102.

  That morning, I received the letter I had been waiting for from the college. I had been accepted onto the plumbing course, and even better, I was offered the full bursary, which meant I wouldn't have to get into crippling debt. It was a really weird sensation to actually have achieved something, even as minor as just getting onto the course. The feeling of accomplishment washed over me, and I was bubbling to tell someone. Unfortunately, the list of people who would care was as long as a single digit, so I arranged with Marilyn to meet up after work and go for dinner. It was the closest thing to a date I had ever had, and I spent the entire day fretting about it.

  I had two baths because I didn't like the smell of the soap I had used. I combed my hair, which had grown ragged and almost over my ears. I combed it, brushed it, and even tried to gel it, which led to my third wash to get rid of it. I decided natural was probably best for me. I cut my fingernails, brushed my teeth, and even washed my face for the first time which felt odd.

  I worried about the clothes I would wear, realizing that pretty much everything I owned was faded shades of brown, grey, or black, which I was usually fine with because they helped me disappear and go unnoticed. But, they weren’t particularly great date clothes, so I decided on an old school shirt, which was the only button-down shirt that I owned and still fit somehow, and a pair of black trousers and the cleanest trainers that I owned. I then spent an hour worrying about whether I should buy flowers or not. I even went to get some and then verbally berated myself for being so cheesy. We were just two friends going out for dinner; this wasn't actually a date, well, at least Marilyn wouldn't consider it a date.

  So I sighed and began walking to Pamino's Italian restaurant. It was only about twenty minutes away from where I lived, and it was probably the nicest place that I could afford. I ended up arriving an hour early and sort of just hung about, watching the day go by. Eventually, I think they felt sorry for me and let me take a table early to get me out of the cold. So I sat down in this nice little restaurant, made very awkward small talk with the overly friendly waiter, and then waited, the letter burning a hole in my pocket.

  Finally, Marilyn arrived, only ten or fifteen minutes late. She had come straight from work and was still in her server's outfit. Her hair was slightly messy, and her face had a little pink flush to it from power walking all the way here. She smiled and hugged me warmly, and I noticed every time Marilyn saw me, her eyes would almost unconsciously do a mental inventory of me, and I never missed the small little smile at the corner of her mouth when she saw no new bruises or wounds on me.

  "You look nice, Alex," she remarked as she sat down.

  "Oh yeah, thanks. I brushed my hair," I replied, having no idea why I said that. Marilyn burst out laughing.

  "It looks nice. You should do it more often," she said, draping her coat around the back of her chair, and for a horrifying moment, I had an instinct to leap up and pull her chair out for her. Thankfully, my natural awkwardness quelled that thought, and Marilyn sat herself down, which she was very capable of doing.

  Marilyn took the lead, as she always did. She began asking me about my day, asking after Grandad, asking about the homeless shelter, and leading me through the conversation. When the waiter arrived, she knew what she wanted to order, and I just mumbled that I would have the same. Then she chatted. I loved listening to Marilyn talk; she always had something interesting happening, some fun anecdote, some little moment in her day that made her smile or frustrated her. Marilyn's life always seemed just so full. She had three brothers and sisters, and she was the oldest of the lot, so she was always doing something: running around after some teenager, brushing some little kid's hair, washing clothes, or moaning about the price of milk and bread. There was just always something going on.

  The conversation naturally died whenever it came back to me and what was going on in my life because, of course, what could I tell her? That I hid in my bedroom every night, desperately afraid of the creatures I had unknowingly entangled myself with? Or that I'd spent last night walking around the estate, feeding cans of tuna to a cat that I was kind of sure was magical and a giant pigeon-eagle king thing that I kind of owed my entire life to and whose service I was pressed into currently? No, those sorts of things would ruin a nice dinner date. So I just shrugged and mumbled the odd answer, and Marilyn would continue the conversation for both of us while I sat and happily listened.

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Our food arrived, and it turned out I’d ordered some sort of seafood spaghetti. It was nice and a massive change from the stale noodles that I subsisted on. It was good; I liked it. The conversation was also good, and the company was even better. I even enjoyed the way Marilyn ate. She ate with such gusto. She would combine things on her plate in weird ways, mop up sauce with bread, and drink deeply to cleanse her palate. She never seemed to be self-conscious, at least around me. She enjoyed her food in a way that I just never did. I ate mostly for subsistence, not for enjoyment. Even here, in a nice restaurant with a nice plate of food in front of me, the only thing on my mind was to get it down as quickly as possible.

