Amy smiled a dazzling smile at him and headed off to clean up her make-up in the bathroom. As Sully well knew, this process might take up to half an hour, so he flipped on the teli and began surfing through the highway of information.
A pretty young woman in a yellow suit sat behind a desk, flipping through a stack of papers. The fast-paced intro-music faded away and she lifted her attractive face and regarded the camera with a neutral expression.
”It is currently four hours past midday on the 24th of November, 2022. My name is Anni Summers and this is the Helsinki News.”
The camera zoomed in from another angle, forcing the newsreporter to turn her head.
”Today is the anniversary of what folk call ”The London Invasion”. Exactly ten years ago, British soldiers crossed the borders of Finland, effectively taking it under control. As is well known, this happened due to a contract signed between the heads of both countries, the sense of which is still debated today. Some say this decision was made hastily, or that it was stupid alltogether, while others state that it was inevitable, that Finland couldn't have survived on its own. Were it wise or not, the Helsinki News team would like to remind everyone that this date is an official day of celebration and flags should be hauled up.”
Sully looked out the window. Sure enough, the red, blue and white flag of the United Kingdom had been hauled up in the public yard that surrounded the apartment-building he lived in. A small child in her pink over-alls tumbled around on stubby feet in the stiff way only toddlers could under the whipping flag, waving a plastic shovel in her hand. She hadn't a care in the world, least of all when concerned with political leadership.
Frankly, neither did Sully. He didn't care if it were Finns or Brits who held the leashes, one was the same as the other to him. He fancied the English language better than the Finnish one, so he was more than happy with the arrangement currently unfolding. At least he hadn't had to learn a new language when he'd moved there from Chicago. A sulky seventeen year-old wasn't the most capable of linguists.
”-breaking his previous record for the 110 meter sprint by a stunning 0,3 seconds. He commented, saying, 'Everything just went perfectly, you know. Air resistance, gravity, friction, all of it. They all just went in my favor. You know.' Moving onto other sports-” the carefully neutral beauty was saying.
Click.
”Oh Harry, I just – I just wish this moment would never end. I wish I could be in your arms, lay here till I die of old age,” a middle-aged actress was crooning.
The barely twenty year old counter-actor grasped the sides of her head and pulled her in for a long kiss. When they broke it, he whispered, ”Oh Tracy, I-”
Click.
The television whined shut together with Sully's sigh. He walked to the bathroom, past Amy – who was busy putting on a powder that made no discernible difference – stripped to the nude, entered the shower and turned on the water on full heat. The luke warm water cascaded down on him, smothering him in its veil. Seemed the girl had used up all the warm water, thought Sully, Figures. He immeresed his head in the waterfall – and yes, it was a waterfall, for water was falling – effectively shutting out every other noise.
The rush of the shower filled his head, washing away the sin. He had commited another act of potential pedofilism. All it required was a stony cop and a tear-streaked Amy and his horny ass was stuck in a stone box for the next couple. The weird thing was, he didn't feel guilty in the least. Or maybe he did, as he was thinking about it, but just not consciously. One way or the other, it didn't bother him; to him what they had done was a responsible choice made by two responsible people.
Age was just a number floating in the air, an imaginary constraint of time. It was human kind's feeble attempt to feel superior to time and ageing, to master it, to label it. That number couldn't encompass a person's experiences, their dreams, their hopes, their shattered visions of the future. Sully told himself all this and more. Oddly, he believed it.
The water was growing colder. He shut it off to conserve the last strands of warmth and reached for the soap on the wall. Sully poured a glob of dark blue jelly into his hand, and proceeded to cover himself with it. Half-way through scrubbing it into his hair, he heard Amy hesistantly ask, ”I was wondering. What tipped you off that I wasn't of age?”
Sully spat a trickle of soap from his mouth. ”When you live in my shoes for as long as I have, you begin to realize there are no such things as good things. Not ones that go unpunished that is. Something goes right for you, then there's a catch. You not being of age was mostly a lucky guess.” He fumbled for the tap. ”Well, an educated guess, really. Educated by goddamn – where the hell is the stupid tap?”
”Two inches to the left.” Sully could hear the smile in her voice.
He moved his hand to the designated spot, felt wet metal and brought down the rain. Three minutes later, he was wrapped in a piss-yellow towel, waiting for Amy to finish up so he could shave his overgrown beard.
”What made you change your mind about... touching me, then? If I'm not completely mistaken, you didn't find the concept of sleeping with me very amusing.” She stared intently at the mirror, a delicate brush held in her fingers. Sully marvelled at how steady her hand was when she brought it down on her lashes.
