A Soul of Lightning
Ah. Today feels like a wonderful day. Nothing like having small pieces of a random dream come true. Especially when at the end of that dream you die. You know what, I don’t care. We all must die sometime, so I guess I’ll just try to enjoy myself until the end. In the meantime, I’m makin’ waffles. It’s about seven in the morning, so I feel like it’s an appropriate time for breakfast. After waiting two minutes I take the waffles out of the microwave and slather syrup on them. “Do you like a lot of syrup on your waffles?” I ask.
“Of course. What kind of a person doesn’t like syrup?” she says, smiling.
It’s nice having someone a bit more positive than myself around. After pouring a good amount of syrup on her waffles I served it to her then sat down at the kitchen table. As we eat we keep snatching quick little looks at each other. She looks good in the morning light. After about three minutes I start saying something to her when someone starts knocking at the door. Dammit. This better be fuckin’ good. “Who is it?” I call out.
“Who the fuck do you think it is!?”
“Oh. Hold up.”
I get up to open the door for my dear old friend Tess Lanchester. I think it's a cool last name, but for some reason she doesn’t like it. She’s a fair-skinned petite British girl with short hair and bangs that cover her left eye. Her eyes are hazel and she has little freckles dotting her cheeks. She isn’t even tall enough to reach my shoulder. I remember she moved here about four years ago. The first thing she did was go over to my house and try to pick a fight with me. One broken nose and busted lip later we became pretty good friends for some reason. When I turned thirteen and I got my revolver she wanted to come shoot with me in my backyard. I’m not talking about a little plot of land the size of my front lawn. I consider the woods behind the house fence to be my backyard which is why I put in a gate. Not a whole lot of animals live in these parts so you can go deep inside and be safe.
Still, I thought it’d be dangerous, so I said no. The next day she knocked on my door with a Marlin Model 336A rifle with a mounted scope stuffed in a guitar case, loaded with blanks, and asked again if she could come over. Her parents are pretty rich, so she could get whatever the hell she wanted, which explained the delicious-looking rifle in her arms. After thinking about it for a bit I decided to let her in on one condition. She had to hit a soda can with her rifle by using only hip-fire. I figured it was damn near impossible. Never have I been so wrong. She was a crack shot with that rifle. Those soda cans never stood a chance. After that she started visiting from time to time, usually bringing her rifle with her. She can be kinda rude though. And by kinda rude, I mean a complete asshole. She’s threatened many times to break some parts of my body on several occasions, especially the parts I really need. She’d never do that, though. I’d fight her first. Alright, now to get back on track. “Come in, you damn blighter.”
“I see you’re in a good mood,” she said in a smug tone. “Just wondering if we could start shooting right now...”
She stopped dead in her tracks. She’s eyeing Elicia with noticeable contempt for some reason. Something’s wrong. Before she can do anything stupid I need to intervene. “So, how has your day been Tess?” I ask worryingly.
“Who the fuck is this?”, Tess yelled.
“I should be asking you the same thing. I hate rude-ass people like you though, so I don’t waste my fuckin’ time with them,” Elicia snapped.
“Why, you little fucker...”
“Shut up, both of you,” I order.
They both look at me as if I interrupted some kind of important conversation. When I look back at them with cold malice they seem to calm down a bit. “All right. You’re not children, so stop fuckin’ acting like you are. Now Tess, tell me why you yelled at Elicia.”
