Chapter 1.2: Destruction of the Night, My Personal Demise

I turned on my heel and started running. Normally I get a taxi to get myself home but tonight I felt like being out in the air. Sometimes, in the dead of night after a late-night romp with Talon I would just stand out on my balcony, naked, over-looking the scenery in the night. He would laugh at me for this and call me an exhibitionist. Either way, something about the night has always called to me and tonight, it was screaming for me. It’s like being wrapped in silk and swimming in perfect water, a feeling of being at home and where you belong. 

 

As I got closer and closer to my apartment I could not shake this feeling that something was following me. I never have felt like that before, especially at night. When I made it home without incident I shrugged it off. I assumed it was a part of my anger manifesting in another form now that Talon had calmed me down. I made it upstairs and dug around in my closet for the black dress I’d been taunting him with. Calvin, having won the settlement had decided to let me have part of my inheritance. It was not exactly a small sum of money. I had spent a little of it before my conscience got the better of me. One of the things was the “black dress”. I never let Talon, or anyone else for that matter, see it. It was my favorite material possession for so many reasons. I was ecstatic to finally have a situation to wear it in.

I jumped into the shower to further rid myself of the icky feeling left lingering in my stomach. I followed up that with a serious teeth brushing and mouth wash. I was in the middle of drying and styling my hair when I noticed my phone was blinking in the bedroom. I grabbed it, opened the balcony doors and turned the screen on. There was a message from Talon on my screen:

             “Looking forward to seeing you in your black dress. We both knew you’d come anyways. :)”

 Bastard indeed. 

I rolled my eyes and snapped the phone closed and tossed it on to the bed and went to finish working on my hair.  I had been looking forward to wearing this dress around Talon for months. Tonight’s party was a celebration of the show’s success and completion. It had been a hard road for all of us and I knew my attitude hadn’t been helping. I sighed was it really going to be ok for me to go..?

                As if on cue, my phone rang. The lit up screen registered it as Talon and I answered without hesitation.“What do you want now?” I asked playfully.
                “Am I going to have to drag you out..?” He was smiling. I could hear it in his tone. “I didn’t get a response so... I figured you were worrying over nothing… As usual.”
                “Ah... So you’re telepathic now.” I sarcastically responded.
                “Always have been… You didn’t notice..?”
                “Smartass.” I scoffed playfully.
                “Only because you make me be.” We both laughed then. This was our relationship in a nutshell. We were playfully, sarcastically, abusively childish.  I could hear his grin through the phone and it was infectious.

“So you were worrying about making an appearance, huh? ‘Cause Brass told you to take a few days and you think everyone’s upset..?”
                “Kind of. I’ve been a bit over-the-top lately, don’t you think?”

    “Natty. I’m ninety-nine percent sure everyone here gets it. Your parent’s divorce settlement drug on for years. We all know that’s not normal and now your dad’s gone off the deep end and you’re feeling like a kid again. No one blames you, Natty. Really.”
                “But what about the whole ‘days off’ speech Brass gave me?”
                “I talked to Brass. He even said it wouldn’t be the same if you didn’t come. We all know you’re the life of the party. He just doesn’t think work needs to add to your current stresses is all. The set’s all up, anyways. We’re just kind of in-the-wings. Just wanted you to know that.” I heard his shower come on then.
                “Yeah… I get it. I’ve got ‘the dress’ out of the closet. We both knew I’d come, right?” I semi-sighed and he laughed.
                “You worry too much. I’ll see you at the club, ok?”
                “Right. See you there… ”

Love was terrifying to me so I just hung up the phone but this was the first time I felt open air between us. We both knew what was supposed to be said but neither of us could ever say it. Not to mention I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to. It wasn’t something we discussed but I knew, deep down, Talon was important to me. I hadn’t seen, or been with, anyone else in, what felt like, forever. It had just been Talon and I for at least a year. In my past I had never settled for one guy, and I still had guy friends, but at any advances I had cut them off, laughed and told them no way. This was as close to becoming “a couple” as I saw us. At least right up until that moment.

Talon had been watching out for me ever since I’d started work at the theater and had never stopped looking out for me. He'd been so brotherly in his ways of helping me that being around him had become natural and not being at his side felt some what awkward. I had originally thought of us as just friends and nothing more but one night at a party after work we had all been playing some stupid drinking game or another gotten horrendously drunk and started our own private game of twenty questions out on the balcony.

