Sister Cities

Part 62: Jinx

Do you still wake up reaching for an empty space?

Do you only know the good days once they've slipped away?

Do you wish that she would call you by another name?

Do you scratch another line out for the same mistakes?

~

Keep me away from what's left

Of all the softness you had

I'm a knife always searching for that one tender place

I'm a violent paper doll you always misplace

You touch me like you're learning how to lose me

Locking the doors from inside

All my days, I wait for something more

________________________________________________________________________________

After Vi falls asleep, I pick the lock on my cuff with a pin and put on my ugly shoes. I found a pair of striped leggings on my bed when I got back from the lab that cover my lash marks, so I ditched Caitlyn's ugly dress and am just wearing the shorter one, but I'm stuck with the ugly shoes. I'm gonna decorate them unless I can scrounge up some good boots soon.

I grab my bag and the excess length of my chain and sneak into the next treehouse. Vi says the Firelights voted Scar in as their new leader today between the Council meeting and volunteering, but I wasn't there, so I don't know how Ekko feels about it. He's probably floundering with that savior complex of his.

Right now he's sleeping face-down like he did when we were kids. I watch for a moment, then take the blade from under his mattress and put my mouth next to his ear.

"Pssssssssst."

I'm at a safe distance again when, in the next millisecond, he stabs another blade I didn't know he had into the space right where my head was. He gets halfway to his feet before spotting me. "Shit!" he hisses, and even though he can see who I am, he picks up his ax and levels it in my direction. "What's even the point of that chain?"

"I want to be able to get out when I want to. I don't want to be able to get out when I don't want to." I go over to turn the lanterns on. "Anyway, I brought you something," I say, swinging my bag around my wrist. Metal clinks.

The sound puts him in a genuine fighting stance. "Drop it."

"No," I say. "They'll break."

"'They'? There's multiple? Drop them. Drop them or I'll hurt you."

"Sheesh." I lower the bag to the floor and back away while he creeps forward. Ax in one hand, he kneels, reaches gingerly into the bag, and pulls out one device.

"What are they?" he asks.

"Guess!" I say.

The ax thumps down. "Jinx," he says in a low growl, "it's the middle of the night and you broke into my room with a bag full of explosives. I'm not playing your game."

"Explosives?" I laugh. "For a tech inventor, you really don't know anything. Besides, if I wanted to blow you up, you wouldn't be getting the chance to whine about it."

He scowls. "What are they?"

"Your new comms." I plop down across from him and take another one out. "You're still using the ones you took from the enforcers, only those aren't safe— any of them could listen in on you if they tuned in to your channel. But these ones are special. They work on a wavelength nobody else can access."