by Jeff Elkins
“Why are we talking about money?” Reggie asked.
“Goddamn it, Reggie. Because you just ordered food,” Chris said.
“You pay for food? I just eat it and run,” Reggie said with genuine surprise.
“We don’t steal. Don’t you have any goddamn dignity?” Chris barked.
“It’s payback,” Reggie said, leaning back in the booth and stretching his arms across the back.
“Payback for what?” Jose asked with honest curiosity.
“For keeping them safe,” Reggie said, looking at Jose like he was an idiot.
The waitress delivered the fries and coffee. “Here you go,” she said. Then looking at Chris, she asked, “Baby, you decide if you want anything?”
“We’ll just stick with the water,” Chris said.
“Alright, hon,” she replied and then walked away to help another table.
Reggie immediately began devouring the fries.
Chris rubbed his temples with his right hand. “So where were you?” he asked. There was an angry pain in his voice.
“What are you talking about?” Reggie said, his mouth full of half-chewed French fries.
“When you partner was being tortured for two days,” Chris said, leaning forward. “Where in the fuck were you?”
“I was handling other shit,” Reggie said. He sipped his coffee and then pushed the mug away. “You should be happy you didn’t order anything. That shit’s disgusting.”
“Why are we here, Reggie?” Chris said.
“I want you to tell me how you did it?” Reggie said as he stuffed his face with more fries.
“How I did what?” Chris said.
“Got rid of your partner,” Reggie said.
“There were extenuating circumstances,” Chris said.
“These are extenuating circumstance,” Reggie said. “I’ve got fucking monsters all over my city. Big ones. Little ones. They’re everywhere. I’m not going to survive with that piece of trash as a partner.” He pointed out the window again. Jose wondered if Crystal could see him. “You know yesterday,” Reggie continued. “I had three Conculos roaming the streets in armor. That’s right. Armor. Black armor. Like some medieval fucking knight. I’ve never seen one with armor before.”
“Sometimes they wear it,” Chris said.
“Well I’ve never seen it,” Reggie said, eating the last fry. “And they had these giant swords that glowed in the dark. What am I supposed to do against something like that?”
“Is a glowing sword harder to fight than a normal sword?” Jose asked.
“No,” Chris said.
“Listen, kid,” Reggie said, sipping the coffee again. “You’re new so you don’t understand. This job is hard enough already. They start bringing weapons and armor and we’re all fucked.”
“How did you push them back across the Veil?” Jose asked.
“You’ve got to pick you battles, kid,” Reggie said.
“So you didn’t fight them?” Jose asked.
“They weren’t hurting anyone. I was watching them,” Reggie said. “So Chris,” he said, taking another sip of the coffee. “How do you get a partner fired?”
“I can’t help you,” Chris said.
“Oh, no,” Reggie said. “You’re going to. You have to.”
Chris replied with a silent stare.
“You’re signing my death warrant,” Reggie said. “You know that, right? I won’t survive without a real partner. Just tell me how you did it?”
“No,” Chris said as he stood. “Let’s go, kid.”
“Sorry,” Jose said. He stood and shuffled out of the booth behind Chris.
“You know I’m a dead man. You know I’ll never make it,” Reggie yelled as Chris and Jose walked out the front door.
CHAPTER FIVE
The crisp morning air brushed Jose’s nose, stirring him awake. He tried to roll over, hoping the wakeup call was a false alarm.
“Get up,” Chris said plainly.
Not a false alarm. Jose opened his eyes. He could feel his partner standing at the open car door, staring down at him. Jose’s legs were stiff. He thought back to his old house. He missed his bed. He missed how his Star Wars sheets would tangle around his legs. He missed his pillow and the hoard of stuffed animals that used to live at his feet. His new bed, the front-passenger seat of the old BMW, had no pillow, no sheets, and no forgiveness, forcing him to bend to its shape.
“Let’s go,” Chris said. “I got breakfast.”
