Four

by Tia Fielding

  Another meow, this one from Spike, sounded from the bedroom doorway. Kaos maneuvered himself into a sitting position under his blanket and watched as the young fluffy cat sauntered into the kitchen to get his breakfast. Damn, but Kaos adored those felines. Spike might not have inherited his mother’s intelligence, but he was a gorgeous cat and sort of the comedic relief to Mouse’s caring seriousness.

  Kaos got up and quietly padded through the bedroom to the bathroom. He felt bad for making any noise, but bodies need certain things in the mornings. He hoped Emil would continue sleeping through Kaos’s bathroom trip and through his and Makai’s breakfast too.

  Kaos ended up looking at himself in the mirror and feeling out his consciousness like he sometimes would when he didn’t know if it was a girl or a boy day yet. He needed to take the trip to the tattoo studio into account. While he had to be honest to Christa about his gender identity, he also didn’t want to go there in heavy makeup or too girly clothing, at least not on the first meeting. He had time still, so he’d worry about eyeliner a bit later. Once he’d had some caffeine. Yeah, that sounded like a good idea.

  He moved silently back to the main living area and breathed in relief when Emil didn’t stir at all.

  “Don’t worry, he sleeps pretty deep now. The first couple of nights were different, but it seems like his mind went ‘okay, you need rest’ and he’s dead to the world.” Makai grinned and finished making them egg sandwiches. “This okay?”

  “Yeah, thanks. I’m going to bring you guys lunch when I get back from Mercer. Then figure out dinner later too. My turn.” Kaos watched the coffee maker mournfully. Having to wait was the worst, after Trev’s fancy machine that used pods, with its twin sitting on the counter in the tattoo studio’s break room.

  Funny how the only two things he missed from that relationship were Trev’s gadgets and Lake.

  “What are you thinking about?”

  Kaos smiled. “Better coffeemakers, mostly.”

  “Ah yeah, I’ve been meaning to get a really good one. This came with the house and is crap, but you know.” Makai shrugged. It wasn’t a priority—Kaos could understand that.

  “We need to look into that, bro,” Kaos murmured, sighing wistfully.

  Makai chuckled and took a couple of yogurts from the fridge, showing them to Kaos. “Want one?”

  “The vanilla is fine. Thanks.”

  They took their breakfast to the tiny table and ate in silence. The cats came to sit on the floor next to them like dogs, until Makai told them to scram.

  “Once Emil wakes up, we’re going into town to ask around about the shop idea. I know Nora loves to bake, and she would probably love the chance to bake for the shop every now and then.”

  “Yeah, you said she makes great lemon bars.” Kaos nodded over his coffee mug.

  “Oh yeah. Have you thought about taking the job there? Unless you get a lot of clients at the studio in Mercer?”

  “I doubt, even if I get the job, there’ll be much work there, to be honest. Couple of days a week probably. And it’s not far, so I could still do both on the same day if it’s small tattoos or otherwise not time-consuming. But yeah, it would be good. I’d rather sketch there than sit here all day, you know?”

  “Uh-huh. I got to admit, I like the idea of being able to make random pieces just because and then sell them there. Tourists buy random stuff. One thing I’ve wanted to learn how to make is wooden puzzle boxes and maybe carvings of animals. Toys for kids, you know?” Makai’s features lit up with the kind of enthusiasm Kaos loved to see in people.

  “Sounds good to me. Although I doubt there’s much tourism during the winter, but you know there’s time to work on pieces, and then we’d have a stock once they start to trickle in in the spring,” Kaos mused.

  “Oh yeah, totally.” Makai shifted in his chair, trying to make himself more comfortable.

  “Have you thought about expanding the cabin? Even just a bay window would do wonders.” Kaos felt for Makai, he did. He could understand how the cottage might’ve looked perfect when it was just Makai, and even with Emil and the cats there. But add one guest and suddenly everything was crowded as hell. Besides, a slightly bigger table to eat at wouldn’t hurt either.

  “Not really, but now that you said it, I’ll give it some thought. Thanks.” Makai beamed at him.

