Fresh Air [Denis]

[Blaize]

WEARING

The clothes fit Blaize loosely, like they’d been bought for someone else at some other time and he’d raided that person’s closet. They were clothes picked by Aleksandra. They’d run out of blood. They needed to get more. She could have gone on her own and left Blaize behind, like she normally did – but fresh air would do him good, she insisted. And some nights were better than others. Some were easier than others. That look on her face, that tone in her voice; the guilt had his legs swinging from the bed that had become his cocoon, and he was pulling on the clothes that were handed to him. They were handed to him hastily, in a rush, as if at any moment he might change his mind.

Though he didn’t need the jacket, he pulled it around himself anyway when their feet found the footpath and they headed toward the black market shop that would sell them the blood they needed – the blood that Aleksa insisted Blaize try to drink and though he did some nights, enough to keep his head above the water, he still wasn’t getting enough. His cheeks were gaunt and his hair a messy mop atop his head, but his eyes were still bright, still piercing as they peered at the cracks in the footpath, as they glared at other pedestrians they passed; broody as he stood, waiting outside of the shop while Aleksandra went in.

His feet didn’t quite know what to do. His whole body felt lethargic, as depression often dictates, and yet there was a restlessness, too—he had been cooped up inside for so long, a self-punishment, which for the dancer was unusual. He was so accustomed to constantly moving, that now he was out on the street again he wanted to do just that. He wanted to walk, and keep walking, and never stop. Walk straight into the sun…

So he paced while he waited, back and forth, with his arms cross over his chest, peering down alleys and through windows like an angry, angelic voyeur. He was hoping this would all just pass, eventually. Time cures all wounds, and all that. But deep down, he wasn’t hopeful.