Chapter Text
“You’re staying with your friends tonight!”
She banged the door in his face.
That was the final blow.
To have tramped about all day looking for work; to have begged for a job which would give Nick enough money to buy a little food, and to have tramped and to have begged in vain—that was bad. But, sick at heart, depressed in mind and in body, exhausted by hunger and fatigue, to have been compelled to pocket any little pride he might have left—to be rejected like this—that was worse. Much worse. About as bad as bad could be.
Nick stared, stupidly, at the door which had just been banged in his face. He could scarcely believe that such a thing was possible, to be kicked out yet again by his mother. It seemed Nick had attained a depth of misery of which never even in nightmares he had dreamed.
“God, I’m such a screw-up.” he murmured. He felt the hotness of tears; Nick angrily rubbed the corner of his watering eyes with his palm. He’d be caught dead before he was caught crying, especially in front of his parents. He didn’t need to cry, he had no right to cry! What would it matter anyway?
“Fucking…cunt,” he said under his breath. As he stood wondering what he should do about his housing situation, his thrill-seeking mind gradually drew images of reckless capers waiting to be fulfilled. Skateboarding and eating concrete again, playing with fireworks, maybe throwing Bang-snaps at strangers’ feet. While these scenarios flickered into mind, Nick began to walk. He didn’t know where he’d go, he didn’t have the money for a hotel or diner, he’d hate to mooch off his sister again, and with the recent fallout of his friend group, he wouldn’t have a place to crash.
There was a franticness to his pace. He was a shark; he had to keep moving, or he’d suffocate. He seemed to be leaving civilization behind him. The path was unpaved, the road rough and uneven as if it had never been properly made. Houses were few and far between. Those which he did encounter seemed, in the imperfect light, amid the general desolation, to be cottages which were crumbling to decay.
Exactly where Nick was, he could not tell. He had a faint notion that, if he kept on long enough, he should strike some part of Walham Green. How long he should have to keep on, he could only guess.
He supposed it was six o’clock, the wind was growing chilly. He had time. He feared that if he attempted to spend the night in the open air, without food, when the morning came, he’d be fit for nothing. It was really hunger which drove him to the workhouse door. Since the Sunday night preceding nothing had passed his lips save water from the public fountains—except for a pizza slice which his friend had given him in Holland Park. It’s Wednesday now. Maybe he could go out into the woods and catch something.
He does not know how far he went. Every yard he covered, his feet dragged more. He was dead beat, inside and out. He had neither strength nor courage left. And within, there was that frightful craving, which was as though it shrieked aloud. He leant against some palings, dazed. It was some minutes before he could collect himself sufficiently to withdraw from the support of the railings and to start afresh. He stumbled blindly over the uneven road like a drunk.
Having regained his feet, he had gone perhaps another couple of hundred yards along the road—Heaven knows that it seemed to him just then a couple of miles. He could see the woods peeking over soulless concrete blocks.
The sun was a pale disc behind a scrim of clouds, ephemeral, subdued. The grey light of dawn dropped, cold and glimmering, between the trees and revealed the scene well. The cold air pricked. In the draughts of day that poured their silent tide from the depths of the forest, with messages from distant ridges and lakes just beginning to freeze, there lay already the faint, bleak odors of a coming blizzard.
Nick bristled. It was so damn cold that even in two jackets, he was practically freezing his balls off. He followed the split hooves of a deer captured in the pristine snow, bolting off in big leaps to somewhere deeper in the woods. He wasn’t hunting deer (despite his hunger); rather, something fun to do.
Just… whatever kept him away from home.
The evergreen pines occasionally grazed his shoulders with needle-lined arms, stinging him. Curiosity tugged at him toward a blindingly white clearing, strangely open and vast in comparison to the thick woods encircling it. It led him to a lone metal powerline standing resolutely against the frostbitten landscape. Nick craned his head back, mouth dumbly agape as he took in the big wires snaking across an impossibly large sky.
I should lick that, he abruptly thought.
Well, with no voice of reason to tell him not to do that, he supposed it was alright. With a mischievous grin, he approached the pole, eyeing it like a prize.
“Is it really true?” he wondered aloud. His self-control grew brittle under the whims of an impulsive excitement bubbling within. He glanced around, ensuring no one was watching, and then, with a boldness that surprised even himself, he grabbed the powerline and pressed his tongue against the icy surface.
In an instant, he felt the shock of the cold seeping into his mouth. After a moment, he pulled his head away, expecting his tongue to come free. But it stayed. Panic flared in his chest as the realization registered—his tongue was stuck! He yanked his head back, but the pole eagerly held on, unwilling to let go.
Okay, this is bad, he thought, trying to stay calm.