”I dunno, to be honest. I guess I just couldn't be bothered to give a flying fuckadile anymore. Something this good hasn't happened to me in a while, might as well enjoy, possibility of charges and all.”
Amy had sputtered at 'flying fuckadile', causing her to stab herself in the corner of her eye with the magic marker looking instrument she had been holding. ”Flying fuckadile? Really? But thanks for the compliment, Sul.”
Sully grinned. ”Courtesy of my late boss. He's rather creative with his word choices. No. Thank you for wasting your time on a small-time fuck-up.”
”I can see that. But don't be too hard on yourself, you're just a victim of consequences, hardly none of them caused by your actions.” She had finished her lashes and was carefully daubing away the black splotch. ”It's the inner strife in the country. All this British take-over nonsense has left the citizens reeling. People in high places are still people, just like your boss – sorry, ex-boss – is a person. So many irregularities have occured in such a small time, it's bound to knock things around. You're just unfortunate enough to have been caught in the backlash. There, done,” she finished with a final press of the cotton ball. ”Don't take too long now, 'cause I have to leave soon.”
She rose on her toes and kissed Sully on the cheek, then left with a swish of her lovely hair, now dry. Sully took out his razor and slapped on the shaving cream. He stared himself in his mis-matched eyes, daring the phanthom in the mirror to cut himself. The phanthom finished the procedure with a long, clean stroke and Sully washed off the remaining cream.
His chin looked much leaner without the covering fur, and he thought maybe he should consider wearing a beard more often. He lifted the hair off his forhead and inspected the cut. It was slightly swollen, but not too red in coloring; it would heal up nicely, so no need to worry about it. He wiped the razor, replacing it in its drawer and took a leak, standing up. Leaving the towel in the rugged heap it had fallen into, he went to his room and pulled on a fresh pair of blue boxers. He put on another pair of slacks and a t-shirt with the text, ”REDUCE NOISE POLLUTION, USE SILENCERS”, and a picture of a pistol sporting a sleek silencer. He tugged on a sweater over it.
He was just stepping out of the room when Amy shouted, ”D'you mind bringing my bag from your room? I have to leave in – three minutes.”
”'Kay,” answered Sully and stepped back into the dark room. He flipped on the light. He'd have to do something about the bed; it was all a huge tumble of linen and sweat and other bodily fluids – the whole room reaked of the scents held in that nest. The room was pretty much filled with nothing but the two-person bed, a small wardrobe and a chair, so finding Amy's bag wasn't too big of a challenge. He picked it up where it lay next to the door, presumably dropped to grasp something more important at the time. On a whim, he walked over to the window and opened the shades, checking the thermometer on the other side of the glass. It read a depressing -5 Celcius; the winter had quit fiddling around with the last traits of spring and cut down to the business.
”It's under zero out there,” said Sully as a greeting as he stepped into the kitchen where Amy was finishing a toast. ”Didn't know I had those. Thought they ran out the day before,” he apologized upon seeing the bread.
”Neither did I,” she answered wryly, ”but it's okay, I believe you. It's no matter, us women have our ways. But seriously? How much?”
”Negative five.” Sully leaned against the doorframe, crossing his arms. ”You do have something warmer than that, right?”
She looked down at her less than sparse clothing and grimaced. ”Well, yeah. I've got jeans and a wind-jacket.” She sighed. ”I'll manage.”
”No. You won't. I'll lend you a sweater, no biggie. But hey, weren't you in a hurry or something?”
”Thanks. Yeah, I am. Just couldn't be bothered to leave; it's warm in here and freezing outside. You know?”
”Yeah, I know the feeling too well,” said Sully, thinking more on the lines of the safety of home and the brutal rape recieved outside of its walls. ”But I'll fetch that shirt for you; you get ready in the mean time. When I come back, I want you waiting by the door.”
”Aye, aye.” She set to finishing off her toast.
Sully went to fetch the sweater , realized he could only loan the one he had on, and was surprised to actually see her by the door, jeans on and jacket on her arm. Amy must've sensed his astonishment.
”We might not be much in the brawn league, but we can leg it when it comes to clothes,” she laughed.
”Evidently,” replied Sully, chuckling. ”This is the only one I can loan,” he explained when he drew the sweater over his head. The wooly fabric hitched up his t-shirt in the process and Sully heard Amy gasp. ”What?”
”Your... your chest. It looks like you got run over by a truck.”
Sully looked down and was slightly surprised to see the bruises on his chest. ”Oh, those bruises. Picked a stupid fight over a stupid thing against someone stupid but way bigger than me. I'm surprised you didn't see them before, they're sort of, well, obvious.”
”I thought they were just shadows or tattoos or something. I didn't pay them too much attention. Do they hurt?”
