‘Cumulus mediocris clouds usually indicate fair weather, but may develop into storm clouds.’

April 2nd, 2000

Cold. Grey. Wet. Bone slick soaked with sea spray and the threat of rain. Felix looks away from the starboard view aboard The Reelist and stares up at the overcast sky.

He never liked cloudy days. They’re just wishy-washy rainy days. It’s especially bad when there’s pre-rain ozone in the air and you don’t know when it will start pouring. Felix grips the rusted railing of the fishing vessel he’s riding with and keeps thinking to avoid the motion sickness that has decided to nestle itself in his gut.

There is a certain cosmic irony in an ocean researcher that gets seasick easily. And to double down, all of his proper research involves getting on boats and fixing up any buoys that need fixing.

His job is to get sick, in other words.

He records the latest measurements from his radio watch onto his clipboard, and surprise, surprise, absolutely nothing has changed in the last four years. The gyres in the Atlantic Ocean can change quickly, but nothing of substance has happened over the past few years. All the currents have been splintering off into sub-currents that circle islands such Sapphire Isle in plastic, beer cars, and other trash from Florida.

But — c’est la vie — that’s life for you. Sometimes one must spend their Sunday afternoons adrift at sea, trying to not hurl the partially digested remains of a chicken sandwich into an already-polluted ocean.

When he gets back to shore, Felix spends a good ten minutes resting on a port bench. The captain of The Reelist sits across from Felix on a stack of two milk cartons. He takes a puff of his cigarette and blows smoke into the winds.

“Son,” the captain says, “you ever considered a different profession? Every time I bring you back, you look sicker than a damned dead whale.”

“Once or twice,” Felix replies. He covers his eyes with his slightly damp sleeve, blocking out the disingenuous almost-light coming from the cloudy skies.

“I can respect the drive to do things on your own, but sometimes you gotta know when to call it quits.”

The captain is a middle-aged man with a beer gut and barely kept mutton chops. He looks and smells like the sort that eats raw fish heads. Felix can still smell him with his eyes closed; it provokes images in his mind.

“You get used to sea sickness after a while, right? Maybe after a few more rides...”

“Aye. But I know how to spot someone out of their depths. Some poor souls end up drowning, no matter how hard they try.”

It is 1:24 PM when Felix arrives at his next job. One can of energy drink later, and his mind is back in nominal operating conditions. He goes from his seafaring clothes to his work uniform in thirty seconds flat.

“You stink. You absolutely reek,” says Aniya.

“Dude, did you just crawl out of an ice box?” asks Gabriel.

His two coworkers, however, seem to doubt his efficacy. They both keep a distance of about one meter from him in the changeroom and share the exact same scowl.

“Can’t really smell it,” says Felix as he sniffs himself. “Do I really smell that bad?”

Aniya rolls her eyes and stares at Gabriel with a pleading look. “Oh god. He’s gotten used to the smell.”

“This calls for plan ‘Stench-Elimination-Emergency-C,’” Gabriel says. He regards Felix with deathly serious blue eyes as he reaches into his locker.

“I suppose it does,” Aniya says, reaching into her locker as well.

Felix raises his hands as they both point their guns at him. In Gabriel’s hand, a spritz bottle with the label ROSE JAMMIN’. In Aniya’s hand, a little perfume bottle with Japanese characters of some sort.

“Is there no other way?” Felix backs up against the wall. There is nowhere to run, nowhere to escape.

Aniya looks away, sighing. “I’m so sorry, Felix.”

Then they fire.

1:30 PM.

Felix stands in front of a cash register, defeated. The customer in front of him is staring with a mixture of apprehension and mild awe.

“This place has a strange odor today,” she comments, trying to avoid Felix’s gaze.

“Yep,” says Felix.

Behind him, the espresso machine makes a garbled blip. That’s his cue to jump into action; he snaps his wrist near the disposable coffee cups — a single brown cup flips into his hand. He twirls the cup along his fingers, slams it underneath the nozzle, and gets working on the rest of the concoction.

Milk. Cream. Sugar. Spice and everything that’s nice. All of these things go into a plastic tumbler, which he proceeds to juggle until the espresso is done pouring. Snap open the top, pour around the cup’s rim, mix until thoroughly combined.

“One Mocha Breve with chocolate and cinnamon infusions, miss.” Serve with a coaster.

That lands him a five dollar tip. Not bad, not bad at all. The bill has some writing on it — a seven digit number.

Felix notes this phone number and remembers to deliver it to the manager.

As the lady finds a spot to sit in the cafe, Gabriel gives him a sidelong glance from the other end of the counter. “You smell like what happens when a car crashes into a perfume aisle.”

Felix rubs the back of his neck and smiles. “It happens.”

It is a slow day for the Block 3 cafe. Compared to the uptown bustle of Downtown Boston, this place is a neglected museum of dusty tomes and teacups no younger than eighty four. But there is a certain allure in the slow days. He gets paid the same for much less work. That gives him more time for his mind to wander.

