what you did in the dark | ({meghan}

Rigid air surrounds twilight rebellion. A man inhales and exhales poison, in and out, in and out. Softly, with nimble fingers he twirls the ever-burning stick of poison in a deceiving stance against the wall of a building far-too-old for him. "No underages allowed." The door reads, but the thought that the notice could possibly pertain to him fails to pierce his black-canvas eyes as he drops the cigarette and follows a stranger into the bar. 

He tiptoes on the daisies, cautious to their questions and immune to their stares, as he glides into a stool and faces the boy who passed him moments ago. Time stirs watchfully and he bites back the venom still painting his lungs with an early death. "You come h-h-here often?" The boy manages to stutter out a greeting before dropping his eyes to the counter below him. 

One, two, three.
I wish I could speak like thee.
Four, five, six.
I wish you could hear like me.

Was he the freak with his broken speech? Or did the world choose not to understand the scuffle of mousey phrases forced out by a boy, who in the end, was just like them? Randolph was not at fault for the inattention of the world. He stumbled through every word, but it was others, the strangers at the bar and the embarrassed women reluctant to enter his sheets, who thought his prose to be wrong. "Say it like this, Randolph." "Damn't, it's ain't that hard." "You're useless if you keep talkin' like that, boy." 

"What ya want?" A suspicious face demands. Randolph trails his gaze away from the wood and swallows the knife that entered his cracking throat after the embarrassing entrance before.

"W-what?" He manages in response. Caught off guard by the question. So the demons wouldn't ask for identification of their incompetent knight. The guy seems to chuckle at this, but repeats the question. "I said, what do you want?"

"O...oh. Um... I'll h-h-have what he's h-having." Randolph nodded towards the boy in front of him. He let the moonlight whisper its accusations into his ears as the man got his drink poured and settled. "I hope you...you don't mmmind."