Jose listened to him walk away. He remembered breakfast with his mom. Every morning she’d had yogurt, a banana, a fried egg, and coffee. Every morning without fail. The smell of the sizzling of the egg and fresh coffee used to serve as half of his alarm clock. The other half was the music. His mom loved playing music in the kitchen in the morning: usually Marvin Gaye or Bill Withers, sometimes Stevie Wonder. Jose closed his eyes tight and tried to remember what it was like stumbling down the stairs. He imagined the banana, toast with peanut butter, and glass of milk she would have waiting for him. He tried to recall the sight of her dancing to “Just the Two of Us” as she did the dishes. He breathed deeply, trying to remember the smell of his mom’s breakfast, but nothing came. He wished he paid more attention to those details. He wanted them back – the smell of fried eggs and gurgling coffee, the feel of sheets knotted in his feet, the soft music, and the softness of his pillow.
Chris banged on the hood of the car. Two sharp pounds.
Jose sat up and opened his eyes. It was still dark out. He pushed his legs to the right, swinging them out of the open car door and stood. Slowly, the world was coming into focus.
“Hustle up,” Chris said. “We’ve got to start moving.” Chris was sitting on the hood of the car with his back to Jose. Next to Chris was something that looked like a muffin.
Jose took up the muffin and joined his partner on the hood. He took the brown paper from the bottom of his breakfast and then took a bite. The bread didn’t give like he thought it should. It was hard, almost crunchy.
“Only three days old,” Chris said. “Snagged it from the Panera dumpster a few blocks away.”
Jose wasn’t sure if his partner ever slept. The five nights they’d been together, Chris had opted for the roof of the car over stretching out in the driver’s seat. Each night, if Chris had gone to sleep, it had been after Jose, and Chris was always up before him.
The city was dark and asleep beneath them. No one walked the sidewalks. No cars passed. Everything was still and quiet. It was this way every morning. They awoke before the rest of the city so they would be ready to defend it when trouble arrived. When Jose had first adopted the four-hours-of-sleep-a-night schedule during his training he’d complained to Moose. Her simple response was, “You can sleep when you’re dead, which will come quick if you spend the day sleeping.”
“Recite the commandments,” Chris said while chewing a bite.
Jose sighed. Every morning had been the same. After breakfast, Jose regurgitated the Gracanjo commandments and then the day began. Jose wondered how long he would have to keep doing this.
“The first commandment,” he said, “is always be prepared. Always be alert. Commandment number two is never be surprised. Number three is never back down. Never show weakness. Number four, nothing escapes. Nothing stays. Number five, they fear us. We don’t fear them. Number six. Um. The six commandment is…”
“Well?” Chris said.
Jose closed his eyes and tried to remember number six.
Chris sighed in disappointment.
“Commandment six... It’s um...”
“Number Six. We fight monsters.”
“Oh yeah,” Jose said, embarrassed. “We fight monsters. Not people. And then, number seven is no weapons. Weapons hurt people.”
“Good,” Chris said. “Number eight?”
Jose hated number eight. It was his least favorite.
“Number eight,” Chris said again.
Jose remained silent.
&n
bsp; “Number eight,” Chris said. “We go it alone. No friends. No family. No one but us gets hurt. Number nine?”
“Number nine,” Jose said, begrudgingly. “Stay hidden. No one knows. Number ten, trust your Relay. Number eleven, never leave your partner behind. And commandment twelve, our life for the city.”
“Our life for the city,” Chris repeated.
They sat again in silence, taking in the skyline and the rising sun.
“Let’s get started,” Chris said, hoping off the car’s hood.
Jose looked at his half-eaten muffin. He pitched it over the side of the parking garage. “And the thirteenth commandment is we only eat stale garbage,” he said to himself.
Chris stopped at the trunk of the car, looked back at Jose, and cleared his throat.
“Sorry,” Jose said, jumping down from the hood and walking toward his partner.
“Mind or body first today?” Chris asked.
“Body,” Jose said. He hated both, but the exercise Chris had nicknamed “mind” was without doubt the worse.
“Alright,” Chris said. “Stretch it out.”