  The whole time we ate, and Marilyn chatted, I kept thinking, how do I tell her? How do I bring it up? Do I just pull the letter out of my pocket and throw it at her? No, that would be silly and very socially awkward. Do I just blurt it out? Do I try to angle the conversation that way? Then I felt a horrifying tension in my stomach: would Marilyn even care? All it was was an acceptance letter to be a plumber. It wasn't anything cool or exciting. In fact, I'd only chosen to be a plumber because I thought I was too stupid to be an electrician and too weak to do something like bricklaying or carpentry. Would she think it was gross, scurrying around on your hands and knees fixing people's toilets and unblocking their pipes? It wasn't exactly heroic or romantic, was it?

  Suddenly, shame and embarrassment, my two familiar bedfellows, bore down on me. I tucked the letter further into my pocket, my head dropped, and I stared at my plate, quietly shoveling spaghetti into my face while Marilyn told me all about her shift and the weird customers she dealt with. I tried to hide the red flush creeping up my neck and across my cheeks. I swear I was so stupid. Marilyn wouldn't care about me being a damn plumber. Nobody would.

  We finished our meal and then did the typical dance of who should pay the bill.

  "I'll get it," I said. She shook her head as she swallowed her final gulp of soda.

  "No, no, let me. I just got paid the other day."

  "No, honestly, it's fine. I asked you to come to dinner," I said, reaching into my pocket as the waiter stood patiently watching us.

  I flipped open the little leather-bound receipt and horror gut punched me for a second time that night when I saw that I didn't have enough to cover it. As if reading my mind, Marilyn smiled at me and shrugged.

  "Why don't we split it? We both ate food, after all, didn't we?"

  "Oh yeah, right, that sounds okay," I mumbled, and Marilyn reached into her purse. I swear the waiter sneered at me when she wasn't looking. Yeah, that's who I was, the big hero who asked girls out for dinner and then split the bill with them.

  We paid, and I helped Marilyn get her coat back on. We walked back out into the cold of the night, and Marilyn looped her arm in mine, as she always did.

  "Do you want to wait for a bus?" she asked.

  I shrugged, knowing I didn't have enough money on my WristPod to actually pay for a bus. Thankfully, once again, Marilyn saved me, whether consciously or unconsciously.

  "Let's walk," she said. "It's a nice night, and we're not too far from home."

  "Yeah, okay." I replied. "I'll walk you back to yours first, and then I can head home."

  "Such a gentleman," she said with a wicked smile on her face, and I felt the blush creeping across my cheeks again.

  The streets were quiet tonight, which was fairly normal for this time of the month. Most people’s paychecks were beginning to run dry, so they stayed at home where things were cheap. After only about ten minutes, we were back in the Mulberry Estate. Now that the goons were all gone, some of the streetlights had actually been fixed and remained working. I realized that no matter how often I walked around the Estate at night, I don't think I would ever quite get used to it being safe, to being able to just walk normally and not worry about dark alleys and corners.

  "I swear these last two months," Marilyn said, "it's been so nice. It feels like we got our home back."

  "Yeah, I know what you mean," I replied. "I can't remember ever being able to walk around here in the dark."

  "Right," she said. "I don't know who this Gutter Mage was or what he was about, but he really changed this place for the better."

  I couldn't help but smile a little bit and nod my head in agreement. But that was the problem with the Mulberry Estate: it didn't like to see people happy. It wasn't the type of place where people should be happy. If you wound up on the Mulberry, it was because you'd done something wrong in life, and the estate was always quick to remind you of that.

  Some instinct tingled at the back of my neck as we rounded a corner onto a small bridge that led across the turgid stream running through the estate. I don't know what it was; it was some sixth sense that fired and suddenly told me to be wary. That's when two hooded figures stepped out from the shadows on the other side of the bridge just as we made it to the middle. Marilyn looked up and saw them blocking our path. I turned and looked over my shoulder and saw there were two more behind us.

  "Alex," Marilyn said in a small voice.

  "Get behind me," I said, pushing her behind me as the two goons began to approach. One of them drew a blade from his pocket.