The young man leaned forward to blow plumes of warm air against the spot, but it wasn’t hot enough to melt the ice. A great kiss of wind ran softly through the awakening forest, and a few maple leaves here and there rustled tremblingly to earth. The sky seemed to grow suddenly much lighter. Nick felt the cool air upon his cheek and uncovered head, realized that he was shivering with the cold; and, making a great effort, pulled.
Owowow, nope, that’s gonna hurt,
He paused again and cupped both hands around the pole, thinking carefully. Nick treated it as though he was ripping off a band-aid. He knew that it’d be much easier, and ultimately less painful, if he simply yanked it all off at once. But that thought was scary, so he continued to fruitlessly tug and prod at his rooted tongue, whimpering like a sad dog.
Perhaps if he came with a bottle of warm water or had someone to help loosen the pole’s icy grip—what was he thinking? What if he’s stuck here forever and ends up starving? He couldn’t die this way!
Just then, he heard a distant sound: the crunching of snow. Hope ignited inside him. “HEEEEY!” He tried to shout, but the sound barely escaped his lips, and it didn’t travel far in the thick storm. The noise grew, and soon an ashen figure emerged from the whiteness.
He squinted against the harsh glare of the snow. Nick could make out a few details—big, that was the first thing that came to mind, the figure was very tall and had a distinct pale face poised upon this shambling body, it looked like a baseball with two eyes, and blended in with the snow. He might have been a priest or perhaps death itself; he wore a black cloak that had been floured with snow, and a loose hood covered his head and obscured his features. It rippled and flapped in the eager winds. Beneath the garment’s hem, heavy buckled boots with square toes.
The figure walked with a limp and had a cane to assist him. They thumped the ice with their ambitious walking stick, making a thin clk, clk, clk sound.
“Mmmf!” Nick flapped his arm, waving them over. Leisurely, the obscurity of fog fell away, and Nick realized something about this man was very wrong. He wore a mask that dates to the medieval ages, avian and bizarre. Nick recalled seeing them in illustrations within his history books, raven men who “cured” the plague in unlikely ways, covered head to toe in loose robes with their most notable feature being that bird mask. Nick would’ve found it cool if it weren’t so friggin’ creepy!
His was especially frightening. The beak dipped into an arc like an ibis, the underside lined with rows of breathing holes. Two large eyelets, ringed with charcoal eyeshadow, revealed his striking gaze, roving over Nick with detached fascination. It was too dark to tell the color of his eyes.
He froze, staring up at the man. Nothing could’ve captured the livid terror that had dropped over his face while he stood there helpless. It felt like his heart had stopped in his chest.
Then, his massive gloved paw reached for him. His heart immediately sputtered back into overdrive. He kicked, shouted, and babbled helplessly, fists pounding against the pole, feet swishing back with furious speed. The man firmly gripped his shoulder and shoved, tearing his tongue away.
“Ahh! Uahh,” Nick made an inarticulate sound of pain, letting his tongue hang from his mouth like a dog. He felt at it, and thankfully, there was no blood, but it hurt like hell. He looked back at the pole to see if it’d taken any skin with it, then back to his unlikely savior.
Clearly, the man was still fighting with some profoundly moving emotion. He looked at Nick bovinely, as though he’d never seen another human being once in his life. When Nick met his no-color eyes, he finally averted them, almost sheepishly.
Nick wished to excuse himself in the eyes of the other. But the explanation for why he was in the middle of nowhere, tongue bonded with a powerline, would only make him look even more foolish—and he knew perfectly well that this man would not be deceived by any excuses. Moreover, to add to the younger man's uneasiness, was the difficulty, no, the impossibility he felt of asking questions. His imagination searched vigorously, but in vain…
The bird man regarded Nick for a moment longer, tilting his head and twisting his cane, and then he was leaving like nothing had ever happened. Nick felt a curious mix of relief and intrigue watching him wade through the snow.
The bird man had helped him, but there was something about his presence that kept him from leaving it as just that. Why was he out here in the middle of nowhere, dressed like he got done bloodletting? And why was he just walking away? Nick felt an impulse to know more about the man who had offered him a second chance—albeit a rather weird second chance.
Nick's tongue thawed slowly, and he grimaced at the lingering taste of cold iron. He hurried to follow his retreating figure, stumbling through the snow. "Wait! Where are you going?" he shouted, his voice strained against the biting wind.
He paused, glancing over his shoulder with hooded interest that was both touching and frightening. Nick felt the sudden intimidation of his full attention.
He stammered briefly. “I-I was kind of bein’ an idiot, buh… hank you, I probably would’a been stuck forever if you hadn’ come…!” Nick awkwardly explained. God, he sounded like a fool trying to speak. The bird man didn’t say anything, but he nodded appreciatively and continued to walk, vanishing in the blizzard.
Nick shouted to the wind, “Waai—wai’ a min—’m Nick, wha’s your name!?”
There was silence; the snowy expanse echoed back to him.
Warren.