Avoiding the Storm

We've only arrived home from our weekend holiday early this morning, but I decided to come in to the office as some sort of show of support. I can't say it's a strong one, really. Mostly I'm a warm body and the lanterns are glowing, but I'm useless to any sort of actual work. Ace is in the lobby and there's tea and coffee brewing while she tackles the bulk of everything I'm not doing. There's all sorts of letters and scrolls on me desk to go through, and an unusual parcel wrapped in brown paper addressed to me from one Ixinane Stormcren. I'm avoiding that one.

The rain outside is keeping the office a bit chilly. I watch it come down sideways in thin, icy sheets of grey needles. The docks outside the window are slippery and miserable and most the veteran workers 'ave good enough mind to stand under Port Authority awnings an' nibble on hot fried sausages or chips until the dark, angry clouds pass over.

I pull me mechano-guitar into me lap and lean over briefly to flip on the amp. An electric pop fizzes to life and fills the quiet office with a low, expectant hum. Leaning back into the comfortable leather of me captain's chair, I cross me boots at the ankle on the windowsill and adjust the guitar to a lazy angle in me lap. Me fingers slide along the metal strings and pluck out a few tentative notes I've been putting to a song I've been writing off and on while my mind wanders away from the work I'm avoiding.

A pleased client had sent along a bit of a "thank you" gift to our offices last week - tickets to a swank box seat at the Battle Ball Massacre. If you live under a rock, I suppose you don't know that would be the yearly charity event where all the teams play each other to raise money for capital city orphanages. It's three days of rain or shine all out fun. In years past I've not been able to go because of work, but here it was PART of work. Naturally, I took Kharris and invited Ace and her lot to join us. We had a bloody grand time: shouted til our voices gave out, drank ourselves into a stumble every night, ate our weight in greasy stadium food, bought all sorts of completely useless trinkets we thought we absolutely MUST own. I came away with a new kilt in Undercity Zombies colors that I wore so much that pants actually felt a bit odd when dressing this morning.

I switch to a different chord and try adding it to the chorus progression.

Cerwis had stopped by our box one evening for drinks and trash talk. It was the first time I'd seen her since discovering that one of me jewelry clients was actually buying her engagement ring. Nice bloke - if a bit uncomplicated for a lass like her - and rather interestingly a dead ringer for me. Like just about everything with her - it only felt muddled and complicated knowing that.

When we'd met a year or so back at White Hart, things had started out rather simple actually. I wanted her, she was about the only one to ever turn me down, so I wanted 'er even more. For a long time it was just a bit of a cheeky game to get her to crack. Surprise was on me when one night she finally did - broken up with a lad, she needed someone who wouldn't ask questions or try to fix it. Just a bottle of whiskey and a good, long ride on the chopper under the Nagrand stars. I knew what it was then and I know what it was now. Right after as we'd laid in the grass, though, when her guard was down and her wee cheek rested on me shoulder - she talked to me like I was more than just The Meaningless Bad Boy Rebound. It had been nice. Lovely, actually. I'd fooled meself into thinking maybe we could be lovers - until much later when I met Reggie, and it was like looking into a mirror. We hadn't had a moment after all. I'd just been too similar for 'er not to fall into old habits so soon. Suppose that stung more than I'd wanted to admit.

That chord's no good. I switch to a D instead, letting me fingers slide with a metal pitch from the buzzing amp, and reform along the fret. Outside me door, a few shadows pass by and there's murmuring in the hall. One of the voices sounds like Liore's. I should go out and check on things, but the chords are so simple and me thoughts tug me back to watching the rain.

Things only got more complicated after that, as usually happens after a shag. Briefly, I think of Theryl - but it tugs at me heart painfully and I twang the guitar string too hard before shutting down that train of thought. Cerwis and I'd not talked for weeks after that night - though I'd 'eard through various channels that she and Reg shacked up rather quickly again afterwards. It wasn't until much later, when I was rather foolishly running a complicated undercover gig to overthrow the Marquis Vinguld, that we 'spoke' again. She had read the papers about the murder of Liore and Maddie - me own close mates - and didn't buy into the official stories of burglary gone wrong. Of course, we were funneling those stories through Ace - Maddie's own newly adopted persona - to throw off the trail, but Cerwis hadn't known that. Suddenly the lovely lass who'd been sighing against me shoulder under the Nagrand summer sky was pointin' fingers at me fer murderin' me own mates. She was right, of course, but it did take me quite aback and sting even further to have a 'friend' so publically campaign against me.

Then there'd she'd been, relatively be'aved at 'er fiance's arm, in Dalaran as we calmly discuss ring sizes and gem cuts. I think we'd both played our parts well enough to keep the elephant in the room out of Reggie's knowledge. She threw a few veiled barbs and I deftly pretended not to hear or notice. I wasn't about to compromise that commission - even if it meant sealing an end to a friendship I'd pined for.

Me fingers pause against the strings - only just now realizing what the ache I'd felt when Cerwis had arrived at our box that weekend was. That was it. I pined for 'er. I'd spent all that time chasin' 'er skirts and found a bit more than I'd counted on: she was more than a night of fun. She was a beautiful, flawed lass under that tough exterior and brash smile. The sort of lass I could 'ave fallen deeply for if she'd let me. She'd shown it to me for only an instant though, and I wanted more. Craved it. Pined fer it. But then it was gone in a flash and replaced with hate and bitterness aimed at me before I'd known where I'd gone wrong.

She was Theryl all over again (though a rather condensed version, of course). And I'd cocked it up. Again.

Me fingers tighten against the fret and I grit me teeth, strumming a blatted, blown out awful clash of strings that makes the amp crackle and spark. The stink of a slightly burnt copper wire fills the office as I lean me head back against the velvet of the captain's chair. There's a cold, horrid feeling seeping through me chest and I tell meself it's just the rain. I reach over across the desk and turn a knob on me goblin transistor radio - instantly Ace and Liore's voices chatter statically over the speaker.

"Ace, Love?" I wait for them to pause, "Can you bring me a cuppa tea?" I don't wait for the answer before clicking the knob off. I know she will.

I'm an arse.