Chapter nine: The whole job

Trigger warnings for those who need them

substance abuse,

I can’t sleep.
Tossing and turning as my brain keeps shouting insults at me.
Idiot.
Failure.
Weakling.
Pathetic.
I can’t think but my brain won’t shut up, like the Bad one is putting my brain through the mangle over and over again.
I just want to sleep.
I just want to stop thinking about all the places I’ve messed up in life.
Now.
Please.

I drag myself to the cul de sac.
“Hey friend, you got more cigs?” I ask Raoul.
His eyes narrow at the question. “You ran out already? How did you manage that?” He asks and I wonder if I can hear a hint of concern in his voice or if that’s just what I want to hear.
Probably the latter. “I didn’t smoke it all myself.” I lie. “A good stash goes quick when you share it with friends.”
He laughs amicably. “I bet it does. How much do you need this time?”
I think for a moment.
This might be my last job.
I have no idea if the wiry man has another box for me next week.
But even if I’m fired they still need to pay me for my last job right?
And I have quite a bit saved up…
“Five boxes will do for now.” I tell him.
“Coming right up.”

A week passes in the blink of an eye and I’m making my way to the same spot as always to pick up my box.
I’m not sure what else to do.
Maybe Adrian didn’t tell Theresa about what happened.
Maybe everything is fine as long as I don’t say anything.
Turning the corner I find the wiry man waiting for me. Without a word he hands me my cash and I look with confusion at the sad-sack pile of coppers.
“I…what’s this?” I ask carefully.
“Half assed job, half assed pay.” He states matter-of-factly.
“But I delivered the box?” If Theresa fired me that was another matter but at least she should pay me for my last assignment!?
The man smiles a crooked at me. “You thought handing off the box was your only job?”
“That’s the thing you told me to do.” I retort.
“Look, that weirdo likes telling his stupid, made-up stories and you just listen to them and hum at the right moments. It’s an easy job. I’m surprised you managed to fuck it up.”
What?
So…the whole song and dance; getting in, sitting down and listening to the guy’s tall tales?
That’s part of the job?
“I wouldn’t have, if you had told me.”
He shrugs as if to say ‘not my problem’ then produces a familiar cardboard box from his bag. “You’re a lucky man though. The customer didn’t tell us to stop sending you so you can have a do-over. At least this time you’re not rara.” He huffs, pushing it into my arms.
“Do you know what’s in the box?” I try.
“Not my job, not my concern. Just don’t mess it up this time.”

As I walk that familiar path the reality of my situation sinks in for real.
It feels almost…unsavoury in a way.
But I’m not doing anything weird! I’m just there, drinking and listening.
I did dance for him that one time…
But maybe he’s just lonely?
Seems unlikely with all the friends he keeps talking about.
Except they’re probably made up too.
I mean, how could any of it even be true? It’s hard to pin down his age but there’s no way he much over forty, yet his stories seem to span decades, maybe even centuries.
They make no sense.
He doesn’t make sense.
So why should I believe anything he tells me?
I enter the old city center and shiver at the chill.
He’s probably just a failed writer who tries his story ideas on me.
But why not just tell me that?
Is he embarrassed by it?
Or maybe he just gets a kick out of telling tall tales to some unsuspecting lowlife like myself.
I grimace at the thought.
Last week truly was a wake up call.
He’s the boss, I’m the courier.
He’s the rich eccentric with the detached house and I’m the filthy junkie who climbs through his landlord’s window.
Back then he looked so…so disappointed at me.
As if I’d sullied some sort of perfect image he had of me.
But he truly is an idiot if he thought I was clean.
Besides, he’s the one serving alcohol all the time!
He’s got his poison, I got mine.
I just wish he wouldn’t be so hypocritical about it.
I ring the bell with sweaty fingers.
The sound is deafening in the silence.
I don’t want to stand here waiting.
What if he just called me over to play a prank on me?
What if he has no intention of opening the door?
I could run…
Leave the box.
And get paid only a handful of coppers?
This waiting is killing me.
When the door opens up, Adrian looks me up and down like last time, then smiles politely. “Valentine.”
“Your package.” I tell him.
“Right.” He takes the box from me and puts in on the side table. To my astonishment, the box from last week is still there.
He never even bothered putting it away.
“Will you come in?” He puts on a smile for me.
I shrug. “I guess. It’s all part of the job.”
I didn’t have to jab like that, but I wanted to.
Adrian’s eyes cast down as I pass him into the corridor. “Ah, they told you then?”
“It’s fine. I’m not in any position to judge.” I tell him nonchalantly as I make my way to the curious room.
The man follows me hurriedly “No- I- look-“ He sighs. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine.” I repeat, yet part of me delights in watching him squirm like this.
I may be a junkie.
But at least I’m not paying a ludicrous sum to lure people into my house.