Felix, Aniya, and Gabriel are the only workers within the cafe. The owner is on an out of town trip, which leaves Aniya in charge of the place. She’s a good boss, relatively speaking. There are definitely worse bosses than a girl who takes it upon herself to do most of the work.

Gabriel finishes cleaning his hands and throws a pink and white towel onto a rack. He collapses into a seat behind the counter, and glances over at Felix. “Y’know, I’m surprised you got a part time job, man.”

Seeing as there are few customers, Felix figures that some chatter would be within acceptable work etiquette. “Money is important.” He steps back from the counter and finds a stool to relax on. “Plus, most of the research funds are going towards the church.”

Gabriel raises an eyebrow. “The church you’ve been staying at?”

“Mhm.”

“Why would a man of science stay at a church?”

“Cheap room and board combined with goodwill, I suppose.”

“Wouldn’t the goodwill factor into the price in the first place? That’s kinda like saying ten plus five dollars is less than fifteen.”

Felix just shrugs. “The clergy is nice enough. I don’t mind it.”

Gabriel shoots another glance towards the main cafe. A group of eight highschool students are enjoying an afternoon off in one corner, and some older folks are reading in the cozy dim corner. Felix can make out some of the titles. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Idoru. Some leather backed door-stopper too dinged up to make out from the counter.

“Ain’t there only two people taking care of that place?” Gabriel says.

“Yeah. Father Kozlow and Sister Jules.”

The corner of Gabriel’s mouth twists upwards. “First name basis?”

A lock of hair falls between Felix’s eyes. He answers with a shake of his head.

“Well, whatever you do is none of my business.” Gabriel rests his head against a counter and looks at the solid white christmas lights on the ceiling. “My sister went to church all the time, back when we were younger. Always talked about how nice Jules was.”

“You have a sister?” Felix asks. “Kinda took you for an only child.”

Gabriel sucks in a breath and looks hard at Felix. “Hey. What’s that supposed to mean?”

Felix tilts his head. “You seem kinda lonely.”

Gabriel stares at Felix for a few more seconds, then gives an exaggerated roll of his eyes. “Hey man, I have a girlfriend.”

“It’s more of an existential loneliness, I’m afraid.”

A long, uncomfortable pause. “Well, I guess you’re right… in a sense. Things haven’t been the same since she left home.” Gabriel crosses his arms and looks out the misty windows. “She’s off studying down in Berkeley, but she wasn’t in a great spot before that. Ma always said she got on the Bus to Nowhere and forgot to get off.”

The phrase sends empty twangs in Felix’s brainpan. Nothing. “The heck is that?”

“Well… guess it’s an urban legend of sorts.” Gabriel looks pensive, but continues. “It’s a saying. Sometimes a bus comes for people when they’re at their lowest points — when they’ve got nothing but the dumps for company. It only comes for people who’ve got no destination in mind. You’ll find yourself drawn towards it, like a moth to a flame.

“Then, when you get on, it takes you somewhere far away. Somewhere your problems no longer exist. And when — or if you get off, you won’t remember a single thing that happened on that bus.”

Felix isn’t quite sure how to respond to that. The story was a little more personal than he expected. “Think your sister got off, then?”

“Mhm.” Gabriel smiles wistfully at something in the street. “Next time I see her, I’m gonna show her what I could do. Wherever that may be.”

“I don’t know, man. Air fare is pretty cheap these days.”

“Damn straight, it is.” Gabriel pumps his fist, then breaks into a cackle. “Screw the bus. I’m going to show up where I need to be in a goddamn helicopter!”

That night, on the walk back to the church, a honk startles Felix. He snaps out of his automatic stupor and glances around.

The winds slap him in the face. The collar of his bomber jacket flips up from the force; a single plastic bag tumbleweed blows by his feet.

Behind him, a single bus flashes high beam lights in the early evening light, as though blinking. It’s kneeling at a curb, but nobody is getting off, and nobody is getting on. The silhouettes of the passengers and drivers are blurred shadows behind reflective glass.

He checks his watch.

6:32 PM radio against 6:30 PM local time. Another anomaly, but it isn’t his.

He finds himself nodding at the bus as it abandons the curb and sets sail on the concrete sea. He watches his warped reflection in the passing windows with nothing more than dull acknowledgement.

As usual, the line 3 eastbound bus is exactly two minutes early. I don’t know why it’s always two minutes early; I’ve gone and sent several emails to the public transport companies, but they gave me nothing but dead air in return.

Call me petty or vein, but I don’t like it when things are labelled wrong. I mean, it’s only human to expect one thing, then get slightly perturbed when you get another. While nobody is going to complain about winning the lottery, somebody’s definitely going to get mad if you lose even a single dollar past the initial buy in.

Same applies to buses and many other things in life. The setting sun paints the southern sky in a one sided lurid orange glow outside the 3’s windows, reminding me that I missed the bus today because of that stupid little discrepency. I’m going to be late. Again.