”Not really,” Sully said, rolling a shoulder to test the tug of the damaged tissue.” I didn't even notice them. I'm sort of used to aching all over, as I do exercise constantly.”
”Well, that's good then, sporty boy.”
The sweater swerved on the way-too-big side, but she said she didn't mind. She also commented on its warmth. Sully shrugged. ”If it's fine by you, it's fine by me.”
”Aren't you the gentleman?”
”Not really, as I don't have any intention of escorting you out there into the cold,” said Sully. Amy awarded his snide comment with a punch to the shoulder.
Then came the ritualistic awkward lingering, followed by a indiscernible amount of making out, and a door snapping shut. Sully stood there a while, his eyes boring holes through the door. Then he grinned and went to get his spare sweater. It was one of Jerry's, thus colored white and gold in some intricate design with no real meaning. It was also more than slightly too long for him, but Sully had to admit it was extremely warm. Next he went to the box of his work-things that he and Jerry had swinged by the appartment before hitting the bar. A quick rumagging yielded the purple unicorn. Almost timidly, Sully grasped the small artifact of his past, feeling the soft fur encompassed in the cage of his fingers. It was as if the touch opened a flood gate into the past.
Images of Anita swept over Sully, threatening to drown him. Anita smiling shyly as he caught her looking at him from the front row of the class. Anita grinning at a lame joke he had come up with to break the ice. Anita's eyes after their first kiss, luminous in the shallow light of dusk. Anita cuddled next to him, watching a crappy film. The feeling of the keys to their shared appartment in his pocket, five years later. Her warmth next to him when he came home from work and dropped in bed. The look in her eyes just before she said it was over, and the gentle shattering of his heart. Sully closed his eyes and counted to twenty, twice.
”It's time,” he whispered. ”It's time.”
He grabbed his keys and stepped into his sneakers. The door banged shut behind him and he locked it, gave the keys a small throw and pocketed them. Then he began to climb. As he trudged up the stuffy staircase, he tried not to think about anything. Amy kept sneaking back in, her smile, her touch, her smell, her soft sounds of pleasure; just... her in general and, what seemed like a resonance to Amy, pictures and moments of Anita crept in the wake. They clashed and sought his scrutiny, sought his aknowledgement. Sully's fist tightened on the purple unicorn. He forced everything out of his mind, counting steps to keep it occupied. At step 121, he enountered the door.
He took a deep breath and wrenched it open. The howling wind surged through the ever-widening crack, engulfing Sully in its icy grasp. He grit his teeth and pulled in his chin and took a step out. After drawing the door to, feeling merciful towards his neighbors, he plunged head-long into the wind. The appartment's roof hadn't iced over yet, but the pre-snowish slush hid every little crevice, keeping Sully busy stumbling on things he didn't quite see. Once he was close to the edge, he slowed his pace, using his toes to patrol the area in front of him before taking a step. The sweater was doing wonders against the cold, but the wind ate through the fabric of his jeans, nulling the feeling of warmth pouring in from his torso. His shoes, too, were soaked and his socks felt squishy.
The edge loomed as a sharp edge, sharp as a knife, ending abruptly, beconing him closer. He complied, taking a wary step, bringing his other foot to its mate's side. He stared down into the city below. Flashes of light streaked through a labyrinth of gray. A labyrinth designed not to make you lost, but to lose yourself. Colorful images meant to alter your way of thinking, alter the way you looked at yourself. It made no difference whether you knew what they were doing to you or not.They would still mold your subconscious into alignment with the government's way of thinking. Crowd control, they called it, the controlling of the masses to keep them from resorting to their violent side. A violent side they were not sure even existed. Just in case, they would whisper to themselves when they went to bed, just in case.
Sully spat down, wondering if it would gather enough speed to hurt someone. A convulsion travelled down his spine, causing his hand to tighten on the stuffed animal in his hand. Anita's face slipped from behind his mental walls and a tear clove a way down Sully's cheek.
”It's time,” he repeated. He brought his hand up, took a deep breath, and threw the stuffed animal as hard as he could. The purple unicorn tumbled down. Anita's face faded from the forefront of his mind, in time with the unicorn. He watched it grow smaller and smaller, until it was lost from sight. Anita smiled one last sad smile and faded to black. The time was over.
”This isn't giving up, no this is letting go,” he recited from a song, the title of which was lost to him. It seemed appropriate.
”Isn't this just a marvelous day to die on, my good lad?”
Sully whipped his head around, startled, and nearly lost his footing then and there.
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Please leave a comment on my work; I know it's quite rough so I need all the help I can get. ^^ Oh, and I'm planning on making Sully flip through a few more channels before switching the TV off, but haven't yet decided what channels they could be. I hope you enjoyed.