     “Have yooouu…. Ever... kissed a girl?” he slurred though his speech in the most pathetically adorable way.
                “Tsch,” I slurred back, just as drunk, “I’ve had girlfriends... and girls that are friends... and friends that are more than girls…Wait…” And then we both laughed so hard we ended up on our backs with tears streaming from our eyes. When we both sat up we knocked heads so hard we ended up back on the floor, laughing.  Then he rolled over on his side and stared down on me, rubbing his forehead, chuckling. “You’re something else, Natty. You know that..?”
                “Is that a good thing or a bad thing, Talon? I’ve heard that my whole life and have never understood what people actually mean by it.” I rolled to my side to face him. 

                “Just means you’re special in your own way. You’ve got a spirit that most people can’t control on their own and you’ve struggled and fought through some demons in your life. And we’re still young. You’re just… Fascinating. That’s what I mean by it.” He grinned a bit then laid back on his back. I remember blinking a few times and being utterly confused.
                “So I’m fascinating? That’s how you… Do whatever it is you do?” I scoffed. Why was I so irritated at him? We'd been like siblings up til now. I could tell I caught him off guard and he snorted.
                “I didn’t think this was going to go THAT direction, Natty…” He inhaled sharply, shrugged and his eyebrows rose and dropped. I was completely taken back.
                “So I’m not good enough for… THAT..? Is THAT it..?” I stood up, stumbling as the room spun in circles. He was up right behind me, steadying me. “No do not touch me if I’m not th-“

                He caught me so off guard with that first kiss that first real touch I immediately backed away from him and straight into a wall. I didn’t know what had just occurred. Did he not just get done telling me I was not the right kind of girl for him? Before I could finish that train of thought he was there, in front of me and pressing to me, kissing me more, harder, stronger. His body was solid from all the hard labors in his life. He loved odd jobs and his body was the evidence of that. Scars, scratches and bruises were his trophy and he wore them proudly. His hands were rough from his work but gently agreesive as they found their way to me, down my sides and over my body. His lips pressed to mine and it was like meeting a mold for the first time in my life.

I don’t remember much after that. Only that we have been inseparable ever since. We never talked about “20 questions” again though we questioned one another frequently about impersonal things. I don’t know his parents. He’s never met mine. We’ve never had a need for it, after all.

            So now, as I’m finishing my make-up and sliding on this dress, why do I feel like we’re missing out?

I stared into the mirror at my completed outfit, my makeup and my hair. I felt vain doing this but there was rarely a chance where I felt the need to dress up so I dismissed my thoughts. This dress was going to blow everyone away. I knew it in my soul.

I grabbed my phone and called for a cab. It was getting too late and the club was too far for me to walk, especially in these shoes. I settled for walking onto my balcony and feeling the night air again.  I leaned over it and looked all around. Not a paranoid searching but just to look, to take in the landscape to appreciate it in all its hidden beauty. People, as a whole, dismiss the night as something scary or impenetrable. No one sees the true glory of the night and how nature really thrives in the dark. Something snapped to my left and I spun so hard I almost broke off a heel.
               
                “Mroew…” Solid black he’d managed to sneak up on me.
                “You little scamp... You scared me half to death. Was that really necessary?” The neighbor’s cat, a Bombay mix, had decided to pay me a visit. He is such a sweet animal but tonight he seemed almost hesitant to be around me. I went to pick him up and he just backed away, staring at me, like he was trying to make me see something or predicting something.

                “You’re being awfully strange tonight, you know… Are you hungry? I think I’ve got some tuna inside.” As if he understood me he walked right into my apartment and right for the kitchen. Weird animal. Maybe his owner talked to him a lot and he just understood “tuna”, either way, he was staring at me impatiently as I tore open the packet and put it into a bowl. He impatiently walked around my legs but avoided making contact with me which was really unlike him.

                As I set the bowl on the ground he hissed and bolted away from me, but not out of my house. I went after him but he was already behind the couch. Making eye contact with him was disturbingly off tonight. He seemed almost terrified of me all of a sudden. His eyes were wide, glowing in the dim light of the lamp.

                “Toulouse… You know you can’t stay back there forever… What’s with you tonight you strange little kitty?” He mreowed really low, a warning, and hissed again. His eyes kept staring into me as if he was almost pleading an understanding into my mind and then he ducked under the sofa as my wall box buzzed at me, notifying me of my cab.I sighed, frustrated, audibly and stood up straight and stared at my sofa.

                “I expect you OUT of my house and that tuna gone by the time I come home, you hear me under there?” As if in response, he mewed, quietly, almost pleading with me for the third time.
                “I have to go.” I said as I walked to the balcony doors, shut one and left the other slightly open to let him escape at his leisure after I was gone. Living on the third floor I did not really concern myself with break-ins, someone would have to be damned determined to get into this apartment.

                I walked to the front door and heard him mreow for me again.
                “Goodbye, Toulouse. I’ll see you next time.”

                With that, I left my apartment and left behind the only warning that something was coming my way and that I was completely unprepared to stop it.