I bounce my knee impatiently as I ride the bus to the end of the line. I’m late on the one day I decide to treat myself to a transit ticket. Although it doesn’t come close to the worst cases of bad luck I’ve had, it’s pretty bad.

I should have spent those two dollars on sweets. Could have gotten at least two-and-a-half peanut butter chocolate cups.

The entrance hall is bleeding orange when I get back. I timidly shuffle my shoes back into the rack and meander up the stairs.

“I’m home!” I call out, heaving a sigh. “Splurged a bit on dinner tonight. We’ve got lobster and stuff.”

“Welcome back, Marie. Late as usual, I see.” Erika slips into view at the top of the stairs, emerging into the cascade of warm evening light.

I roll my eyes. “This is the first time I’ve been late in months. You can’t hold that earlier streak over my head forever.”

“That incident may as well be yesterday.” The unnatural nature of Erika’s eyes is exposed in light like this; they are unapologetically green. Despite the melting pot of colours in the entrance all, her eyes pierce through like emerald needles. “Not my fault you won’t get your driver’s license.”

“Who do you think I am?” I stop a flight of stairs underneath Erika, staring back with my own green eyes. For a brief moment, Erika’s gaze makes me wonder if others can see the sheen of my eyes. “I don’t have any income. I’m still a highschool student.”

Erika leans on the railing and just smirks. “If you insist on going that route, a lot of your peers have part time jobs, don’t they? I wouldn’t have to arrange for an allowance if you made money.”

“With how much work you dump on me?” I scowl, marching up to her. “My mind’s checked out. Mental labour is tough work — I can’t just rent out real estate for minimum wage.”

Erika regards me with her usual bemused smile as I march past her. “You could always invent a machine to flip burgers for you, dear. A brain powered burger flipping machine.”

The dining room of the Schwarz Manor is, for the lack of a better word, completely and utterly overbearing. It’s a twenty person maple table gilded with tarnished gold, a dozen empty painting frames, mahogany red carpets, several cabinets filled with silverware, all topped off with a leering chandelier twisted into an approximation of a spiderweb. The remaining snapshots of previous denizens of the manor stare from pastel and oil prisons, forever judging our table manners.

I just want to eat lobster in peace, for Christ’s sakes.

Yet, in the next room over lies our dishwasher. Such is life in the definitely not cursed manor.

Me and Erika sit side by side at the table, quietly munching away at the feast I brought back.

“So what’s the occasion?” Erika says, peering over at me curiously. She raises a fork with a bite of shrimp impaled right on it.

“Whaddya mean?” She catches me right as I’m chewing. I clear my mouth with a gulp of ice tea, and peer right back.

“You only buy things with your own money when you’re in a really good mood, or really bad mood.” Erika grants me a tight-lipped smile.

“Everything is fine.”

The past week has been painfully ordinary. Schooling was as it always is; a slog of learning things that I will forget about as soon as I graduate. I can barely remember what I learned on Friday, other than a jumble of math and science I brushed up on in my free time. Sure, there had been plenty of minor things I got annoyed about, but there was nothing to really linger on.

“Is it that new kid you keep talking about?”

I sputter and nearly choke on my own spit. “Gods no. Screw that guy.” Hearing another mention of that kid sends my brain pains into overdrive. “He can’t read the mood at all. Every damn interaction I have with him is just — I don’t even know what to say.” I lean against my chair’s headrest. “Damned kid is always, always catching me off guard. He always says the perfectly wrong thing, every time.”

“Have you considered that you are an irritable person?” Erika suggests.

I regard her with an unamused glance.

Erika rests her chin against a propped up palm, drumming her fingers on her cheek, staring at me almost expectantly.

“Listen.” I cross my arms and close my eyes, idly hanging a fry from my lip. “Thinking about that stuff only makes my mood worse, so I won’t. No thoughts, no problem.”

As usual, Erika looks amused by my answer. “Keep going down that path and you might be able to weaponize your ignorance.” She pries apart a lobster shell with a single pull from a fork. Rivulets of juices pool on the left right of her plate.

“Maybe I will.” I turn my attention back to the meal, fully intending on smothering my thoughts in overseasoned seafood and biscuits so buttery they may as well have come straight from a cow. “Screw bliss, I’ll make a blade.”

The aftermath of engorging on nice food is never pretty. I lick my proverbial wounds while sprawled out on a red leather sofa, desperately attempting to find the motivation to get up and do the rest of the night’s work. The postprandial somnolence hit me hard — I can hardly find the energy to keep my eyes open.

Above, the star stained night winks through polarized glass, taunting with faded memories of faraway places. There could be any number of worlds out there, but us humans are stuck on this one for the time being. It’s unfortunate, but hey, what can you do?

I roll to my side and close my eyes, turning away from the planetarium’s domed ceiling.

