The light of another day . . . ugh. Was it morning? Afternoon? I didn't know and didn't care. It was Saturday and that was a good excuse to stay exactly where I was—my abysmal nowhere.

As my day wasted away, unexpectedly, and for the unprecedented second time in one week, there was a knock at my door. I knew, absolutely, that it wasn't Skylar, so I stayed put. I kept my eye on the shadows of two large feet, however. They lingered for a moment and shifted side to side. After a tiny white object popped out from beneath my door, the visitor walked away and didn't return.

Strange. Any mail I receive is delivered to a post office box, and an enemy would be more persistent or barge in if I didn't answer. So there'd be no need for a note.

My curiosity finally got the better of me. I still felt smaller than dirt, though, so I stayed small, and judging by the size of the envelope, about a half-inch wide and less than that for height, I had made the right choice. Inside, there was a small piece of paper with writing on it too small for human eyes:  

Want your life back, boy? Meet me at the docks at 7 pm. V.O.

Van Orden. I should have known. Once I transformed, I torched the note and the envelope with my lighter.

I didn't want to go anywhere. Spending the entire weekend sulking under my bed seemed like a viable alternative. And I doubted he could give me what it was that peaked my interest. Unless he had the equivalent of Patton's Third Army of fairy soldiers, there was little he could do to help me get my life back. But, a half pack of cigarettes later, I decided it wouldn't kill me to find out what his message meant.

At seven on the dot, I was waiting for him on the docks. It was drizzling and he was late, so when his piece-of-shit Pinto pulled around, I wasn't exactly brimming with cheer.

"You got me out here, old man," I said, since he refused to call me anything but boy. "Now what do you want?"

Out of his open window puffed a smoke cloud and his course voice. "Get in."

I reluctantly obeyed, and before my seatbelt had a chance to click, he jolted the car into motion like he was in a hurry. We made it to the outskirts of Gloucester and he still hadn't said a word. His only show of hospitality was the grunted offering of a cigarette, which I accepted. I didn't need to waste the precious few I had remaining on this adventure.

"Where are we going?" I mumbled as I lit up.

"Ipswich."

At least it wasn't going to be that long of a ride. Ipswich was only a couple of towns away. "For the purpose of?"

"You'll see."   

He wasn't going to explain. I trusted him, enough not to dive from a moving vehicle, but I didn't have a reason to trust anyone else of our kind. Sauvageau "eyes" were all over the world. It would be safer and smarter for me to avoid fairies entirely. And that's why Andromeda always wins, because bearing an "unworthy" fairy mark is no guarantee of disloyalty to her.

I couldn't think of anything else to talk about and I wasn't in the mood to try. So I stared at the dreary fishing towns passing by, wondering why I was still scared shitless about the dream I had.

Nightmares are regular occurrences for me, almost as soon as my eyes close. They come for me, I run, they catch me, and I die. I've gotten used to them over the years and all their subtle variations, some realistic, and some just weird. This last one, however, was the first time I had ever dreamt about a baby.

Was Andromeda pregnant? I'm not sure, and if she was, I'm not even sure it was mine. She was a master in the art of seduction after all. But a pregnancy was something I suspected. Knowing what she knew about magic—the best of the best of the best—there is no way I should have been able to walk away from our clash with a couple of burns.

She was off somehow. There was the fire of hatred in her eyes, but the power behind her magic was lacking. When she was screaming in agony at my feet, the thought crossed my mind that my child might be inside of her. It was the reason I didn't kill her when I had the chance. I couldn't, even if I should have, pregnant or not.

To this day, it eats me up inside worrying that my child could be out there somewhere, under Andromeda's domain, and I can't provide any protection. As much as it shames me to say this, the child would be better off dead.     

Oh, hell! I chucked my cigarette butt out the crack of the window. Maybe all this worrying is for nothing!

I decided it was ridiculous for me to lose my dignity and my chance at happiness over so many "ifs." But I came to another conclusion too. I should never have kids.

~~~

Neil Young. Old Man (1972).

https://youtu.be/rAtDrFdomN4