Sort of Deadly

14 - A Brief History Of (My) Time (In The City)

Sorry about that. I think the ravens just got some more refugees from the woods.

Anyhow, the city. It was okay, I guess. It was big. And it had everything. Malls, fast food stores, stadiums, theatres (Aar would love that), subways, museums . . . pollution, slums, rats, more rats, Bad People.

Our apartment was fine. The school was fine. The children in it were not.

If I didn't like Arbo, then I detested his sister. She was a meanie through and through. And she was smart and funny and popular. These kind of bullies are the absolute worst and the most vicious, in my humble opinion.

I'll call her Garbo. It rhymes with Arbo. But mainly because the first four letters match with those of "garbage".

Arbo must already have given her an ultimatum about me. She was in my class, addicted to chewing gum, and she made sure to make my life a tragedy more cataclysmic than Shakespeare's Hamlet. And she was a topper, can you believe it? A straight A-s student through and through.

Of course she made a point to make jokes about my hair. I felt like I was in primary school all over again, only here Aar wasn't the troublemaker, Garbo was, and Garbo was huge. I have no doubt sumo-wrestling would suit her well as a profession. Not saying sumo-wrestlers are mean, they look sweet and cuddly to me.

I wish I could punch her in that gum-chewing mouth of hers. I could have, I guess. But I'd only hurt my hand.

It was fact to the new students that I drank blood, and that was the reason my hair was so red. Perhaps they should have met Marra when he had his anomalies.

Why couldn't my hair be auburn, or blonde, or green, or grey, or yellow, or pink, or whatever? Why did it have to be red? Why did I have to be me every day?

I don't know. I'm grateful for my life and all. Me and my friends defeated a Coven, for Avogadro's Number's sake! But I felt so helpless here, amongst this strange bunch of kids. Don't get me wrong, most of them were pretty decent. But many were under Garbo's wing.

And heavens, was she competitive? I like competition. I thrive in competition. But there is something known as toxic competitiveness, which I am repelled by, and that's exactly the sort of sportsperson Garbo was.

Like, if I had to recite on some topic to speak on in class, she'd deliberately do research on the same topic and input her "extra" knowledge just to spite me. Soon I had to start doing it too. I know what you're thinking: don't indulge in all that, ignore her, let meanies be - but it's not as easy as it sounds. I was suffocating. Whenever I stepped into the school premise, I felt like someone had given me a shot of parabens.

Okay, so maybe I was putting things mildly when I said school was fine.

But most everything else was. Like, our next door neighbors, I guess? Two men in their thirties who had quit their career in the exciting field of banking to pursue their passion in rock-n-roll. They wore cool mascara or eyeliner or whatever it is you call it, I've never been much into make-up - again, natural is best - and earrings and sported skull tattoos and whatnot.

Except they practiced their quadrophonic blaring music at whatever hour they felt like. Had extremely loud friends over whenever they felt like. Clearly, their drummer 'Dope Sue' still had a lot to learn before they'd let her into {Undis-2-closed}'s Got Talent.

Their random-hour band practice interfered with my studies a lot, too, and whenever I asked Pops to go give them a good upbraiding, he'd come back laughing and holding orange juice in his hands.

Then there was the library. The sole peaceful place. Filled with books to explore and . . . except here no one knew who Bee was, and would just gawk at me like dumb eagles when I would ask for a copy of A Brief History Of Time, claiming no twelve-year-old would want anything to do with it unless they were a.) Recovering from a concussion; or b.) Out of toilet paper.

There was also this street I passed every day on my way from the apartment to school and from school back to the apartment that struck me as odd, for some reason. It looked uncannily like the alleyway in which Gaba had killed Marra. And there was just something . . . magnetic about it.

Moreover, it was always empty, so that was a definite plus.

Therefore whenever I needed to cry I'd go there and bawl my ducts out. Sometimes I'd kick one of those discarded black garbage bags lying around the corner, visualizing it to be Garbo herself. The terms are basically synonymous in my mind, anyway.

See missed Es the most. He just sprawled around the apartment, licking and sniffing and snorting at everything like he didn't approve of it.

Me too, bud. Me too.

I also had Toby. Toby was always nice and patient and willing to listen. He didn't interrupt me once, unlike you, when I told him of that time I had fallen off the swing and broken my arm or that other time when me and Aar had confused Granny regarding her own stories. You know her, right? The antique package of bones in wrinkled skin who first warned Marra and us of being wary of Witch/Ghost Moon Day, other than Bogs.

(Oh, Bogs, I hope they've stopped making fun of you back in {Undisclosed}. I know how you felt completely now, and I'm not even there to defend you. But seriously. Get rid of your nose-picking habit, it's disgusting.)

Granny's just so easy to dupe. You tell her she had said bishop instead of king in the first line of the story, and she'd go back and reconsider the whole plot - which revolved around a bishop getting married to the king's daughter, so good luck figuring that out, Granny.

I missed her, though. Still do.

Unfortunately Toby's back in that apartment, so I can't share anything with him, and I'm left with you.

Say, want to hear about how the 'mares grew more and more truculent?

Oh, okay.

Strap your seatbelts on.

you bootiful person ♡