Once upon a time, a place like this must have been the pride and joy of the manor’s owners. A gleaming glass jewel to top off the already impressive foreign architecture, the glass dome above allows one to see every section of the sky on a clear day. From the azimuth to zenith, the secrets of the sky were laid bare.

The view isn’t so great, these days. The light from the nearby town has drowned out the once fantastical view, leaving the night awashed with a thin film of white. The stars are still there, but they are reduced to little white pricks that struggle to shine.

I wonder what the old inhabitants of this manor would think about the current state of their home. Their tools have been rendered all but useless by the advance of technology; desk-sized quadrants, octants, sextants, and planisphere that must have cost a fortune back in the day have been replaced by a computer and hundred-dollar telescope from the nearby tech shop. The only thing still in use from the old era is an armillary sphere: a constantly spinning circle of a hundred nested rings sitting in the center of the room. Erika says it gives a reference to the most important celestial objects, but I don’t really see it. I can’t even read most of the markings since they’re in some nearly incomprehensible language. Gaelic runes, perhaps.

If an individual life is but a transient flash, then what remains of us within the span of our own lifetimes? How much will our world change in five, ten, twenty years? Will I remember this moment when I look back, or will I have shed my current self and become a new being?

All of my thoughts disappear as Erika’s hand strokes my head. Her slender fingers gently pry the knots in my unkempt hair; it feels nice and fuzzy and gives me gentle tingles in my chest.

“You need to grow up eventually,” she chides, running a finger on my nape.

“Later,” I murmur. “Went overboard tonight.”

Like an oversized baby, I rest curled up against Erika’s lap. Her body is soft and warm, and given that there isn’t a blanket anywhere on this floor, she is a perfectly acceptable replacement. As much as I want to snark, being pet is rather soothing, albeit extraordinarily shameful. Right now, the exhaustion outweighs the soul crushing embarrassment, so I’m perfectly content to laze about.

Erika delivers her weekly lecture in a silent lullaby, telling me everything with just a few brushes of her fingers.

She tells me that I need to learn faster. That I need to hurry up and make a decision. That I need to focus.

—that time is running out.

But I already knew all of that. I’m still taking some time to prepare myself and make sure I don’t have any regrets. It took a long time, but we’re finally starting to think alike.

Erika is not a person that should be understood. The moment you begin to understand, there’s no turning back. At the moment, she serves as a live-in maid and tutor, but a relationship as complicated as ours runs much deeper than surface level connections. Since I’m still experienced with life in general, I don’t really get it either. But that doesn’t stop me from enjoying her presence.

A friend is a friend, really.

“Suppose we’ll have to postpone our review session for tomorrow,” Erika says.

I nestle into Erika’s lap and sigh. “Sorry,” I mumble.

She reprimands me by gently rubbing my head. “I’ve got something that needs to be done, though. After your nap, I need you to courier something to the church.”

I find myself nodding along to her words, already halfway asleep. Peaceful days like this are bliss; I wouldn’t trade them for the world. “You’re comfy…”

Another pat on my head. “Such a troublesome girl. What were you thinking, Eleanor…?”

My slipping consciousness doesn’t have any time to process the words. Bodiless vertigo washes over me as I fall and fall, further into a lightless abyss.

Midnight. Felix is not asleep as his body demands. Instead, he is sitting in the cover of the church’s bell tower, gazing listlessly at the stars above.

Compared to the big city, the night of Sapphire Isle is afire with cosmic fury. Throes of dead and dying stars have finally reached the Earth, planting their vistas within the human psyche, twisted and immortalized into legends, paintings, and countless memories. He can finally see why people move away from the cities; seeing the world without humanity’s influence is quite breathtaking.

Not that he’d actually give up civilization for more than a day, anyhow. There is a certain beauty in a constructed world; millions of collective hours poured into claiming the wilds since the dawn of humanity has turned the world into a hybrid of synthetic and natural life. Cities are their own organisms, the flowers of dreams and blood bloomed from immeasurable sacrifices.

It has been a week since Felix arrived in town. Since then, he has situated himself into a stable place in society in order to conduct his two research projects.

The first research project is a straightforward oceanic mission, but the second one is much more interesting.

Time is an innately human construct, just like many other things. Some humans experience the passage of time differently, yet few question why this phenomenon is. The brain is a poorly understood tangle of neurons and axons that is everything one is. Yet, some phenomena surpass science, logic, and reason. To humans, who desperately explain all that happens around them, this would be an incompatible concept. Something that would obliterate the thin line of sanity most people have.

In other words, the world around humans is human, because it must be human. The same cannot be said for places that humans do not reside.

But a thought experiment like that should be saved for another night. Underneath the roar of the ocean winds, the hatch leading up to the bell tower unlocks with a metallic ping.

“Good evening,” Felix says without turning around. Even though he’s been here for only a week, there’s only two people who could have all the keys required to get up to the tower.

