strange {jb!blitz}

For all intents and purposes, I don't give a shit. There's no point in going to visit him, I don't expect him to say much of anything to me and I might even get the shit kicked out of me as a parting gift. It's the haphazardness of it all that makes it fun. He's a customer- a vastly unpredictable and deadly one - but still only that. At least that's what I tell myself while trudging toward the aftermath of this shitshow reaping.

To call me guarded would be an understatement. My heart has been buried beneath bruised knees and sore throats, torn away like bits of my hair, pinned to the wall by sweaty hands wrapped around its throat and the whites of their knuckles were bulging with black veins. Humans are unpredictable- chaotic in their variations and to come with strings is to ask them to be used against you.

So, even if I wanted to care about Ingran - as foolish as that might be - I couldn't. I do not even consider Ichor or Vitus my friends because labels are prisons to which I would rather not be chained. I'm scum, born and bred in the streets. Prettier now, with tight-fitting clothes and the face of an innocent but there is no changing what I am. Dirt is branded into my skin, the smell of piss an alcohol and nights huddled against my mother's chest down some dark alley way. A pauper cannot become a prince, no matter how many glamorous trinkets he bears.

I ignore the feeling of my heart stopping when I see him, plastering a half smile to my face- doing my best not to see the bits of humanity I have found tangled within the monster's matted coat. "You know, I never pegged you for suicidal Ingran."

I play with fire because it's fun to be burned.