Facing each other, the partners warmed their muscles with basic stretches. They bent at the waist, touched their toes, and held the position while Chris counted to ten. Then they separated their legs and reached for their left toes while Chris counted. They then switched sides and did it again. The stretching continued for another fifteen minutes. With each ten-count Jose could feel his body coming to life. The sensation reminded him of gym class in elementary school. After sitting at a desk all morning, it was his favorite part of the day. He felt better after using his muscles.
Once the last stretch was finished, Chris called out, “Ten sets of thirty, on my count.”
Jose and Chris both assumed the pushup position.
“One. Two. Three. Four. Five…” Chris called. With each number, Chris and Jose steadily pushed up from the ground. Jose hated the feeling of the rough parking garage concrete on his palms. He missed the grassy field he and Moose had worked out in each morning. At the same time, after only five days his hands were building callouses. He figured another few weeks and he wouldn’t even really know the difference.
After completing the ten sets of pushups, they moved to sit-ups. Chris demanded the same number of sets. He counted them off at the same speed. By the end of the fifth set Jose felt like he might puke the little bit of the muffin he’d choked down and kept going. Moose hadn’t liked sit-ups so she hadn’t made Jose do as many. He wished now that she had pushed him harder. But even though the exercise made his gut ache, Jose pushed on. The pain wasn’t anything compared to his fear of what Chris might do to him if he stopped mid-set. Jose was convinced it would be horrible.
After sit-ups, Chris began his usual rant about how he wished they had a pull-up bar. This went on as they both walked to the trunk of the car. Turning their back to it, they placed their hands on it and extended their feet out in front of them as far as they could.
“On my count,” Chris said, “ten sets of fifteen. Ready. Go. One. Two. Three. Four…” On each number they lowered themselves with their arms and then pushed themselves back up just before their butts touched the ground.
Jose was amazed each morning that his body didn’t hurt after the workout. Moose had explained that, while they didn’t have super powers, there was something different about them. They were faster, stronger, more agile, and Gracanjo had seemingly endless energy. “In fact,” Jose remembered Moose explaining during a final set of pushups. “They say that the longer you live the faster and stronger you become. But that might just be a rumor though.” Jose smiled at the memory.
After the last dip, Chris said, “Let’s find somewhere else to finish up. I’m getting antsy.”
CHAPTER SIX
Jose took his spot to the right of Chris. The two partners assumed their starting position: knees bent, heals aligned with shoulders, back straight. The grass was cold and wet beneath Jose’s feet. He squeezed his toes, feeling the early morning dew between them. In complete silence and in unison, the partners moved their arms in a circular motion in front of them, pushing the air up with the back of their wrists and then down with their palms. Just as Moose had taught him, Jose focused on his breathing, maintaining a slow and deep pace, inhaling through his nose and then exhaling through his mouth. In perfect agreement with his partner, Jose shifted his weigh to his right foot and extended his left foot out, continuing the momentum of his arms in the wave-like patterns.
They continued together, stepping to the right in circular fluid motions. The ten minute routine was slow, controlled, and contained. There was no extravagance in the gestures and the movement was continuous. Jose’s mind became lost in the rhythm of the movement. His soul grew still. Soon he was no longer aware of the moves he was performing or of the early morning commuters who raced past on either side of the median the pair occupied.
Over the past five days, this was one thing Jose had found more enjoyable with Chris than with Moose. In the forest, Moose would hum as they moved. There was never a discernable melody. Jose was unsure if that was because Moose was unconscious of the steady noise radiating from her or if she was tone deaf. Either way, the first time he first did the morning routine with Chris, Jose was shocked at how much he loved the silence. It was the only time in the day when he was free from fear and doubt.
They ended the morning routine in the same position they had started in. The two partners turned to face one-another. Chris bowed. The motion indicated the start of Jose’s least favorite part of everyday – sparring.
“Bring me your best, kid,” Chris said looking completely relaxed.
Jose tried to step toward his partner, but Chris held him back with a small push-kick to Jose’s chest. “You’re not trying,” Chris said. “You can never half-ass it. That’s how people die.”