“Thought I’d find you here again,” Jules says. The Sister guides herself with the tower’s safety railings, then stares out the tower's front.

Tonight, she wears a silken black blindfold underneath her habit. Felix hasn’t seen it before.

“How did you get up here without any of the keys?” she asks, clasping her arms behind her back.

“I climbed.”

Felix raises a pair of wrenches stitched together with heavy duty rope, letting them jingle in the wind. Jules barely turns her head towards him.

“You made an improvised grappling hook from wrenches? Most interesting.”

“Your sense of hearing is excellent, as well.” He rests the improvised hook in a pile of ropes, then goes back to hugging his knees.

Neither of them have any response to the other’s compliments. Felix doesn’t even bother thinking of reply; emotions can be communicated with body language alone. And given that Jules has uncanny sight with severely diminished senses, she might be able to read him like a book. No point in trying to hide anything from her.

A long moment passes. Jules' robes flutter in the wind, cloth rippling across her back like waves. A chill ebbs into the bell tower, slicing across Felix’s cheek. Somewhere, a gull shrieks.

The muscles in Jules’ biceps tense. Prepared for an overhead chop, or to draw a weapon.

“Why did you really come here?” Jules turns to him, lips twisted in a pale sneer. “You’re a very suspect individual, ‘Felix.’”

Felix blinks. Jules is aggressive tonight — it seems like she doesn’t buy the details written on the rent contract. Taking matters into her own hands. She will not be satisfied with an ordinary answer.

“Research,” he says. He doesn’t bother raising his hands; it’s not like he could match this girl in a fight, if blows came to blows. She seems to know what he’s about to do before he can act. “I was sent from MIT to conduct research into the subtropical ocean gyres, and to collect information on the history of this town.”

Jules stares ethereal needles in Felix’s general direction. Her hands clench into fists, then slowly loosen. “There’s nothing good here.”

Felix cracks a small smile and scratches his cheek. “That’s fine. History is history. People are people.”

“It’ll be a waste of your time at best.” Jules shakes her head. “Keep your head down and stay close to the church. There’s no telling what can happen these days.”

“Is there anything I should be worried about?”

“You… really are a clueless guy, aren’t you?”

“Ah, well. It happens, right?”

Jules clasps her hands in front of her lap. “I think I know what you’re really here for, even if you won’t say it. You want to see something that doesn’t exist, yes?”

Felix offers no reply.

“I don’t know why you feel so familiar,” she admits. She raises her hands to her chest, almost in a plea. “So I’ll give you one warning, and one warning alone: don’t get too close to any ‘green-eyed monsters.’”

After 10 PM, Sapphire Isle has a tendency to die. The commercial doors close, leaving dive bars and fast food places as the last bastions of civilization in an otherwise dark night. And since it’s off-tourist season, only the locals haunt the streets.

As an act of revenge, Erika has purposely ruined my sleep schedule in order to teach me a lesson. Now I’m stumbling around at 1 AM while freezing my ass off, trying to deliver a satchel filled with copper tablets to a church. I’ve seen enough horror b-movies to know where this is going. I can already see it in the headlines for tomorrow:

DUMBASS TEENAGE GIRL WANDERING AROUND AT NIGHT GETS GANKED BY DISCOUNT MICHAEL MYERS

Said discount Micheal Myers will have to work if he wants to take me out. The streets are empty, the lights are actually working, and I’m going through the main streets, where one can only hide in alleyways.

And most importantly, I happen to be very good at screaming. I bet the entire block could hear me if I opened up my lungs and hollered.

“This sucks,” I mumble under my breath, wandering underneath street lights.

The Closure Point Church is easy enough to find. It’s the odd one out among the rough and tumble new age buildings, an old gothic style church grafted straight from the Bismark era. According to the pastor, it was built around twenty years ago as a goodwill project from the city, but I don’t believe that for one second.

What kind of tourist town would ever want a building like that? Not many locals are religious — the only person I know with a remote interest in Catholicism is Aniya, and even she’s distanced herself from the faith.

I’m not one to judge the architectural and economic decisions of local municipality since I’m just a dumb small town girl, but come on. Build an amusement park or something.

A sharp chill drags me away from my thoughts and makes me realize I’ve been glaring at the church from across the street for a while now. I look back at the bag full of clay tablets and wish my shoulder didn’t hurt so much. My brain already hurts from the mere thought of interacting with her.

In and out, Marie.

Just like you always have.

Three knocks end the night.

The sounds come from the church entrance, echoing with the finality of mourning bells.

“Hello? Heeelloooo?” A muffled girl’s voice comes through the thick wooden doors, along with three more knocks. “Anybody awake? Delivery for the suspicious nun.”

Felix is resting on a nearby pew when the night ends, staring up at the ribs of the cathedral. There are fourteen ribs keeping the roof where it should be — and fourteen happens to be the number of death in the east. An conditionally unlucky number, just like thirteen, that only is unlucky if you believe in it.