  “If there’s space, even an extra room might be possible. Or a sunroom-type thing. Hell, go wild and add something in the back and a deck in the front?” Kaos gestured with his sandwich, enjoying the hell out of the way Makai’s eyes glazed a bit as his brain started to whir with possibilities.

  IT WAS easy enough to find Christa’s studio that was actually a converted garage next to a small house not far from Mercer’s main street. The sign, with neatly printed words Pink Ink, was nailed to the wall above the large door. There was one of those mechanic’s doors within the bigger one, so a human could pass through without having to open the whole thing. The sign for contact information and hours was on it, much as Kaos had expected.

  A few flakes of snow were drifting from the sky, but not enough to even make it to the ground visible. The weather was oddly beautiful in its stillness. He stood by his car in the parking spot in front of the studio and stared at the flakes floating down against the backdrop of trees that lined Christa’s yard.

  The smaller door opened behind him, and a woman in her midthirties, with dark pink hair, peered out. “Hey, you must be Kaos!” she said cheerily, and smiled at him.

  “Yeah, nice to meet you!” He picked up his portfolio from the car before following her into the studio.

  The space itself was really nice. The art had tasteful graffiti, some posters, and even a couple of paintings in addition to the usual flash art one saw in most tattoo studios. Kaos looked around, liking what he saw a lot. About half of the building was the front, with sitting space and a front desk, with sketching desks behind that along the left side wall. There seemed to be three work stations under some sort of loft space, all divided by walls with movable partitions that would probably close them off to the front. There were also narrow stairs to the upper level of the garage, but most of the space had a high ceiling, which made the studio seem bigger than it actually was.

  “This is all very nice,” he commented thoughtfully. Then he realized how it might’ve come across and hastened to add, “I mean, it’s not like I expected a dump or anything.”

  Christa laughed, her small, voluptuous body shaking with the emotion. “I know what you mean. It’s fine.” She waved a hand at him dismissively to further show she wasn’t upset.

  “So here’s my portfolio.” Kaos lifted the hefty binder. “Did you want to go to a brunch somewhere or…?”

  “We could go somewhere, but I also got some goodies from the bakery this morning, and we have coffee here up in the loft.”

  “Oh, well, I don’t mind either way. Staying in might be nice?” He wanted to give her the option to do whatever was more comfortable for her.

  “Sure, I have one of those Keurig machines, so once we want coffee, it’s gonna be fast, no prep needed.” She took the binder from him and gestured to the couches in the front of the studio. “Let’s sit there. Or I’ll sit, and you can look around the place while I take a look at these?”

  “Yeah, that sounds good. Anywhere I shouldn’t go?” he asked, just in case.

  “Oh no, go anywhere, look into drawers if you want. Mi casa, su casa and all that.” She grinned. “If you wanna work here, there’s even more reason not to have secrets, you know. Not that I have any, but… you know how that goes!”

  He saluted her and started the rounds.

  It was obvious that the workspace located behind the stairs a bit was used as storage right now. It was still clean and neat, which was impressive. Not all studios, even reputable ones, knew how to keep stock.

  The next workspace, the one in the middle under the loft, was clean and free of clutter. There had been things on the walls, but they had b
een taken down, based on the empty spaces. One wall was painted white, and if he looked at it just so, he could see a Japanese-style image under it. Must’ve been the ex-husband’s space, then—the guy had been big on Japanese traditional, Christa had told him on the phone.

  The leftmost space was obviously Christa’s. One wall was painted hot pink, and even though Kaos would’ve thought it to be too much with the rest of the small room’s décor, it actually worked. It looked like Christa, at least.

  He peeked into drawers and cupboards, finding everything to be in order, including the certifications framed on the wall. This was a nice little home studio and could easily function with three artists. In another place, it would’ve been a huge success. Here, Christa had said that she could barely get by with her three kids.

  Kaos went back to the couches and plopped down on the one at an angle to hers.