I enter the curious room and sit down on my designated chair.
I expect Adrian to sit down in his but instead he walks up to my chair and kneels down in front of me.
He looks up at me as he speaks. “I just wanted someone to talk to, but didn’t want you to feel nervous about being here or try and blow smoke up my ass. That’s why I told Theresa not to tell you the full job description.”
He looks so vulnerable, so ashamed.
My chest swells with a sense of grand superiority.
It feels amazing.
“What if I hadn’t come in that first time then? Would you not have paid me?” I ask.
“I’d…I’d have paid you the fee and then asked Theresa to pick someone else next time.” He admits.
That’s weird.
This whole thing is weird.
I should be angry right?
But I’m not.
In a way, I feel validated.
“Am I just a sounding board to you then?” I ask.
“What? No! No Valentine. You’re great.” He grabs my hands and holds them tightly as if afraid I might flee. “You listen so well. You even notice when I change the decor. I adore having your company. You’re the first one who ever asked my name.”
Wait.
“How many couriers have you had?”
His eyes get striked with panic. “Only two, well, two who stuck around for longer than a week.”
“And where are they now?”
“I didn’t kill them if that’s what you’re thinking.” He bites.
“I didn’t say that.” I pull my hands away. To my astonishment he lets me “But I want to know what happened to them. Whatever story you had planned can wait. I want you to tell me or else I’m out of that door and I won’t come back next week.”
I don’t feel like this should be a hard choice, yet he thinks for an eternity before saying “Fine.”
He gets up slowly. Pours two glasses of liquor from a brown bottle, downs his glass in one swig and takes a deep sigh before handing me the other one. “It’s fire-wine.”
“Thanks.”
He droops to his chair and sits down, eyes caught in his empty glass for a moment. Then he opens his mouth and says. “Before I start, I want you to know it didn’t start out like this. I genuinely need the stuff inside the boxes. They’re not some empty vehicle to lure people inside.” He holds his tongue for a bit but I can see through the trick.
He’s baiting me to ask what’s inside, trying to get me to change the subject. “Go on.” I tell him.
“Well, I’d just gone through a bit of a bad breakup. It left me a tad…shattered.” He chuckles to himself as if he said something funny but I don’t get the joke. “I won’t go into the details but his departure left me feeling lost and lonely and I just wanted someone to talk to.” He then sets the glass down on the table and tops it up again. “I tried to hire someone for that purpose at first. But trying to buy people’s time always gives them with the wrong expectations.” He takes a sip. “They think it’s foreplay, a cry for help or both. And it’s not! I just, want, to, talk.” He sighs exasperatedly and for a moment his eyes look ancient and weary. Like he’s been at this for centuries.
“What about your friends?” I ask, wondering if they’re even real.
“They’re dead- Well not all of them. Some I just lost track of or they don’t remember who I am.” His eyes turn melancholy. He then looks up at me and gestures me to drink.
I take a sip of the fire-wine, it’s warming, comforting.
I like it.
But I didn’t tell him to stop talking. “And the other couriers?” I ask.
“The first was named Maeba. I invited him in expecting him to say no really. But he did, I gave him tea and he just listened for a while as I told him my adventures. I gave him a large tip for his time and from there on my problem was solved for a while.
Maeba would come by, he’d drink his tea, I’d talk and he got his extra cash. We never talked about it. Never discussed rates or voiced the implications. I think I paid him well and he seemed to agree since he kept on coming back. It was a good arrangement.”
His mouth curls into a smile but his eyes stand pitiful “That is until one day I open my door and find this new guy. I talked to Theresa of course but she said Maeba had quit.
I didn’t understand. I thought things were going well but…well it took me a couple weeks of searching to find out that ‘quit’ meant ‘overdosed in a dank alleyway and left to the rats’ in this case.” He takes another swig then gasps. “It uh…took me a while to recover from that one.”
“I’m sorry.” I tell him and surprise myself by meaning it.
“His poison was c-salt. He never told me of course and I didn’t exactly pay him to talk about his private life. So when you turned up on my doorstep last week I got…concerned.”
“Right…” Pretty sure c-salt puts you in a completely different state though. Doesn’t that stuff make you hallucinate?
“I finally explained to Theresa what I needed and because I’m a loyal customer she was happy to help. Sending me different people until there was ‘someone that struck my fancy’.
It took months to find another one. Her name was Lucile. When I asked her to come in, she did so without protest. I gave her coffee and I told her about a zoo made of robots that I made for a friend. That first time I’m pretty sure she was scared out her wits the whole time. I felt like I had to be very careful around her. No sudden movements, no sudden sounds or she’d jump up like the devil’s on her tail.