Jose felt his blood quicken with the first contact. He jabbed with both fists, but Chris deflected them with his forearm and smacked Jose across the side of the head with his other hand.
Jose took a step back, took a breath to recover. Then the teen made another attempt. This time he came with a four-part combo Moose had taught him. In the woods, each move Jose had learned came with a corresponding number. Moose would call out the numbers she wanted to see, showing Jose how the individual components could be worked into combinations. As he stepped into his partner he heard Moose’s voice yell, “One-Two-Four-Seven.” Chris blocked his left jab, dodged his right, deflected his right forward kick, and then caught his left leg and delivered a strong strike to Jose’s chest, knocking the teen to the ground.
“You’re too small to take a monster head-on like that,” Chris chastised. “You need to slip inside and get behind them. If you try to take a Mardock from the front, he’s going to get you before you can get a strike in.” He extended his hand to the fallen teen, pulled the boy to his feet, and then said, “Again.”
The sparing continued in this same way for an hour. Occasionally Chris would take the position of aggressor, each time striking Jose with painful accuracy. Finally, after putting Jose in a wrist lock that dropped the teen to his knees in pain, Chris said, “What I have you in right now is a thirty-two. It won’t work on Mardocks because they’re too muscular and their hands are too big for a fighter your size to manhandle in this way. But it’ll be effective on a Conculos or a Slake. But it’s best to just take Slakes down before they get this close. They’re slippery. If you let them inside like this, they’re liable to get you with their tail.” Chris release his grip and Jose grabbed his wrist with his other hand. “That’s enough for today,” Chris said. “You’re getting quicker but you still have a long way to go. Let’s catch a bathroom break.”
Jose was grateful the fighting was over. Traffic was picking up. He didn’t like strangers watching him get beat down on their way to work.
They walked together across the street to Royal Farms convenience store. Chris went to distract the cashier while Jose wa
lked straight to the bathrooms in the back. Knowing he only had a few minutes before Chris ran out of things to say to the cashier, Jose moved quickly in the restroom. He wouldn’t get another break until they stopped to clean up before bed. Jose washed his face in the sink using the hand soap to clean the dirt off his cheeks and elbows. He then washed his hands and forearms. Just as he was drying off, he heard Chris’ pounding on the door. Jose opened it and exchanged places with his partner.
While Chris used the restroom, Jose pretended to examine the soda selection. He could feel the cashier’s eyes on the back of his neck from behind him. He knew it was clear he and Chris didn’t belong. You can’t hide homeless. It’s in your hair and your clothes and the smell of your breath. Even after they’d washed all their clothes at the Mission on Friday, Jose’s shirts still smelled like they’d been sitting in a backpack in the trunk of a car. Probably because that’s exactly where he kept them. Jose wondered how long it would take the employee to say something. Usually they waited to see if Jose or Chris would try and shoplift.
Finally Chris returned. When he stepped out of the bathroom, they both headed directly to the door. Without saying “thank you,” they pushed through the double doors into the morning air. It was going to be a hot one. Jose could already tell.
Thankfully, the sun was coming up. Bright purples and blues melted into reds and oranges above them.
“Let’s start patrolling,” Chris said. “We can practice your gift at lunch.”
“Great,” Jose replied.
Moose had warned Jose that Chris liked to walk. “Some of us,” she’d told him as they’d plodded through the forest together, “pretend like nothing is different. We try to carry on normal lives until our Relay calls. Others of us, like you and me, we serve in hot spots. The Relay calls too often for us to pretend like we’re normal. So Squirrel and me, we ride the train all day. All day on the tracks, taking in the city. Others of us like to find a spot and camp out. Your partner though, he’s a walker. That crazy man walks a marathon-and-a-half every damn day. Says it’s to get to know the city better. Bullshit, I say. Who would want to know that God-damn city better? I think he’s just bored. Maybe PTSD or something. He’s gotta keep moving or he’ll go crazy. His first partner, Carl, he was a walker too - or maybe a stumble-er? Old drunk bastard. Anyway, you better get used to it. He’s going to have your little ass walking all over that damn city.”