:| Fallen Landmarks |: {Ella}

Damn, we’re already out of milk? I had to admit, it was difficult to live in a house that wasn’t under the control of Ma but at least I had Wess around to make sure I kept the place tidy. The only problem with also having Wess around was there were now two more mouths drinking the milk. I really didn’t mind having my brother with me, though, and having my nephew around was the best thing that ever happened to me. As much as I was certain Ma wanted Flowwy—what an odd nickname but it caught on rather quickly—to remain at the family home, I thought to offer Wess the chance to live in the same house once I earned enough money to move out.

How strange how I had used what I had hated most growing up to help me leave the house. The world was filled with numbers and when I finally used them for some purpose, they helped me see more numbers which eventually led me to the very house I was standing in. Every part of it had numbers—the corners would tell me angles, the walls would give me the age of the wood which was rather annoying since so many different trees were used for the construction—and I exploited my ability to see them to deem it the perfect house. As much as I hated saying it, the numbers were useful some days.

And then there were days when they were absolutely useless, like the day the milk in the house ran out and they just couldn’t think to give me a reminder. I knew Wess wasn’t going to get it—as orderly as my older brother was, he was busy with his job and son to maintain his obsessive behavior—which meant that I would have to buy some before my nephew started crying for milk and we had nothing to show for it. Placing the milk carton upside down at a certain angle—just enough that it would balance on the table for a while…and annoy Wess—I grabbed my coat and walked out the door.

District 9 wasn’t exactly the wealthiest of districts and the buildings that lined the streets were harsh reminders of that fact. I didn’t even have the time to admire the art of the buildings before the numbers flooded in, reminding me that some of the houses had been poorly constructed and were in dire need of fixing. It was the reason I disliked going outside—numbers had a tendency to cover my vision and while I could walk around, it was rather annoying when I saw a big clump of numbers moving around and I had to figure out if I knew that person or not. Friends and family, I had their number combination mostly down in my memory, but there was always the risk that I would run into someone I knew but could not recognize. It didn’t help that my memory of images was terrible.

Getting lost was difficult in the district as the lines and numbers were fairly consistent. I could not account for human nature, though, and when shopkeepers decided to move their stores and stalls to a different location, I always had trouble finding them again, forcing me to find another vendor to replace the old one. If I had a properly working mind, I might have been able to find them—their image would be enough—but the number patterns always changed when they were in a new location and it was absolutely frustrating. So many times I was certain I was walking right past them, but I was never sure and I resorted to the next best thing I could find—until that vendor moved as well.

I made it a goal not to do it this time, though; we all loved the vendor and his product was the best any of us had had since we left the family home. Not knowing where exactly to go, I turned to this young-looking girl—the numbers gave me around the age of 9 or 10 but her height made me bump my estimate to include 11 and 12—and tapped on her shoulder. “Sorry, miss, but could you help me? There was a milk vendor here about a week ago and it appears that he moved. Do you possibly know where he went? The stall looked like 27-6-845-13-45.”