Chapter 12--Noise Shaped Pieces

It’s been a month. Peddito hasn’t come back. That’s a good thing, obviously, but that’s the weird thing: He hasn’t come back! Well, it was never my problem, but I still fear he’s coming back someday. Fakey hasn’t come back. Fakey’s bounced back from many situations, but not this one. Somehow Fakey’s death feels more permanent than Peddito’s death, and they were two very similar odd things that lived in this world.

For a lot of people, grief is more inevitable than joy. The loss of Fakey and the death of Peddito have left, inevitably, silence. It’s hard to tell if it’s a nice or unpleasant kind. To insinuate either just feels cruel, but I can’t help it. It’s neutral, a very tolerable kind of neutral. It’s made me very sad, that I can’t deny; I still find myself crying about Fakey. Sometimes I hear a knock at my door and all I can picture is Fakey, as if that was the only person who has ever knocked at my door. It’s difficult, but it doesn’t feel futile. A lot of people say that after suffering comes joy, but joy isn’t inevitable either. After all suffering and joy comes neutrality, a new normal that you may or may not adjust to. No, not even that sounds right. I’d prefer this neutral feeling than the one before, so what’s really different?

I’d expect an outcome like this to be a complete total reset, but only so much has changed. I didn’t see Fakey everyday, nor was the Doise killed everyday. The Doise is still paranoid that Peddito will one day hunt her down, but it hasn’t happened yet. She has assured us that Peddito is dead, that if he really came back, we would’ve seen him lurking around like we always have. It’s odd that the Doise is the one telling us this; he seems like the last person to state this so sincerely and clearly. I guess she’s just feeling something I’m not receiving. She’s not been in her prime lately, but I’m hearing about that more often. His body does not need to say everything about himself; he’s speaking. Not all of it is good news, but she is speaking. I suppose that’s a fine thing to happen.

I guess it’s just clearness. Everything is a little more detailed than it was before and I see that just fine. Such clarity would probably inspire curiosity, but it’s not consistent. Sometimes I find myself thinking less than I have before.

We had Fakey’s funeral in an alleyway housed near what used to be Peppino’s old pizzeria. The pizzeria has been replaced by some other business for years now. The whole thing was very macabre. It was difficult to see Fakey’s hollowed out and lifeless skin on a crude display, but I really tried to remember every wrinkle. Their right socket always drooped more than the left. We recounted memories, brought some old memorabilia, then wrapped it up by disposing of its skin through a nearby dumpster. The whole thing wasn’t traditional in the slightest. It’s what Fakey would’ve wanted.

The Doise is in possession of most of Fakey’s hardware, at least the most important stuff. She’s been tinkering away at extracting anything of use from its parts, albeit slowly due to trying to recover mentally. It would be nice if Fakey’s little brain could be uploaded to something, giving it new life. I could’ve shelled out for a necromancer. I wished I visited Fakey more, or at least the Doise since it hanged around her a good bit. I wish I trusted myself more to hang with her. But I didn’t do that. I didn’t do it.

It’s sunny out. The sun’s been rising earlier than before. Bo and I are having some morning coffee. It just feels like that type of morning.

I watch Bo finish up brewing our coffee, their form longer and more relaxed than usual. They’ve been changing up their presentation lately. It’s still inconsistent as always, but there’s something about it that’s certainly different. Bo’s been wearing different clothes, not just that onesie they used to wear all the time. The look’s more masculine, with a carabiner to match. There’s more depth in his face, too. If I wasn’t paying attention, I could’ve mistaken Bo for a human than an angel. And that’s fine.

Bo places a mocha in front of me before sitting down in their own chair. Their chair has a pillow on it for extra height. Height isn’t Bo’s strong suit.

“What’s got you pondering, lady?” Bo asks playfully.

I gotta smile at that. “Oh, just…” I begin, struggling to make a response. “Everything’s a little odd now.”

“We all had to fight some very difficult battles, tough pills to swallow. I think it’s good to swallow them,” they take a moment to snicker, “but I can’t help but refuse to swallow mine sometimes.”

“Denial is a toughie,” I remark, “…and regret is a toughie too.”

“What’s regret doin’ to little ol’ you?” Bo asks tenderly.

I sigh. “I wish I did more when Fakey was alive. I knew the guy for years and then we got real distant. I guess Fakey got busy—and I have my own life too, no duh—I feel like I could’ve done something about it. I always considered it my best friend and it saw me the same way, it’s just… I wish I wasn’t a coward.”

Bo never knew Fakey like I did, and I never knew Fakey like the Doise did, even though I knew Fakey longer than she did.

They think about what to say for a moment. “It’s so hard to leave those kinds of things alone. Everyone thinks of themself as something much more omniscient, haunting their past with the conscience of the present. It isn’t practical though, despite how much that thinking comes out of a desire to be practical. You…” Bo pauses, some kind of image in their mind stopping them in their tracks. He then looks at me. “The past self is only an animal to the man that the current one is. You can only blame an animal so much for acting poorly, but the man knows so much more.”

“The past is in the past…” I remark.

“Whether you like it or not,” Bo states, finishing my sentence.

We both sit in silence.

The past’s just an animal. Really, all of it? I get the statement, but it’s… the only descriptor I can think of is “radical”.

“If the past is an animal, then that makes the Noise one too, right?” I ask, uneasily.

Bo’s expression grows serious. “She became human a long time ago, but she kept acting like an animal. And now she is dead…’cause I killed her.” He starts laughing.

I join in on the laughter. Boy, what a turnaround! I feel bad for laughing.

“Man, that’s so… god!” I snort.

“Oh well, can’t help it. She’s dead whether we laugh or not…” they get giggly, “’cause I killed her, and that white demon too!”

“Hey, I’m right here, y’know!”

“Shut up!” He laughs. “Oh lady, you gonna kill me!”

“Hehe, I’m gonna kill ‘ya!”

Our laughter eventually dies down into gentle smiles. Granted, a gentle smile for Bo means a comically large grin that extends out of their face. But it’s gentle to me. It makes me feel gentle. And that’s fine.

“So,” I begin, “it seems like you’re taking the murdering thing better.”

“There’s still work to be done, but I’m letting myself accept it. At least I can say I didn’t do it out of cruelty.”

There’s no need to ruminate right now. I’ll leave it be.

“Oh that’s right! You’re heading out soon!” I blurt out. “Where are you heading again?”

“I’m heading out to that market. You’ve told me about it, the one that comes every spring.”

“Right right.” I look away for a moment. “You were planning to go alone, right?”

He sees through me. “You can buddy-buddy with me!”

Man, now I’m embarrassed. “I-I know I know! It’s—I don’t know,” I laugh awkwardly, “you don’t have to take me everywhere. It’s your choice.”

“It’s your choice, too,” they state in that trademark playful tenderness of theirs.

I would’ve hated this feeling two months ago. I feel like I should go through the song and dance again, but it’s the song and dance. I know that routine; I practiced it every week. I can live without rehearsing.

I shake my head and smile, “it takes two to tango…”

“And it takes three to watch Rango!” Bo finishes my sentence, getting up from their seat. “That market opens up pretty early. You wanna start heading out?”

I take a moment to finish the leftover mocha in my mug before getting up as well. “I’m all dressed too, so why not?”

Bo chuckles warmly as we approach the door, wrapping an arm around me and patting my shoulder once we get close.

As I open the door of the apartment, I catch in the corner of my eye Bo tucking their tail through a loop in their pants, lest it droops too low. I wonder if that tail will ever go away.