Fictober 2023 prompts #2

# 7 “Do you recognize this?” - Reed

It might not be a novelty for you to interact with someone under the influence of Perfumare, but so far the only victims were the other runners who you had to usher into Dia’s office for a breather. This time, though, it’s Reed, of all people, who you have to guide back to his own apartment before he gets himself into even more trouble.

He comes along willingly enough, with eyes wide open and face unguarded. He babbles, too, with less restraint and purpose than he does nowadays, asking questions so fast you have a hard time answering them all.

“You’ll remember soon enough,” you brush him off when you finally reach his place. Navigating around the harder subjects took all of your strength, and you’d rather not resort to lying just to spare his feelings.

“What if I don’t?”

“You will. Come on.” It’s good that he gave you a spare key, otherwise you’d have to take him to your place... and if he sees where you chose to stay, his nagging will have no end.

“Which bedroom is mine?” Reed asks at once, having barely stepped a foot into the narrow corridor.

The apartment is smaller than his first one, with only two rooms (one of which he hoped to offer you, unsuccessfully), but it still smells fresh, of concrete and steel. Far more pleasant than the stench of urine seeped into the rotting wooden panels in your hidey hole. Not that you’re complaining.

“Huh? Both are yours,” you say, pushing Reed into the aforementioned area, and almost dragging him further when he hesitates to move.

“We’re not livin’ together?” He sounds deeply puzzled, and it vaguely reminds you of the post-graduation plans you made... back when everything was easier.

“Nope,” you say quickly, steering the conversation away from that subject by adding, “Here’s the living room. Go on, take a look.”

“You promised to be my guide,” Reed complains when he notices you pause. You almost roll your eyes before you realize that, behind the airs he puts on, there’s genuine anxiety, obvious in his scent, if not on his face.

“And I’m guiding. Not that there’s much to see.”

A well-lit living room, foldable sofa, coffee table, closet, a red chair. A stack of neatly sorted paperwork, and books. In a sense, it looks just like his dorm room. The sight does help to soothe his apprehension.

Despite that, he reaches backwards to grab your arm, as if it was a safety line, just as he did when you first found him next to the collapsed boxes with shattered Perfumare bottles he’s been helping Dia move.

Even in his most lost, he remembered you, is what you gathered from the gesture, though you can’t guess how far his memory loss goes. He inhaled a lot, but he left the room relatively fast. He still reacts to the name ‘Reed,’ but since he popped his brow at you when you called him that, his mind has to be stuck around the early academy days, back when he was at his most obnoxious.

Pulling you along, as he used to do all the time through the old, narrow corridors, Reed heads towards the closet - obviously - humming appreciatively when he picks up a pair of dark jeans with a price tag on it.

“I still have good taste,” he says, grinning at the number printed on the tag. One too many zeros for your taste - and wallet - but it’s just like him to pick his stuff from the highest shelves.

“And a huge ego.”

“It’s not the only thing huge—”

“Ah, right. How could I forget about your big head?”

“I meant my wallet,” he sniffs, affronted. “My head is normal-sized.” That’s what he says, but his eyes flicker towards the mirror to double-check. “It’s the hair,” he whines, trying and failing to flatten a stray lock that sticks out more than the others.

“If you say so,” you concede before he can disappear in the bathroom for an hour straight. Memories or not, you’re sure he could find his way between the mountains of hair products with ease.

Trying to distract him before he can make a run for it, you pick a random book, some sort of biography. It’s old, worn, neatly kept, but with loose pages—

No, not pages. There are notes and—

“Hey!”

Snatching the book from your hands with lightning speed, Reed’s reaction seems to have surprised him, too, because he blinks owlishly at you, then at the book.  “Sorry,” he mutters, genuinely contrite. “Reflex, I guess.”

“What’s with that?” you ask, though without moving closer. You’re not used to him having secrets, it makes you feel... off.

Reed opens the tome slowly, smoothing a piece of paper that has been creased during the scramble. “The ink’s faded,” he narrates as he leaves through the pages. “Ah, just some notes we passed durin’ class. Maybe I forgot to bin them— Huh?”

“What?”

“Well,” he pauses, looking at whatever it is that he found, then at you, and back again. “I’m not sure if I should be showin’ you this.”

“Why?”

“The future me could have hidden it for a reason.” Though he says it with a grin, the acrid aroma of unease gives him away once more. It doesn’t last long, and with the trust only his past self possessed, he hands you the book. “Fuck it, it’s the future me’s problem.”

“Current you,” you correct absently, intercepting the discovery readily.

Instead of a secret document or message, it’s... a photo. You, Reed - younger than he is now, with his hair growing from that atrocious buzz-cut - and Flavio’s fingers in the lens. You don’t remember when it was taken, but it just might be the only photo of you in existence. Next to it is a scrap of paper, with a code or such. Whatever it is, you can’t read it. At any rate, it doesn’t seem important.

“Just some notes,” you confirm when you notice Reed staring at you expectantly. “And a picture.”

“Borin’,” Reed concludes, moving on to ruffle through his other belongings while you put the book away.

Indeed, it has to be mundane to him. Unlike you, it’s all very fresh in his mind. In a couple of hours, though, it’ll be as distant as another life. You’ll miss his openness, if nothing else.

# 9 “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” - Alan and MC1

Though Dia prefers to keep her business separate from her cousin’s - at least on paper - you find yourself running a small errand to the bar across the street. Since Reed’s shift was about to start, Jewel traded the chore for cleaning duty, and you took it without a second of hesitation.