He wonders if the owner of that voice is aware of the numbers as he opens the door.

Felix comes face to face with a green-eyed girl in the dead of night. Her eyes are the only light, radiating unseen might. Those eyes then narrow at him.

“You?”

“Me?”

“You.”

“Me.”

Marie scowls and shifts on the spot, trying to look past Felix. “What are you doing here? Where is she?”

Felix doesn’t know what to do with himself, so he shuffles and attempts to get out of her way. “I live here.”

She stops and looks at him incredulously. “Wait. The church thing wasn’t a joke?”

“Why… would it be?”

“I don’t know, maybe it’s because you’re the most suspicious person in this entire damn city. Come on you—” She tries to shove him out of the way, but her hands just meet his chest. She looks up at him with apprehension. “Why the hell are you so strong? What’s a twink like you doing with muscle?”

“Twink?” Felix tilts his head. “Isn’t that a cream filled cake snack?”

“What?” Marie looks appalled, like he called her some sort of profane slur carved from the depths of hell. Her face twists in almost juvenile anger — her voice jumps an octave higher. “I don’t have time to deal with you. You know how late it is? Come on—”

She keeps trying to shove him out of the way, but he only feels a light pressure against his chest. Her face is turning red — she looks confused and upset at the same time.

Felix isn’t sure if he should step out of the way, or pretend to fall over like a dead fish. The former option is quite rude, but the latter is disingenuous. So he just stands there, unsure of what to make of the angry girl.

Before Marie can get mad enough to actually hit him, Jules steps onto the pathway leading to the church and clears her throat. That turns Marie’s attention away from him.

“Well, well. Look at what the wolves dragged in.” Jules takes a step forward, hands clasped together in mocking prayer. The street lights flicker, illuminating her blindfold. “So brave, coming under the cover of night. What brings you here today?”

“Don’t try to play with me. Here.” Marie turns away from him, completely forgetting that Felix exists. She slips a satchel filled with blocky objects off her shoulder and hurls it with such ferocity that it seems like she’s trying to kill Jules.

But Jules catches the bag mid-flight. She steps out of the way, as though she saw the bag coming, and hooks her delicate fingers around the strap. The bag strains as she slings it around like a flail — the circular momentum ends as she forces the bag to stop in her hands. Then she smiles.

Marie frowns. “Tch.”

“You seem upset,” Jules says, walking towards them.

“I’d be less upset if I didn’t have to come here.”

Felix flattens himself against the doorway as Jules walks by. He gets a glimpse of the bag’s innards — it almost looks like the inside of the bag is glowing.

“You can leave soon enough, Marie.” Jules slings the bag over her shoulder and glances directly at Marie. “I need to verify the calligraphy first, as usual.”

And as Jules walks deeper into the cathedral, Marie scowls so hard that she could make a lemon pucker. “...Bitch.”

Felix knows enough about women to know to not get between their interpersonal conflicts. But this time, his curiosity wins out over his common sense. “History?” he asks, glancing between the two women.

Marie shoulders shudders as she releases a long sigh. She spares Felix a single glance as she makes her way to a waiting bench near the front. “It’s a long story.”

Felix follows behind at a distance, glancing at the trap door at the altar that Jules disappears down. “Can I hear it? We’ve got the time.”

“No.” Her response is an instantaneous zap; a verbal slap across the cheek. Marie snapped back so quickly it seems like she herself didn’t realize she said anything — she takes a seat at the oak bench, leans her head against the wall, and winces at something. “I mean, it’s not really that long or special.”

He takes a seat at the opposite end of the bench and subjects himself to her icy green gaze — her eyes seem brighter than the stars themselves in this place. The time is passing normally. Around this girl, the past, present, and future unravel and wind back together before anybody realizes it. Not even she is aware of the phenomena that haunts her. “I’d like to hear it,” he says, stretching and yawning. “Jules has been really nice to me — she’s a good person. I can’t imagine what she’s done to get on your nerves.”

“You have no idea,” she grumbles. “That damned girl has been a pain in my ass for a long time.” Marie barely looks at him as she talks; her eyes are focused on the crucifix looming over the main hall. She scratches the back of her hand, leaving big red trails on her pale flesh. “Her sheer smug superiority — I hate it.”

Felix raises an eyebrow. He didn’t imagine Marie was the type to get easily flustered. “She’s blind. Maybe she can’t regulate her facial expressions well — that might be her resting smile.”

“We both know that’s not true.”

“What… do you mean by that?”

Marie looks back at Felix and grimaces — like she just realized she said something she shouldn’t have. “Nevermind that. You never answered my question — why are you here?”

“I live here.”

“You live here. In a church.” She looks around, perplexed. “Surrounded by God. Don’t you science folks hate that?”

“I mean, Galileo and Ernest Pascal Jordan were devout Christians. Science and Faith are not mutually exclusive. Some would say science is a form of fa—”

Marie slides across the bench and forcibly covers Felix’s mouth with her palm. “Save it, Jesus boy. I have a headache and I don’t want to hear it.”

