whole screen, and the ceiling fan had a bird nest on it. I just hoped they were nice birds.

            Avery groaned loudly. “I hate boats.”

            “Why? You control water. I thought that’d make you like boats more.”

            “I can’t get my bearings and I just wander around looking lost.” He muttered as he rolled over on the bed.

            I chuckled quietly. “Well, this is the ferry, and then we get to Greenland and get on the cargo ship.”

            He groaned louder into the pillow before saying, “I’m going to bed.”

            “Okay.” I grabbed the chair, which proved how cheap this place was, it was a folding metal chair.

            “Wake me up in a few hours so you can get some sleep.”

            “Alright.” I said as I moved the chair so my back was to the wall opposite of the door in the corner.

            I waited a few hours until I woke Avery up like he suggested. He rubbed the sleep away and found his way to the floor and felt around for the chair before taking his seat and yawned loudly. “Did you set the alarm for when we need to go?” He asked as his translucent blue years drifted around the room without looking at anything. I still wasn’t used to that. It was as if he wanted me to feel more comfortable by acting like her was looking around, but I knew he just saw darkness.

            “Yeah, when it goes off we’ll get ready to get out of here.”

            “Want to ditch our old clothes in the morning?” We had been able to grab some cheap clothes a few days ago. Avery was wearing some band t-shirt and jeans and I was in jeans and an orange t-shirt with the words LOVE IS FOR PANSIES in black.

            “Probably not a good idea, we could need them later.” I replied, thinking about how we could sneak into the labs later.

            “Alright.” Was all he said before I drifted off into the world of empty sleep and nightmares.