019 - From the ashes

After the surprise, Cynthia finally processed the cause of the abrupt change in ambience a moment ago. She looked around with a displeasure evident on her face, before finding her target on the upper floor. Seeing his unrepentant smile, she huffed, and frowned in anger. She took Daemon by the hand and dragged him back to their table.

"Was that the Micheal Green I think?"

Taking a fierce swig of the strong alcohol, Cynthia snorted at the question of her friend to expose the full extent of her displeasure:

"If not that simp, who else? He is upstairs with people of the same kind."

The curious girls turned to search for the man in question when Cynthia interrupted them:

"Don't look. Don't give him more attention than necessary."

This made her friends snicker:

"Do you think that will make him give up?"

"Of course not. I don't know how many times I have already rejected and ignored him."

Cynthia rolled her eyes, before harshly putting the drink she was finding tasteless down.

"Shall we go elsewhere? I won't get back into the mood if I continue to stay here."

The girls nodded, but they still decided to tease her first:

"Is it only about the mood? Do you want to avoid being interrupted next time?"

"You!!"

Cynthia reacted like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, and threw a look at Daemon before avoiding his gaze.

She stood and left, leaving the others behind.

The girls snickered before running after Cynthia, and Daemon followed behind them.

They left the noisy club under the gaze of the eyes coming from the upper floor.

Michael, who had shown a smile when Cynthia had looked up before, lost it at the sight of their departure and clenched his fist with even more force, as if he wanted to bend the railing he was holding. Too bad he was too weak for that, or the rail was of too good quality.

His friends, seeing him like that, snickered, then tried to distract him. They pulled him back into their midst, and pushed liquors in his hands to let him drown his frustrations with.

Unwilling but with no other way, much less run after the woman that had been finding him a bother, Micheal followed the advice and used the alcohol for its intended purpose. Though, whether he would manage to drown his jealousy, or fuel it even more, was unknown.

Outside the club, Daemon followed the girls to the side of the road. They did not seem to have their cars around, if the others beside Cynthia did have one, which he thought most probably the case. By the look of things, they had prepared themselves to avoid driving while inebriated, which was a good thing.

After they hailed a taxi, he spoke:

"I won't be going with you girls. Have fun, but stay safe."

Kelly, Jane and Rachel reacted mildly, but Cynthia didn't hide her surprise:

"Why?"

She didn't voice it out loud, but her face made it obvious that she was wondering if what just happened was the reason. Maybe the ambiguous moment, or the interruption that followed.

Daemon didn't put that much thought into it, and gave a simple reason:

"I just left the hospital, so I need to take more rest."

"Ohh."

Cynthia looked relieved, but Daemon didn't let her speak again:

"Alright, go. I will also take a cab to return to my place."

"Then take care, and remember to call me this time."

He only nodded in response, and watched their car leave. His hand went to the wounded side of his face, and his expression turned indescribable at the difference between the previous high intensity life, and this one in which he was feeling aimless.

He looked around, before the look in his eyes deepened as he found himself with a feeling of separation, unable to integrate himself into the same normal life as normal people. Maybe he had overestimated himself, but he didn't feel like running back to that place with his tail between his legs.

Instead of hailing a cab, he opted for walking, taking the cold of the night wind that was trying to overcome the protection of his jacket.

His eyes were roaming around, but his thoughts were elsewhere, going over his life, and trying to determine what to do.

But until he reached his hotel, he still failed to find a concrete answer. He took a shower, and went to bed.

The next day, he left the hotel with a fresh look.

He went around the stores of the city to buy things like elastic cables, wetsuits, bodysuits, harnesses, electronic equipment, and renovation tools.

In the afternoon, he returned to the place he had been to the previous day, but this time instead of knocking on the door of Mrs Almer, he opened the adjacent apartment with the key he was given when he rented it.

The inside was wide but simple, with a living room and a bedroom, both empty, the former with a kitchen space at the side.

Satisfied with the place, he put down everything he had bought into the living room, and went into the bedroom to start measuring it.

By the end of the afternoon, he had made many holes on the walls of the bedroom, but as the night was descending, and the noise of his work would bother the rest of the people in the building, he stopped what he was doing, and left.

But looking at his dusty appearance, he felt like knocking himself on the head. The apartment did have a functional bathroom, but his tunnel vision on the project that had been on his mind even before retirement had made him overlook how dirty he might become, and how a simple purchase of a few amenities would have allowed him to clean himself before going back.

In the days that followed, it became his routine to leave his hotel in the morning, spend the day at the rented place, and come back in the evening.

Even after a week, he was still adjusting the elastic cables he was working to fix on the walls. Some of them would need only a few kilograms of pulling force to get extended, others, up to dozens of kilograms.

He was getting a little frustrated at failing to find an ideal balance for the position he wanted everything to end up in, but he was disturbed when his phone rang.