A headache. Felix gets those too, sometimes. Sometimes they leave him crippled and with no memory of the past day. “Mrhrgmrghmrhgrmg,” he says through her hand.

“...What?”

He digs into his coat and produces an off brand bottle of ibuprofen. Headache medicine.

And Marie just looks at him like he pulled a rabbit out of thin air. She leans back, completely and utterly bewildered, then slumps her shoulders in resignation. “Gods. You’re such a bastard, you know that?”

“You said you had a headache,” Felix offers, shaking the bottle. 47 remaining tablets jingle in a caxixi shaker tune. “These are extra strength.”

She rolls her eyes and crosses her arms. “Listen, I don’t need your help. But thanks, I guess.” She sends a hard sidelong glance in his direction, green as molten spring.

“Just let me know if you need anything.” He pockets the pulls and stares near her general direction. Her gaze is too intense to meet — even somebody like Felix might crumble if he looked her in the eyes.

“Hm.” Marie cocks her head at him, then nods. “Actually, yeah, I would like something. Tell me; are you really here for an ocean research mission?”

Time stutters from 1:18 AM to 1:20 AM: complete irregularity.

“Like, I don’t buy it.” She points a finger at him, accusingly. “I don’t buy you.”

“I’m… not sure what to tell you.” Felix really isn’t here for much. He is a casual observer — that factoid is not worth mentioning. “If you’d like, you may come along with me for a day. I don’t really have much to hide — my room’s over there.” He gestures to the left side of the church and the lone torch above the clergy room.

But Marie goes slack-jawed — looks like somebody punched her in the gut with a spiked gauntlet. Her face grows red enough to glow in the dim night. “D-Did you just ask me out on a date? Are you actually serious?”

“Date?” Oh, yes. Midnight has already passed; the date has changed. He looks at his radio watch. “It’s currently the third of April.”

“Oh, my god.” She raises two fingers to her temple and stares at the floor with dripping exasperation. “I’m going to kill you.”

“Why? I only gave you the date.”

“Shut your face.”

Felix shuts his face.

“I can’t believe somebody like you exists. It’s just — gah. Can’t you just give me some goddamn space?” Marie whines.

So he does. He puts exactly six feet between them — he finds himself standing in the middle of the isle, gazing back in her general direction.

Marie Weiss. The girl who couldn’t possibly be from around here. Felix detects the faintest smudge of an accent on her rugged tone: German, if he had to guess based on her last name’s etymology.

Weiss is the German word for white. Ironic, considering her existence remains in the shadows. Those green eyes hold all the world’s spite, luminous with poison.

But after a few moments, those eyes begin to soften. “I didn’t mean that much space — gods, you f… Now you’re making me feel awkward.” She points to him. Then points at the spot almost beside her on the bench. “Sit down. Shut up.”

Felix sits down and shuts up.

“Seriously… What’s his deal?” Marie mutters, closing her eyes. “I can’t believe a guy like that exists.”

Must be one of those types that speaks out loud sometimes, Felix notes. This may be a chance to gleam an outside opinion.

“...Obnoxious.”

Rather, he gets a one word answer. Obnoxious. Synonym for annoying; extremely unpleasant. He doesn’t understand why she thinks that, but she’s allowed to think whatever she wants. It’s not his place to judge, after all.

“Tch.” Marie turns her head to him, half-lidded eyes brimming with exhaustion. Slivers of jade. “You aren’t doing this on purpose, are you?”

Felix leans back. “Doing what?”

Her stare pierces through him like twin javelins — he can feel his insides doing something weird. His esophagus and intestines are doing loop-de-loop corkscrews all around his ribcage, smearing visceral and undulating in orbs. She scrutinizes him for a long while before visibly giving up — her shoulders shrug involuntarily.

“Fine. Okay. Sure. So you really are like that. Abso-positively-wonderful.”

“What do you mean by that?”

She holds a fist to her chest and regards him with the same look one would regard a walking dumpster with. “Lord forgive me for what I’m thinking right about now.”

He tilts his head.

“Look,” Marie says, almost pleadingly, “if you’re going to subject me to psychological torture, could you at least, like, talk about something?”

“I’m not sure what to talk about,” Felix admits.

“...School. Let’s talk about school. That’s what normal people talk about — let’s just talk about that.” She nods to herself, then looks at him. “Say, you’ve been at Reyes Cooper for a while, right? How do you like it? Is it fun? Is it exciting? Come on, you can hold a conversation, right?”

Fast words. Near panic. Desperate for basic exchanges of nominal pleasantries. It takes Felix a few moments to gather his thoughts. “Well, it’s not the worst. I haven’t actually been to a high school before. It’s very… relaxing, I suppose.” He closes his eyes and rests his head against the cold cathedral wall. “I’ve never had this much free time in my life before. Sometimes, I just don’t know what to do with myself.”