  “These are really good, Kaos. I mean, you haven’t been tattooing for long at all, and this is what you produce.” She sounded a little bit awed, which made Kaos preen on the inside.

  “Yeah, well, I had some good teachers. I didn’t have one mentor—more like couple of really talented guys and then a revolving door of guest artists who were normally into explaining stuff and telling me all about their mistakes, so I learned fast.”

  “In any case, this is impressive,” she said, smiling at him. She was leafing forward and back again between different pieces still, seemingly unable to stop. “Did you apply for your license yet?”

  “Yeah, and Sheriff Newman said he’d call the Department of Safety and Professional Services if I wanted to rush them along a bit. Which I honestly probably want, because I can’t stay idle for months and months.” He frowned at the thought.

  “Well, I’m not expecting anyone to come asking for a station, but we still have one extra, so I’ll keep the middle one for you, for sure.”

  “What, I’m hired, just like that?” Kaos blinked at her.

  She laughed again. “Yes, honey, you are. You’d be an asset to this place, and frankly, I need talent to back Pink Ink up.” Her expression turned serious and a little bit of sad and maybe even pissed off.

  “Coffee now?” Kaos asked, sensing a discussion coming up.

  They went upstairs to the kitchenette-slash-break room. Once they had coffees—blessed be the gods of Keurig—and pastries from the bakery, they sat in a booth someone had built into the corner of the loft.

  “You’ve seen my portfolio, right?” she asked as she put a croissant on her plate and started to rip it apart.

  “Yeah, I looked that up, but none of the gossip online. I don’t need to hear that shit.” Kaos picked a danish and took a bite.

  “Well, if you had read the gossip, it’d say that my husband was the one people came in for. He’s somewhat of a name in the Japanese traditional circles, like I told you on the phone.” She took a sip of her coffee. “So, when he decided to follow his calling and this barely twenty-year-old girl he met at a convention in Texas, that kind of left me in a bind. Sure, I could call on some friends to come visit—you know, fellow artists who wanted to help out because Ronnie certainly wasn’t everyone’s favorite, and leaving me and the kids like that didn’t do marvels for his reputation.”

  Kaos nodded. He could understand that. Tattooists were usually very loyal, taking care of their own, and if one of them fucked up, they were quick to figure out where the fault lay. In this case it was obviously Ronnie, and Kaos felt proud of being part of a community where you’d step in to help someone, even if they were in the middle of nowhere.

  “You had some bigger names here, didn’t you? I’m pretty sure I heard about that at one point.”

  “Yeah, we still had a mortgage, so we had some really well-known people drop in for a couple of days each, just to raise money so I could pay the bills and maybe have hopes of sending the kids to college eventually. If I’d had the mortgage, I couldn’t save at all.”

  “How old are your kids?”

  “Ten, eight, and six. They’re great. They don’t understand what their dad did or why, and they certainly haven’t forgiven him. I try not to meddle, just explain where I can. I won’t be the one he’ll point at when he wants to figure out who ‘poisoned their minds’ or some shit.” She snorted in a way that told Kaos she knew what she was talking about. Maybe she’d been a child of divorce, then.

  “So there’s another female-run studio somewhere near, right?”

  “Yeah, so that won’t work as a draw either. Those girls are good, and they’re in a bit bigger city, but it can’t be easy there either.”

  “Do you have another job?”

  “Oh yeah, I do websites and book covers as a side job. Good thing I learned to code and use Photoshop when the kids were little.”

  “Smart of you,” Kaos agreed. He cleared his throat then and took a sip of coffee to calm his nerves. “There’s more that you should know about me. Not just the jail time.”

  She’d taken that in stride, especially when he’d explained the whys of it all. She wasn’t prejudiced about that, but she had kids, and if she didn’t want a queer person around them, Kaos would accept it, even if he wouldn’t quite understand.

  At Christa’s encouraging and curious expression, Kaos took in a deep breath, released it, and said, “I’m gender fluid. And I like men. So… queerness multiplied or something….”

  “Okay…?” She looked at him like she wasn’t sure what the problem was.