Not only do you get a break - because, let’s be honest, you’ve been sitting in the downstairs office for twenty minutes now, nearly dozing, while you were supposed to deep-clean the basement - but you’re going to get a free drink out of Reed later, too. A very fair deal, in your book.

It’s only that with nothing to do and no sound other than the shuffling from upstairs to keep you company, you’re becoming increasingly more bored with every second.

When Reed brought you here, promising that his boss will be there ‘shortly,’ you already expected to have to wait, but the clock ticks, and your ass gets numb, and the boss is nowhere to be seen.

Standing from the couch, you stretch your frozen limbs, idly trotting towards the desk in the middle of the room. The metal shelves in the back are off-limits, not that you need to be told, but the papers scattered around the counter seem unimportant enough.

You only get to take a peek when a disembodied voice stops you from leaning any further. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

Whirling around so fast you almost send the papers flying, you find yourself face to face with the one you’ve been tasked with seeing.

Now that you do, the dim room that you once found large suddenly feels cramped, and you realize that there’s nowhere to retreat or escape to, not with the man pausing strategically in the doorway.

He must have appeared here from another dimension because you didn’t hear him approach. Even the stairs didn’t creak to betray his presence. His office, too, is already permeated with the scent of his perfume that you didn’t notice when the aroma thickened.

The boss’ pale eyes regard you with indifference, but at the same time, you know you’re the center of his focus. He evaluates you like a bug on a vivisection table, and whatever conclusion he makes of you isn’t a flattering one, because when he finally enters the room fully, it’s with his open back to you. Allure or not, he doesn’t consider you a threat.

“Can I help you?” he asks with a hint of impatience as he takes off his coat and fastens it on the hanger by the door. The movements of his fingers are slow and elegant. It’s hard to believe those same hands strangled a man twice his size to death, but you’ve heard enough of Reed’s warning to make light of the information.

“I am here for-”

“Reed, I gathered,” he cuts you off with some annoyance, though you suspect it’s not directed at you, but rather at his employee. Done with his coat, he turns back to you. His expression is deliberate, as if making sure you know you’re intruding. “He’s upstairs.”

No shit. “I have documents for you, actually.” You place them on the desk as if it was your plan all along. ”From Dia.”

He doesn’t acknowledge your explanation with even a blink, continuing to level you with a cold, calculative gaze until you crack under the pressure.

“Reed said to wait here.”

“Am I driving you out?”

“Uh no?”

“Then sit down.”

Shit.

Since it’s clear he’s not going to move until you do, you yield, scurrying towards the couch. Now, you no longer wonder how he got the menace that is Reed to walk and talk like a little toy soldier when he’s around. It’s obvious the guy is accustomed to handling far worse individuals than a blabbermouth and a rookie runner. Wasn’t his last customer a gangster? Or was it a politician? Ah, same shit in Elazar.

From the corner of your eye, you observe the boss sit at his desk, browsing through the documents you brought. Whatever the information is, it has to be unfavorable, because though you’re pretty sure he has to use scent blockers, you can swear the air turns acrid with ire. All the while his brows barely twitch.

For a poker-faced man, it has to be the equivalent of a tantrum, right?

When in the deafening silence, you hear the blessed tell-tale thump thump thump of shoes on the wood, you waste no time muttering,  “Have a good day,” and dashing out of the room to meet Reed upstairs, almost tripping him over in your haste.

Forget about a free drink, you need at least five.

#12 “I’m not saying I didn’t like it.” - Flavio

“You didn’t have to stay,” Flavio mumbles through a mouthful of a stale donut. You vaguely remember Max bringing it here two days ago, but with the amount of work you had today, and no break in-between, a surprise donut is a treasure, not garbage, even if it’s not box-fresh.

“If I knew you’d rather sort through this alone,” you pause to motion at the box of documents while he swallows after barely chewing, “I wouldn’t have bothered.”

“Nah, I’m not saying I didn’t like it, pumpkin,” he says, already grinning seconds before you roll your eyes. “Your company, more than the paperwork... Your company and the paperwork. Don’t tell me the interrogation script wasn’t chuckle-worthy.”

“‘Chuckle-worthy,’” you mumble, shaking your head. You’re not going to point out who made the interrogation ‘chuckle-worthy,’ but the suspect wasn’t the only clown in the room, you have to admit that much. “You’re not that trustworthy, you know.”

“Hm?”

“You rarely complain,” you explain, passing him a tissue that he only takes after licking the powdered sugar off his thumb. “About me being here, or in general. How would I know you mean it?”

It’s all idle musing, but Flavio sees past your facade, scrunching his face in deep thought. “Now, that’s not true. I uh, I remember saying I don’t like your tone.”

“And I said I don’t like your face, but I know we were both lying, weren’t we?”

Flavio grins a little, wider than his usual reflexive smile. “I’d have you know that what you’re doing is punishable by law,” he says, tone as stoic as his expression.

“Oh really? And what am I doing?” you play along, prying the wrought tissue out of his hands. If your fingers brush against his a little too obviously, well, you do have to help him with that punchline.

“Seducing an officer on duty.”

“So it’s fine if you’re off-duty?”

“I—” He startles, obviously expecting a different answer, mouth agape before it widens in a salve of laughter. “You’re mouthy!”

“You like that.”

“I can neither confirm nor deny,” he lies, leaning forward to retrieve his tissue.

His skin is rough, despite the thick layer of candy-scented cream he’s been using religiously through the winter. His touch doesn’t linger as long as yours did, but just enough to leave a trace of warmth when he moves away.

“For legal reasons?”

“That’s right. For legal reasons.”