She kept coming back though and calmed down after two, maybe three visits. She was a proper and prim type that sat still and listened attentively to whatever you had to say.
I quite liked her. Which is why I still kick myself for asking her why she came in that first time. ‘I didn’t know I had any other option’ was her response and I was flabbergasted. I explained to her she could have left if she wanted to. She nodded at this, thanked me for the coffee, and left. I never saw her again after that.” He sighs “So there you have it. One died of his own stupidity, the other left by her own free will. And then we’re back to you.”
“I see.”
“Do you mind?”
“What, being the third?”
“No being here, this whole arrangement. Are you just going to disappear like Lucile once you walk out of here tonight?”
I take a sip from my drink, consider my options and find “No, no I don’t think I will.” I always felt there was something off about the situation but now that I know what’s going on the tension is gone. I feel…I feel oddly okay with this.
The man’s eyes light up “Thank you.”
I smile, down my drink, set it down for another round. “So what’s the story you have prepared for me tonight?”
“Well, I wasn’t sure you’d come so…” He scratched the back of his head apologetically. “How about you pick something, anything in my room and I’ll tell you how I got it.”
“All right.” I jump from my chair to the mantelpiece but…the white statues are gone.
“You removed the statues here.” I note.
“They’re getting cleaned, you’ll have to pick something else.”
A bit disappointed I follow down the rest of the shelves until I find a small wooden box covered in a strange pattern. “What about this then?”
“Sure, open it.” His mouth pulls into a grin as I look for any lid, lock or lever. “How?”
“It’s a trick box you see. They’re often made as pastime play-things for the children of Madricord. But of course those aren’t nearly as complex. There was a boxmaker near Staed who made this box as a promotional stunt. Anyone who could open the box could keep it and the prize inside.
Many have tried, many have failed. But failure just fuels my desire to keep going. Every tiny step I recorded in my journal and when I cracked the first layer, its creator got pretty worries. He sold it to me then and there to save him the embarrassment and give me the chance to solve it in the comfort of my own home. I’m glad he did, it took me four more months to get down into the depths of it.”
“Four months!?”
“Of course now I can solve it in four minutes.” He reaches out his hand “Do you wanna see?”
I look at the box one more time, I can’t even spot a place to get started. It’s all just smooth wood and painted symbols which I assume is Madricorian then? I hand it off.
He puts his nail underneath one of the symbols near the edge and props it up ever so slightly, another letter springs up as if my magic and he grabs hold of it before twisting it a tiny fraction activating yet another tiny change you’d easily miss if you’re not looking for it. His hands glide over the box smoothly. But it’s the face of this strange man that interests me the most. It bears an expression of utmost concentration and focus and I can only imagine him looking the same way back in Madricord. “What’s Madricord like?”
“It’s mostly cold.” He explains, eyes still on his task. “Their winter takes up half the year, with the rest of the seasons squashed in at the other end. The towns are small there. You’ll be hard pressed to find a metropolis like Venusia. Even the capitol only counts ten thousand residents. Distances between villages are great so unless you’re a merchant, you’ll likely to never leave the village you were born in. But at least they’re surrounded by woodland on all sides meaning they got plenty to burn to keep warm and cosy.”
“I guess, sounds a bit like a nightmare to me.”
“How so?”
“I doubt they have a theater out there. What use is a theater without an audience right?”
He laughs. “Of course that’d be your complaint.” He pulls a thin wire from the box and suddenly it falls apart into pieces. I’d be convinced he broke it if it weren’t for his calm expression. Inside the mess of parts he pulls out another box, smaller but no less intricate “How’s the rehearsing going?” he asks.
“Oh…I grunt. I’m sorry.”
“Whatever for?”
“I lied to you.”
His hands halt mid-action. His eyes flick towards me “Go on…?”
“I’ve been a dancer, for over ten years but I got fired a couple weeks before I started working for Theresa. I was embarrassed to admit that to you.”
“Is that all you lied about to me?” He asks sternly as he snaps a set of tiny levers into the correct positions.
“That’s all.”
“Good. Thank you for telling me the truth.” His eyes soften. Then he opens up the top of the box and pulls out a wooden top encrusted with colourful stones. It looks impressive. “Here.” He tosses it to me. I scramble to catch it. “You can have this if you want.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I don’t care much for the prizes.”
“Somehow I find that hard to believe.” I gesture to the room at large. He pull up his eyebrow for a bit, then smiles. “That’s different.”
“Sure it is.”