Lord of Unkindness: Chapter Four

 Notes: On we go! I love these brisk chapters :)

Title: Lord of Unkindness: Chapter Four

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Chapter Four

 

Ciro wakes up in the morning to an aching back and fingers that are numb from the second knuckle down. He flexes them idly, knowing it won’t help but unable to stop himself. He stares up at the ceiling and lets gaze go vague as he searches for more of his birds. Other than the two in the room, cuddled up against each other like bookends on the back of the futon, the closest significant group is about thirty miles off, hanging around a copse of fire-burned trees outside of Chino Hills. His magic likes to cluster, and he can’t blame it—like calls to like. But he also can’t have them here.

“Not that it wouldn’t be nice to feel my fucking fingertips,” Ciro mutters, but there’s no use crying over things he can’t have. Maybe when he’s ready to move on, he can head out into the desert for a few weeks and let his magic recombine for a while. He glances over at his phone, but a few pokes quickly informs him that the battery is dead. Great.

Eh, fuck it. He’s got the money in his account, and no jobs lined up for now. There’s nothing he needs to check with it Ciro heaves himself to his feet, walks over to the charger to plug his phone in, and grabs a pre-packaged oatmeal out of the cupboard. He fills the cup to the line with water and sticks it in the microwave, pushes the timer for a minute, then runs his hands through his hair. Ugh. Greasy.

He tilts his head and sniffs himself, then grimaces. Ugh. Stinky.

This building has shit water pressure, but anything is better than how he smells right now. He strips down and heads into the bathroom, gets the shower going—a lukewarm trickle, but he’ll take it—and brushes his teeth before stepping into the water.

Actually, it’s pretty nice today. Maybe because it’s close to noon and he’s the only person using the system right now. Ciro pumps some of his combination bodywash/shampoo into his hand, works it into his hair, then rubs until it’s a proper lather. He washes once, then twice, then gets to work on his body with his clumsy hands.

Half a year ago, Ciro had a full-on skin care routine. His shampoo had smelled like bergamot and lemon, his moisturizer had come in tiny, gorgeous glass bottles, and he’d gone through bottles of Sauvage like it was nothing. He had looked just as beautiful and expensive as all his products, too. And now…

Now who would pay twenty bucks for you if they were just going on looks? Not that Ciro thinks he’s not attractive—he knows some people go for the waifish and cut-cheeked look, but personally he’d rather have the grace to gorge on beignets for a week. Instead, he buys cheap multi-use products and cheap multi-pack foods and he’s grateful for it. Anything that puts more distance between himself and the person he used to be is good. No buying from familiar high-end brands; he’s sure those purchases are being tracked by his family. He’s got to be a new person, now.

Ciro gets out and towels himself off. His dick, previously uninterested, starts to perk up. It’s tempting—a nice laze on the futon while he jerks off to porn on his phone, and fuck anybody who says that’s not a thrill—but then he remembers that his phone is out of juice.

Well…

“Going out is an option,” he reminds himself as he pulls on another pair of jeans, these ones acid-washed blue that are more hole than fabric—and not in the sexy distressed way. He tries to make up for it by picking a shirt with no holes in it, solid red and washed so many times before it ended up in the thrift store that it’s as soft as silk. A baseball hat—fuck his hair, he’ll style it later if he feels up to it—and a pair of ratty tennis shoes paired with decent socks later, and Ciro is heading out the door after pounding down the oatmeal.

Coffee. He’ll get coffee, at an actual coffee shop, someplace nice. “Nice” being relative, but whatever, not the decrepit pot in his apartment. His ravens, now fully awake, leave through the bedroom window. He’d like to have at least one of them on him—he’s numb to the wrists now that they’re so high above—but he’s got to take the bus to get to Café Dulce on Alameda if he wants to get there without walking another two hours, and an “emotional support raven” would attract too much attention.

Ciro waits at the stop—he’s the only person there. The bus arrives fifteen minutes later, the driver looking irritated. His irritation grows when Ciro fumbles his wallet, barely able to take out the pass he purchased a few weeks back. Ciro heads to the back and sits in one of the many free spots, keeping his head down but his eyes open the way he’s been trained. Surveillance was one of the first skills his parents taught him, and he tries to keep up with it. Magic is great, but you still need to be able to use your brain.

I see…a salmon swimming in a purple stream next to a tired old dog. The dog is staring at a container of cottage cheese on the stairs, where an astronaut is about to land. There’s a pair of budgies chirping on the next step, one blue, one green, and a cloud of smoke is drifting close to the ceiling. The smoke is red and yellow, and it’s making Mr. Magoo mad.

The salmon swimming in the purple stream—a student wearing a salmon-colored Cal State sweatshirt with purple headphones on—gets off at the next stop. Ciro amuses himself by swapping out the actors in his mental playhouse for thirty more minutes before he finally gets to his own stop, and leaves with a head full of characters and the desire to dictate or write everything down so he can write it into a proper report later.

But there’s no one else to report to. No one cares whether he does a good job except for himself.

He hears a bracing “caw!” above him somewhere and grins as he enters the coffee shop. It’s larger on the inside than it looks, with a central bar for ordering and plenty of space for people to sit, even a patio. Ciro orders a huge coffee topped off with caramel and whipped cream, then grabs a chicken apple sandwich as well and heads out to the patio. He sits down in a chair at the edge of the shady space, then throws one of the apple pieces into the air.

A raven catches it, then settles on the railing a little ways away. He throws it another, then takes a bite himself.

“You shouldn’t feed wild birds, you know,” someone calls from a few tables away. It’s an older man with a pot belly and a distinctive red hat. “You’re going to make them dependent on you.”

“It’s fine,” Ciro says mildly.

“Young people today,” the man snaps. “Don’t take any fucking responsibility. I bet you’re living off the government, aren’t you? Wasting your food stamps and SNAP benefits on coffee when you oughta be buying a five-pound bag of rice, you piece of—”

A long, dark feather lands in the man’s salad. Irritated, the man turns to pluck it out with his thumb and forefinger, and then—

He eats it. Shoves it right into his mouth, crunches it up, and swallows it down. It’s clear he has to work at it; he gags a little bit toward the end and has to wash it down with a big gulp from his coffee cup. A few seconds later his face starts to turn green, and he stands up and hustles himself toward the bathrooms.

“What a weirdo.”

“Jesus Christ, that dude.”

“Asshole.”

Ciro smiles and throws his raven another piece of apple. Better the gentleman with the unwanted opinions have a little bit of indigestion than Ciro actually get upset with him.

He hears another cry for attention and throws a bit of chicken to the other bird. Two…two is the most he can have around right now. Two could be a mated pair, two is family. Any more than that and he’ll be in trouble in the light of day, but—

“Hey there!”

A compact woman wearing last night’s clothes and stinking of smoke and sweat plops down in the chair across from him. She’s got the manic look of someone who’s been up for over thirty hours and has a huge energy drink can in one of her hands. “I thought I’d see you again! Lucky, huh?”

Fuck. Yeah. Real lucky.