“You’ve never been to high school before? How did you end up in university?”

“Long story.”

Marie scrutinizes him long and hard, before raising an eyebrow. “I bet.”

There are many parts to the existence of Felix Conti. Most of them are too much.

Where did he start?

More importantly, where does he end?

“My caretakers were part of an MIT research team. They raised me, and I guess I took interest in one of their fields of study.”

“You guess?”

“I guess.”

She frowns. “Y’know, not many people ‘guess’ what their life careers are. Especially at our age.”

He nods. “I guess.”

“Hmph. Guess you’ve got it all figured out then. Probably better than most at the tender age of eighteen.”

“There’s still a lot of things I don’t know. That’s partially the reason I’m spending a semester finishing up a high school degree — I never really learned what it’s like to be a normal kid.”

“Maybe that’s for the better. Normal can be pretty boring. The good kind of boring, though. Big surprises aren’t the best at 6 am.”

The time. It’s currently somewhere between 1:45 and 1:46 AM. But time loses its meaning around this strange girl.

Time is a human construct, after all.

“Life would be boring without any surprises,” Felix says.

“Can’t say I agree. Give me a schedule and I’ll be one happy gal.”

Schedules: partitioned time. Chop up the innards of the day and rearrange them into clockwork snip-snap billboard flashcards. It’s a neat device.

“But I’ve heard you sleep until noon.”

“Got a problem with that?” She scowls. “Who told you that? Was it Gabriel? You’ve been hanging around him, right?”

“I got a part time job at Block 3. He’s my coworker.”

Marie pauses, hands resting in her lap. “Can’t go anywhere without running into you. Next thing you know, you’re going to—” Suddenly, she averts her gaze, her gentle expression twisting in pain. Four fingers rush to her temple as she winces and breathes a deep sigh. “A-Actually, I… need to go.”

Marie half-stumbles half-sprints out of the church, gazing glances that could most certainly kill. It almost feels like an invisible handful of blades sunk into the walls around Felix, missing him by a hairline thread.

A wayward soul, dripping with venom. What could have possibly happened to twist a normal girl to such a state?

“Hey, errand girl. All the tablets are good.” Mere seconds later, Jules steps out of the priest’s chambers and into the cathedral's isles. She regards the empty pews, then glances directly at Felix through her blindfold. “Wait. Where did Marie go?”

He points at the front doors. “She ran off.”

“Huh. That’s never happened before.” Jules steps closer, basking in tainted moonlight. Her steps are feather falls of iron and pallid mists. “Did you say something to tick her off?”

To that, Felix can only shrug.

Tick tock, goes the clock.

My head.

My head.

Why does my head betray me so?

I stagger underneath the spotlights of streetlights and distant starlight, nursing the ticking time bomb lightning bolt of a headache welling up in my frontal lobe.

Just being near that kid drives me crazy. Something about him doesn’t work out with me on a near existential level — it’s like that bastard is a being created specifically to spite me. It can’t be his personality; I’ve dealt with bitches much more annoying than him. No, it has to be something else. That doe-like demeanor must be hiding a wolf with razors for teeth.

But even that thought flits away from my comprehension in a few steps — I can only concentrate on the thumping of pain in my head and the direction of footsteps that can take me far away from it.

The agony ceases when I clear a few blocks. Unwilling images fill my head as my head clears — I see visions of imagined mundanity. Walking. Talking. Chatting. Socializing, loving, breathing. Living.

I’m reminded of everybody I interact with on a daily basis. Gabriel, Adrian, Aniya; the only souls who can keep up with my irreverent antics. Friends kept at a near distance — except for Aniya, the ex-church girl who insists on acting like my mom. She gets pretty pushy at times, but I don’t really mind. Most days, at least.

Today, I wasted my time doing boring normal person things. I broke bread with Erika, read a book, watched some TV, and browsed my emails — which was mainly populated by spam. I did nothing out of the ordinary and only decided to exist as a completely typical person. Why am I being reminded of such insignificant things now?

“...Must be the season.”

That’s right. It is springtime, after all. I’ve never liked spring — it’s only a time where the muddy grounds and the necrosis afflicted earth prepare for the gentle embrace of summer. A transitory period from decay to life. It’s never a pretty sight. People always romanticize spring as a time of flowers and sunshine, but I could never see it as anything more than a time where the maggots finally wriggle and writhe from the old corpses hidden by the censor of snow.

And that Felix kind is almost like the very manifestation of spring, presented specifically to piss me off. Something about his flippant, unknowing nature rubs me the wrong way on a primitive level. Just like how most animals know not to eat brightly coloured poisonous frogs, I don’t think I can ever get along with a guy like that.

So that’s that. I don’t need to think about it any further. I can get another partial night of sleep, wake up tired and somewhat awake — as usual — and go about my day as usual. There’s nothing wrong here.

I cast a wistful gaze towards the now unseen church and disappear back into the night.