The Police Hate Magic

Nathaniel was twelve when he killed his father.

Afterwards, he dragged the body down the cellar stairs. where it lay undisturbed for years. He eventually disposed of the body, and his mother and him moved out of the house.

Nathaniel and his mother went to the city. The two of them enjoyed their short stay as Nathaniel finished high school. The images of the sparkling lights and the optimism they felt looking at their new apartment didn't fade in their brains, and they would bring it up wistfully many times in the next few years. They bonded over cheap ice cream, the exciting news of his mother's first job in twenty years, and his improvement in school.

Months later, as Nathaniel sat in his high school geography class, a thought came to him, He wondered why he had never thought of burning his old house down. Intrigued, he tapped his pencil on his desk.

'That would be better than just letting it sit,' Nathaniel thought. 'It's just taking up space.'

A student in the back of the room coughed, and Nathaniel started focusing on the teacher's lecture again. Yet, he kept on his train of thought.

'Nobody would ever want to live in it again anyway. Its walls are decaying, the floor will probably collapse in a few years, and the smell of decaying flesh probably still wafts in from the basement.'

Nathaniel sighed and rested his head on his hand, not even attempting to pay attention for the rest of the class. The bell rang, and Nathaniel unhurriedly packed up his stuff. His book fell from off the desk, and he quickly looked around him to see if anyone was paying him any attention.

When he confirmed everyone else was busy gathering their own belongings, he floated his hand over his book, and it flew up into his palm. He smiled, and walked out of the classroom.

***************************************

The alarm jerked Nathaniel out of sleep. Having been woken from an interesting dream, he grumpily sat up and grabbed his flip-phone to turn it off.

Nathaniel stretched out his aching muscles. Even though he was only twenty-four, he had very tense muscles from all the stress he'd experienced in his life. To make matters worse, he discovered a few weeks ago that if he moved his eyebrows up, he could see thick lines of worry etched onto his forehead.

That made him self-conscious. So, instead of getting the usual haircut he got every month, he had been working on keeping his bangs long. His current hairstyle stretched down to the middle of his neck. It was his natural brown color, which was a few shades darker than his olive skin, and much lighter than his dark brown eyes.

Nathaniel sluggishly got dressed. As he was pulling on his cloak, he heard tapping on his hotel door. He grimaced, and mentally asked himself what day it was.

"Oh right, it's Friday," he mused out loud. He pulled out his wallet and hastily grabbed an indiscriminate number of dollar bills. The person behind the door impatiently knocked again, loud and hard, and Nathaniel grimaced.

It was the manager of the hotel. Not even a second after Nathaniel's head popped around the door, the man scowled at him, and said in a gruff snarl:

"Pay up."

"Of course," Nathaniel said, trying to make his voice light and sweet . The manager glared at him. Nathaniel dropped the cash he had in his hands, which amounted to twice more than the weekly rent he was supposed to pay, and the manager's furious expression melted to casual irritation.

"How long are you going to be here, kid?" The manager asked, slyly sliding the bills into his coat pocket.

"Only one more day," Nathaniel replied.