“Come on, cut me some slack, how am I supposed to give you a wicked tattoo if I don’t practice?” He forced a laugh. “Didn’t you want a Kitty van Gogh tattoo? That artsy cartoon kitty princess thing?”
Jonah erupted into little laughs. “No! No way! I never say that!”
“So did!” The two of them laughed together and even when Jace stopped, the five-year-old still laughed. He always found everything Jace said funny and when the giggling settled, Jace broke the small silence. “Hey…brat? I need you to promise me something..."
“What?”
“Promise me...that you'll take care of mama and Jordan. Always be good for them...especially mama, okay?"
“When are you coming home?” His voice balanced on hopeful and sad.
More tears slipped from the corners of his eyes. “I’m not sure, hopefully soon, but if not…” Jace had to stop for a moment, another sob threatened at the thought of telling Jonah anything to make him sad. “I love you, Jonah.”
Shy, and giggling, the little boy murmured something similar, bringing a smile to Jace’s face. In the background, he briefly heard his mother break down, screaming something as Jonah asked what was wrong and Jordan picked up the phone once more.
“Jace, listen, please. Let me—“
“I love you, Jordan, take care of them.”
He hung up.
And fell apart.
With no witnesses, no demons or human strangers, he let it all out. The tears burned and his legs gave in, dropping him against the foggy glass painted with prayers and names. He almost couldn’t breathe, but he didn’t care.
It was easier to lie because lying would keep them safe. He couldn’t imagine his family falling into the same pit Bryce and himself had been to.
They never will.
But it still hurt.
Misery, pain, and sorrow conquered every pure emotion he'd been holding onto by a thread, ripping it from his child-weak grasp and holding it above as he watched helplessly from a glass cage, and the distant voice of an operator asked him to try again.
Twilight helped the throbbing in Jace's head and the sting of hot tears in his eyes, the temperature had dropped a little to a crisp bite of approaching Autumn and the cool wind kissed his face when he left the phone booth.
Time didn’t have meaning anymore, so he was unsure how long he’d been sitting inside nor did he care. He just needed to clear his head before he tried to figure out what he was going to do about this task.
A sudden noise jarred him, a trash can being moved by weight, and he looked up to see something leaping into the shadowy pools of an alley. A cat? No, it was longer and darker—a shadow made solid.
His right eye pinched in slight discomfort and he rubbed it.
Voices broke the silence and Jace turned to see a couple walking arm in arm down the sidewalk. They laughed and nudged one another, and his nerves settled.
Having nowhere to go, he walked. The pain in his eye and the sadness of his phone call faded together as if he left them in the booth.
Though odd noises seemed to turn his head and shift his eyes; small scratches on the pavement, shrill moaning in tune with leaves rustling in the wind, and clicking purrs.
“Guys, stop, I don’t have anything! Please!”
Jace heard a sudden cry and looked over across the street where three figures stood half-devoured in the shadows of another alley. His eyes tensed and he crossed the road to investigate.
Two of the three figures forced their victim further in before hitting him across the face hard enough to drop him into a ball of pain. They laughed, their voices carrying the echoes of giggling demon—or Jace might’ve been hearing things when he stepped into the mouth of the alley.
“What are you doing?”
Both men turned to him, unamused but curious as to who was interrupting their game. Their victim remained pressed to the ground.
“Get the fuck out of here or you’ll join him with a couple of teeth missing, bitch.” One of them said as the other watched Jace closely with dark eyes through a cloud of smoke he exhaled.
“Yeah, right, and who’s going to chaperone me? A spineless punk-bitch like you?” Jace’s eyes darkened and he glanced at the silent one. “And what the fuck are you looking at?”
“That’s it, motherfucker.” The restless one ran at him and swung hard, a punch that missed by a laughable amount of space when Jace dodged it. And he countered with an uppercut that grounded him.
The silent one flinched, his cigar dropping when his comrade hit the ground, then his eyes tightened.
Jace tossed his bag aside and positioned himself. If there was anything they would regret tonight, or any other night, it was pissing off the son of middleweight champion Angel Rosario on a night where he was feeling less than understanding and overcome with dark emotions just begging to be let out through violence.
The silent one lunged, but no longer silent as he threw a mouthful of obscenities and a fist full of strength that Jace blocked with his arm. Pushing past the pain, the two of them collided in a promise of blood and bruises.
Tonight, he was going to fight, he was going to draw blood. It was his turn to cause pain and he was going to cause a lot of it.
In the middle of a storm of fists and kicks, the not-so-silent guy left himself wide open and Jace ditched his posture for fury by grabbing the guy’s hoodie and pulling him into a series of punches. The restless one rejoined the fight and Jace took his sucker punch to the jaw.
He parted through the discomfort with a line of adrenaline that slammed his elbow into the guy’s face, sending him to the ground with a satisfying snap of a broken nose. Blood flowed in a river of red down his face and throat. He moaned and sounded more when those internal bones pressed into sensitive spots.
And Jace threw Not-So-Silent to the concrete with him, watching them stir in their pool of blood and embarrassment.
Panting, Jace glared at them.
Together, they stood on shivering legs and wobbled into a sprint toward the mouth of the alley, urging each other forward.
“Next time we see you, you’re fucking dead!” Restless hollered through a mouthful of nose blood.
“Yeah, and you keep fucking running,” Jace said back, standing firm until he knew for sure they were gone. He wiped the blood from his sore mouth, spitting it off to the side, and looking down at the guy still curled up in a ball like a hedgehog.
“Hey,” Jace said, approaching him. “Come on, man, you’re okay.”
It was a statement based on how weak Restless threw a punch.
Still shaken, the guy sat up and scratched under his beanie, reaching dark curls that fell over pale and pierced cheeks. And he winced when his fingers grazed an eye.
“Let me see.” Jace knelt in front of him.
“Ah, is..is it bad?” He asked, lifting his head like a sniffling child so Jace could get a better look.
“You’ll live,” Standing, Jace offered the guy a hand, which he accepted and stood with help. “Definitely going to be black and blue for a while though.”
“….Thanks.” A sigh escaped him. “I’m Noon.”
“Jace.” He said with a short handshake and his eyes caught sight of the logo on Noon’s shirt.
Skin & Scars.
“Hey, you work for Israel?” Jace asked, suddenly smiling. “I used to apprentice for him.”
“No shit,” Noon was smiling too. “Yeah, I just started a few months ago. I’m on my way there now to meet up with a practice client.”
“Mind if I join you?”
“Do I?” Noon grinned, showing off dimples beneath the silver balls pierced into them. “You just KO’d two thugs Fist of the North Star style, you’re definitely coming with me.
Jace laughed, letting every bit of that normalcy and relaxation sink into him as he walked with Noon toward the street and grabbing his backpack on the way.
When he touched it, however, he heard something—the sound of maggots writhing through flesh—and he glanced into the alley, trying to focus past the darkness that moved.
“Jace?” Noon’s voice pulled him away and Jace glanced at him. “You comin’?”
“Yeah, sorry.”
Tiny slivers of shadows reached from the edge of his right eye like claws hoping to grab it, but they were gone in a few blinks. Jace felt like he should be afraid, but he wasn’t. Not right now.
Instead of tasting fear, he opted for the metallic-zing of his own blood and walked out of the alley beside Noon.
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