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We walked the block and half to the coffee house in silence, heads bowed, leaning into the wind as it whipped off the harbour and howled through steel and glass canyons. We didn’t speak to each other as we ordered, grabbed a table, waited for our coffees.
Didn’t even make eye contact.
The whole Dillinger thing sat like Pandora’s box on the table between us. Neither of us wanted to open it. I didn’t even know how.
What was I going to say?
Hey, something funny, y’know Dillinger, our supervisor, the one you turned into a eunuch, him, yeah, I think he was reading my mind.
Elise broke the silence.
“That’s going to kill you.”
I looked down into the black ink of my 747. Looked back up at her. Her cheeks will still pink from the wind.
“A coffee isn’t a coffee unless you run the risk of being rendered sterile.”
She smiled slightly. Blue sparked half seen at the corners of her mouth.
I looked out the window, trying to ignore my hallucinations. The wind was causing the glass to shudder in its frame, the world behind it twisting and warping. It wasn’t doing my headache any good. Neither was the coffee.
An old man walking into the wind, head bowed, flat cap pulled low, scarf up around his ears. The only bit of skin I could see was the pale bridge of his nose. It was overlaid with a green like old copper.
I looked back at Elise.
The blue sparks were still there.
At least she was better looking than the old man.
“Some first day, huh?”
“Oh no, about par for the course for me. I always try and castrate my new supervisor on the first day. I usually try and get it out of the way before lunch, but I didn’t get a chance till just then.”
Elise, harsh voiced, bitter.
We lapsed back into the same old awkward silence.
I bowed my head, returned to studying my coffee, as if I could read the seven shots of espresso like tea leaves.
Searching for a sign that Elise wasn’t going to look at me like I was bugfuck crazy when I opened my mouth and said –
“I-think-Dillinger-was-reading-my-mind.”
Elise’s words come out in rush, her nerves stringing them together like a race caller’s patter.
She’d taken them right out of my mouth.
She looked down at her caramel flavoured, chocolate sprinkled, no fat soy, decaffeinated travesty. She started to turn red as she spoke into the whipped cream.
“I know it sound crazy, it’s just that… you remember when Mr. Dillinger grabbed me, when he called me a…”
I nodded.
“Well, he said that he’d heard me having dirty thoughts in John’s… Mr. Penderghast’s… office.”
She paused, sunk lower in her chair, hid further behind her coffee.
I leaned in closer, made a noise that I hoped was encouraging.
Her voice got even softer.
“Well, I was having… dirty thoughts… about… someone.”
She looked like she wanted the big red armchair to swallow her.
“I sound crazy, don’t I?”
I sat back.
“Well, if you’re crazy, then so am I.”
She looked up.
“You know how Dillinger thought I called him a mother fucking, cock sucking goat shagging son of a whore. Well, I didn’t.”
Pause.
“I thought he was motherfucking, cock sucking, goat shagging, poxy son of a filthy disease-ridden whore.”
Relief flushed through Elise, lifted her out from behind the whipped cream mountain.
“Almost word for fucking word, Dillinger read my goddamn mind.”
“That’s good. I thought for a second there, I was going nuts. It’s good to know that I’m nice and sane.”
“Hey, I didn’t say that.”
She laughed.
“Well, who’s crazier? – “
giggle, snort, giggle
“- The crazy lady, or the guy who agrees with her?”
Ah, the snort was back.
“I thought the pigeon thing settled it. We’re both completely mad.”
“Any minute now –“
giggle, snort, giggle
“- you’re going to – “
giggle, snort, giggle
“- going say you see people’s – “
giggle, snort, giggle
“ – auras!”
Funny you should mention it…
Auras! That’s it. I was just thinking that the headache was making his vision go wonky.
But auras is much cooler.
Coolies!