Chapter I: A New Beginning

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"You know, life fractures us all into little pieces. It harms us, but it's how we glue those fractures back together that makes us stronger."

― Carrie Jones, Entice.

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It was not Dex's usual habit to stop for a drink, but the stock market had chosen this particular day to trip him, kick him a few times in the ribs, liberally use the baseball bat and spit on his Armani suit for good measure. So it was with weariness and slight short-tempered disposition that Dexter Pryce made his way into the Cat and Fiddle Bar, the most expensive and perhaps most unfortunately named establishment in the neighbourhood.

Dex didn't even bother heading straight for the counter; instead, he found a small table tucked away in a dimly lit corner, far from any patrons. He didn't need companionship. He dropped his briefcase with a thud, wincing when he remembered his laptop was in there, and sank into the booth, burying his head in his folded arms.

He was so busy listing the reasons to commit hara-kiri over plummeting stocks of his company that he didn't hear a stranger approach until he sat down across from him and cleared his throat. Dex raised his head, startled, only to be met by the sight of pale lavender eyes, bright even in the low light.

"Do you need a drink?" The boy, whom he presumed to be one for he looked no older than twenty, ignored Dex's shock and slid a glass across the table, leaving a wet trail on the wood. "Of course, I wasn't sure what you wanted, but a beer's a beer, right?"

"Um...right." Dex took the drink, lifted it to his mouth without swallowing and stared at his new companion through the foggy glass. Thick blond tresses with specks of red dripped along the angelic visage, brushing delicately over the gentle roundness of his cheekbones. He wore a pair of tight jeans and a pale blue knit sweater—certainly not the usual uptown bar customer. He had a purple sharpie tucked behind one ear, and light smears of charcoal on his face. He looked younger, almost like a child, and he moved his shoulders every few seconds as if trying to work a kink in his back.

"My shoes cost twenty-five bucks, by the way. Are you done?" The boy smiled, flashing his dimples, and Dex lowered his glass sheepishly. How could he be checking out the boy? "I didn't spike it or anything if that's what you're worried about."

"Then why give it to me?" Dex asked. He had no obligation to be polite to a stranger, after all.

The boy shrugged, hands curling around his own tall glass of amber liquid. "You looked like you could use it, and you weren't planning on ordering any time soon."

Dex frowned, and took a small sip of beer. It tasted normal, or at least not extraordinarily different. "Still...why?"

"Why a random act of kindness for a complete stranger?" The boy shrugged again. "Maybe I wanted to be an anomaly. Break the mold."

Dex "hm-med" and took another sip. That couldn't be it. People didn't work like that. He tried to study the boy once again, more surreptitiously through his eyelashes. But he was watching Dex right back, the beginnings of a smirk spreading across his impish face.

"Or maybe..." the stranger continued. "I wanted to somehow atone for something I've done. Maybe I killed someone. Stole from an old lady. Kicked a puppy. And I'm trying to balance out the karma."

"Maybe you're just trying to f*ck with my head even more," Dex grumbled, but he couldn't stop his own smile. Just who was this person?

"There's that." The boy chuckled softly before lifting his glass and taking a large gulp. He thumped the glass back down and pressed his lips together. "Actually, truth be told, I came into a bit of money recently, and I wanted to see if rich beer somehow tasted better than dirt-cheap crap. And you know what?" He made a face. "It doesn't." He frowned, pushing the the drink away, and propped his chin up on his hands, studying Dex's face in way that made the other squirm. "Tell me, why did you bother becoming rich if the beer is all yucks anyway?"

"What?" Dex asked, startled by the question.

"Just wondering," the boy said, still staring. "I've always had a fascination with the idea of wealth, for obvious reasons. It just seems sort of pointless, really. I mean, yes, having a steady paycheck would be a definite bonus in my life, but after that...it just seems like money would get in your way. And where do you even spend it all? Seems like a huge waste of time, waste of energy, for something you don't really need, not if you live right. So why bother?"

"I..." Dex stopped. Why did he bother becoming rich? He took another sip of beer to buy himself time, because despite the boy's opinion, it still tasted like a normal beer to Dex. But the extra moment didn't help. He couldn't answer. He didn't know.

Why be rich?

Because his parents had taught him that's what he was supposed to do?

The stranger gave a small, understanding sigh when Dex remained silent, lips pouting in a way Dex should not find attractive as he did. "You know that's the thing. No one I talk to ever seems to know the answer to that." Dex felt an odd spark of jealousy at the idea of him doing this with other people, but the stranger was right here, talking to Dex. "It just seems that dressing in a starched suit every morning and spending your day holed up in an office watching numbers on a ticker would be a one way ticket to a glass of cyanide, but then again, that's just me." He traced a pattern on the table with one slender finger. "But that'll be why you're here right now, I guess. Drinking a less concentrated form of cyanide."

Dex lifted one eyebrow and his mouth jerked into a small grin. He'd never met someone like this before, man or woman, so blunt. They weren't like that, not where he worked. And, beyond everything else, it was rather true, now that Dex came to think about it. Starched suits every day, cubicles, finger sore and callused from banging on keys. Nobody at work ever complained about it, and his family was supportive, but suddenly...it all seemed sort of boring. Pointless. "Just who are you?"

"Me?" The boy's finger paused. "I'm just a random nineteen-year-old guy who likes engaging random people in economic discussions. Nothing special. Who are you?" He surprised Dex by swinging his body around sideways and drawing his knees up to his chest, hunkered in the booth like a spry woodland fairy, eyes narrowed with curiosity. "Rich family? I bet so. Did your daddy want you to become a big business man? I'm sorry. It's tough to live up to those kind of expectations."