  “So since you have kids and all, and… you know, I wear makeup some days and might be in girly clothing, I just thought I’d talk about it just in case you….” He stopped talking after watching the minute changes in her expression.

  “I know you don’t think I’m a bigoted idiot,” she said in a tone that must’ve been close to her young-man-you’re-in-trouble-now tone. “I know you’re not thinking I would have a problem with my kids being around LGBTQ people and you’re just being careful, avoiding surprises on either side.”

  Kaos nodded. “Right—”

  She lifted a hand to shut him up. “But for the love of all that’s precious in this world, do not condense yourself to the things you’ve told me. The prison, the gender, the sexuality. You’re all of those things, Kaos, but you’re also so much more. That’s what I keep telling my kids—that they’re so much more than the things they’re interested in or the color of their hair or the fact that my middle one talks with a heavy lisp. Or that they’re the kids whose dad left one night and never came back. We’re all so much more than the surface things people see at first.”

  Her speech was passionate, and Kaos felt it somewhere deep in his chest. “Okay….” He cleared his throat and nodded. “Okay. I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “And if anyone gives you any trouble while you’re here, or even in town, let me know. They won’t know what hit them.” She smirked a little bit evilly. “You should’ve seen what happened at the school when someone tried to bully my kids.” She winked at him, making him laugh.

  “Noted.”

  They talked about future plans, depending on when Kaos would get his permit, and general scheduling with the shop thing in Acker up in the air still.

  ONCE HE left Pink Ink, he stopped at a pizza place in Mercer and realized his cell had run out of battery, so he couldn’t call and ask what kind Makai and Emil might like. He really needed a new phone, but he would have to wait until he had some money coming in again. For now, he just needed to be more vigilant about charging the damned thing. He picked a few random pizzas that sounded good, hoping there would be something for them all.

  It was closer to midday when he got back to Acker. His stomach was growling despite the pastries he’d had with Christa. He drove to the cottage just to find that the others weren’t back from town yet. Great. He wondered briefly if he should wait to eat and came to the conclusion that it was the most polite thing to do, probably. The little voice in his head that popped up when he thought about manners, which sounded a lot like his gran
dma, agreed with him.

  He carried the food and his portfolio in, taking the pizza boxes into the kitchen. The fragrant pies made him salivate, and he decided it was best to take the cats and himself out to avoid temptation.

  Since the cats were sniffing around already, he picked Spike up. “Mouse, let’s go outside,” he told her, and she followed him to the door. “Out you go. Mind your tail, lady.” He closed the door behind her. Makai and Emil had assured him that the cats wouldn’t go anywhere without humans, so he felt comfortable taking them outside.

  He put Spike down on the grass and started toward the little incline to the lake. The silence still stunned him a little. There wasn’t much wind, so the water was calm. When they got to the dock and stepped on it, the small waves from the rocking motion traveled quietly on the surface of the lake. Then a fish jumped nearby, the rings mixing with the waves, making new patterns.

  Physics. It was all so beautiful here.

  The cats perked up soon, and when Mouse let out a commanding meow, Kaos knew they could hear the car. Smiling, Kaos trailed after the cats, who were trotting up the path to their daddies.

  A car door slammed and he got to the yard just as Emil stepped inside the cabin while Makai rounded the truck.

  “Hey, I let the cats out. I hope that’s okay, I know you said so before, but you know.” Kaos smiled at Makai.

  Before Makai had time to answer, a horrible animal sound of distress came from inside the cabin.

  “Emil?” Makai dashed inside, almost trampling Kaos and the cats in his haste to get to Emil.

  Kaos followed him and found the most peculiar sight in the living area. Emil was huddled in a corner by the bookshelves, trembling violently, while Makai tried to calm him down.

  “What is it?” Kaos asked, alarmed and panicking over whatever was happening.

  “I don’t kn— Shit, did you bring pizza?” Makai whirled around, sniffing the air.

  “Yeah, wh—”

  “Get it out of the house, right now!” Makai snarled and turned back to Emil, talking to him in a gentle voice as he knelt by him in the corner.