Beggar

Victoria before Sayter

"Men are disappointing, anyhow. They fall like dominos, just pluck up another as if you're picking flowers."

A bell rang, it was Millers cat trying to get her collar off. Stupid thing to wrap around a cat, you can't leash something not meant to be owned. The tiny bell was like a punishment, it rang on her collar like a coughs on a clock. I looked up at Miller, she was zipping up a makeup bag I'd never seen before. She should be packing shit into boxes, gods did she have a long way to go before moving to her new place. Then I would be alone.

"Are you listening, sweetie?"

"I'm sleeping. Trying to."

"Trying, trying. I'll be quieter." She picked up a tart from the counter and licked the frosting caught on her fingernail. I turned onto my side, gods was she loud. I'd told her my heart had shattered from the landlords death, the man I'd been sleeping with. Told her that I couldn't get out of bed, not for a while.

In a way it was true. Dammit the bastard got me good; he hitched his heel in my ribs before he bled out. Not a lot of men can get at you when they're draining. I moaned the way I moved in the bed, something had broken inside, something important. I'd take myself in tonight, now would be too dangerous. Tonight it could be a fall when Miller was gone. But right away, Miller would know if she'd seen me fall, or heard it. She's a good girl, really, but gods does she need to move out quicker.

It had been a few hours before Millers cat woke me up again, it must of been one in the morning. I had finally fell asleep when she left to rent a few men from the pub to help her carry her shit to Pt. Lucys Street. It was a whore house; I was losing my only friend to a damn whore house. A nice whore house, though.
Miller was asleep in the bed with six plates staked on her night stand. I'd gather them if I wasn't afraid to wake her up. No, suppose tonight I'd slip out and find another man. I'd limp about and let him follow me into an ally or offer me a ride, how would I get my knife in him? How would I slip in between his ribs when I would be clutching tight to mine?

I grabbed a rollup and slipped out anyway, I lit it up and let the smoke melt into me, I drank down the tobacco like a cold breeze, warming my lungs against a rose stained chest. It was cold out, and I could feel the bars on the door pressing through my gown. I didn't have to live here, in Blaylock, not really. There was no point. But I would stay, for the talk and the men and the liquor, because nowhere else could I get away with killing my landlord and enjoying a cigarette on a cold night afterwards.

My stick melted down to my fingers, a browning lit nub staining my nails with an aged smell. I put it out on my heel and went back in the building, back to my bed. But another bell sang, the bell on the door that announced someone's entrance. Now though it was coming towards me, the handle slamming into my chest. I threw a hand over my ribcage instinctively first instead of backing up, a mistake, a gods awful stupid mistake.

The knob cracked against my hand, thumping against the bruise on my ribs. I knelt over, gaping, a sound of awe cackling. Something was wrong, something was very wrong. The pain was immense and immediate, it grew and grew under and around my chest, in my lungs. I couldn't breathe. Something was wrong, oh gods. The man that threw open the door knelt next to me, but the pain was everywhere. I could see it so far out I couldn't see anything else, I could see black dots squirming in the corners of the street. I felt a shock down my hip and impossibly, down my left leg.

"Miss, are you alright?" But I knocked his reaching hand away. I clutched onto his shoulder and stood, he huffed but didn't stop me. Holding my side I walked into the building, limping, brooding. I thought I couldn't make it up the stairs, I could, I thought I couldn't make it to my room, I didn't. I collapsed at the door, moaned the way I hit the tile and how my waste spazzed. The pain was a living thing thrashing in my chest, collecting cells and blood and demanding to heal itself.