The tone of his voice was more revealing than his words. "What were your expectations?" Dex asked, setting aside his glass. The question allowed him to avoid the truth in the man's statement. Did your daddy...

The boy looked down. "Oh. You know...the usual." Dex opened his mouth to reply but didn't have the chance before the boy started talking again and managed to steer the conversation away from himself once more.

"So, you got a family?"

"No," Dex said, shrugging off his suit jacket. "Not yet."

"I figured." He raised an eyebrow when Dex stared, pointing his left hand and wiggling his finger. "No wedding band. And guy like you, you're proper. You'd put a ring on it first."

"Maybe I'm divorced," Dex said, trying to catch him off guard, be on top for once. This was almost frightening, being steered like this.

"Yeah, I guess. Oops." He didn't sound apologetic. It didn't do Dex any good being right if the boy wouldn't fight against it.

Usually that was all people did. Fight and fight and fight until they were exhausted and couldn't possibly function anymore, but to admit that he might be wrong, yet not seem to care...

"Significant other, at least?"

"What?" Dex snapped back to the present.

"I asked if you have a person of significance, preferably of the 'other' variety," the stranger explains, hand returning to the water on the table.

"Oh." Dex paused, frowned, and decided there was no point in lying, really. "No."

"Hmm. That's a pity." The boy ran a hand through his red-streaked hair. It looked almost like paint, though Dex couldn't tell in this lighting.

"Why?" Dex asked, taking another drink. He was half-expecting a flirty response here.

The stranger shrugged. "Well...not having someone. Sounds difficult. Working all day, being a faceless pencil pusher in an office, and then going home to an empty house. It would be very lonely, I imagine. I'm sorry."

Strangers weren't supposed to say stuff like that. They weren't supposed to pity you.

It was unnerving. It threw Dex off balance, and he didn't know how to react. He felt weak, fragile and he hated it. He hated it because his life really was nothing—just numbers, tickers and endless lonely nights—and this complete stranger could tell so easily, and just reduced it to nothing within a matter of minutes, simply by being so alien, so different.

For the first time in his entire life, Dex had no idea what to do. And he was jealous. He was jealous of this boy with his feet up on the seat with smudges of charcoal on his pale cheeks. He was jealous because he wished he could be like that, easy and smiling and care-free.

Why did his life suddenly seem like such a friggin' mess compared to this boy? It was all completely pointless, was it not?

Wasn't it? The sheer realization hit him hard.

He needed to gain some control. Dex stared at the boy across from him, wanting, hoping, needing to prove to him that Dex was worthwhile, that he was something other than a soulless modern machine. He needed to make this boy care, watch him fall apart and become human and vulnerable. But Dex had no idea how to do just that. He didn't even know this person's name, and those were not acceptable thoughts.

But even as Dex came to this realization, the boy's feet were back on the ground, and he was standing up, leaving his barely-touched drink behind. "Gee, that was some bad beer. See you around, Dapper Dan." He began to walk away back to the bar with a graceful lope, that of a lithe dancer's step, rolling his shoulders as he moved. There was a light drumming as the boy tapped a rhythm against his thigh, as if this didn't matter. As if Dex didn't matter, as if he was just another face, another memory, another stepping stone. And Dex couldn't accept that. Images flashed into his head—of this boy waiting for him when he got home from work, eating dinner with him, falling asleep with a gentle breath on Dex's face. He gaped for a moment, shocked by the sudden onslaught of desire, before standing up and scurrying after him.

"Wait!"

He turned back with a smile. "What? Did I forget something?"

"Yeah. I want your number," Dex said, his voice trembling as he forced the words out before his own cowardice and commence could suck them back down. Smooth.

"Why?" He laughed a chime of silvery bells, soft and velvet. "I'm just some guy."

"I want to talk to some guy again then. Someone not like me." Someone who can show me I'm not worthless. That I matter.

Someone that I can maybe create something out of nothing with. Dex pushed that thought away.

The stranger bit his rose petal lip, rolled his shoulders, and stared at Dex for a moment before cocking his head to one side. "Fine," he mumbled. "Gimme your hand."

Dex reached out a hand unthinkingly, and before he could pull away, the boy had pulled the sharpie out from behind his ear and scrawled across Dex's skin.

"Hey!" Dex yanked his hands back and glared at the purple now stained onto it.

"What? It's my number." The boy recapped his pen and smiled, flashing his dimples at Dex once again. "I'll be expecting you to call then."

"It's Dex!" Dex blurted out. "My name's Dexter."

"Good for you." He laughed again, before his face straightened, taking on a pondering expression. "Well, see you later, Dex. Have fun watching your Wall Street ticker."

He spun around and pushed at the door, Converse slipping on the smooth tiles of the bar for just one moment before he was gone.

Dex glanced down at his hand, blinked, and then glanced again.

Instead of numbers, all that was there were a bunch of pointless doodles.

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αυтнσя'ѕ иσтє:

A shoutout to @ThatAmyGal who has been a backbone throughout my writing endeavour.

I should probably inform that former readers of this novel may note significant changes here and there from the preceding version, not the least of which was a notable rewording of many exposition heavy paragraphs as well as a complete rewrite of the conversation between Dex and the not-so-unfamiliar stranger. winks winks

Expect a reasonable degree of exposition in the next few chapters, as well as some notable compression of events; I'm cutting out a lot of unnecessary sequences from the legacy chapters.

Meanwhile, I would love plenty more constructive criticism if you are able to provide any, if at all. You can also expect a return to Through My Eyes. I might even return to complete This Is The Night, too.

Until next chapter...

offers everyone a vanilla snow cone

PS. No Name by Ryan O'Shaughnessy.