four alarm fire // matty healy

Ladylike / WHATTA BITCH

The Den had exactly six rooms in it and Isaac and I still had to share one. Partially because it was a warehouse full of other people's goods and shattles, partially because of Uncle's security. He said the guards were family, and they needed a place to stay, too.

He also told Isaac and I that we would get a lot for the Vera Wang haul. We could even get a big enough cut to pay for a billiards table. Haven't played since I was 18. I was never that good, but I was better than the blokes that challenged me at the bar, and that's all that really matters. Drunk men will bet against anything with tits.

After a heist, I'm normally running on adrenaline. Isaac uses his time effectively and gets out of bed at a reasonable time in the morning, but I need to be piss drink to come down from a high like that.

I know this one club. It's called the Safety Net, which is ironic. I hate that I love it.

I'm buddy-buddy with one of the bouncers, who knows what I do and keeps tabs on me. He's a good guy and respects my hustle, which is hard to find sometimes. Respect, not good guys.

Vlad sees me coming a while away, even though my clothes hide me in the night. He waves me to the back door of the Net and flashes his pass to the security reader. A green light granted me access into the venue.

"Careful in there, Eris," Vlad warned. "There's a bachelor party, some of them are alone and some of them are married or soon to be." I hadn't said anything yet but his eyes narrowed, telling me to smarten up.

"I've got this," I said. "I'll make you a deal. Thirty minutes, and I'll have half of them eating out of my hand."

We didn't break eye contact as his shoulders tensed. He rolled his eyes and pushed the door closed behind me.

It was dark and sweaty in the Net, but when was it not? I scanned the familiar scene of gyrating bodies until my eyes saw a group of six young men at a table. Bottle service - fancy.

Music boomed as I squeezed my way to the back of the club and I could already see that one groomsman was eyeing me through the crowd. His gaze never left mine as he watched me approach their table. That's one. He had dipped his head to whisper to the taller man sitting next to him, who smirked in approval. That's two. Confidently, I took large strides to the table where the group was seated. As I approached, I heard one man groaning.

"This place had gotten stale, eh?" He turned to the one with the word "GROOM" splashed on the front of his shirt. "Peter, what do you think?"

I sat on the edge of their booth and cleared my throat. Curt, concise and garnered their attention. I lowered my elbows onto the glassy table top.

"Listen, boys," I began, "I'm no expert but I think if the party has gotten stale... we should try to liven it up." I reached for a small bag in the breast pocket of my old jacket. It was my celebratory bag after Krystal's Day. "Don't you think?"

My fingers never left the baggie, and the groups eyes never lifted from my pocket... or was it my breasts?

"It would be an honour to make your party really special," I said with a sly grin. "Would you care to have fun with me?"

An exchange of glances across the table, and the men nodded to one another. I held the bag out to the table and allowed everyone to take a portion. The men smiled with perfect teeth as they rubbed the excess powder on their gums. Already becoming numb myself, I yelled over the table.

"Do you wanna dance?"

A nod. That's three.

-

My night ended with grabby hands and my guts on the floor, the toilet. Two of the group members had their way with me in exchange for some cash. I think one of them may have been the groom, Peter, but it was hard to tell the as the toilet stall spun around me.

They were fun, it would have been more fun if the two of them were less ginger with me. Even as they pumped into me, they refused to touch me. Obviously, we were all extremely close, but there was no closeness. I had not had that happen to me before. At least they tipped me well.

I fell onto my bed with weak legs. It was dark but the sun was threatening to cut my rest short. I stared at my ceiling as my boots shuffled off my feet. Isaac, in the twin bed on the other side of the room, flipped over and peered over at me.

"What?" I asked, my slurred voice cutting through the darkness. His thick brows furrowed.

"You know what," he said. He lifted his head from the pillow and let his long hair fall down his shoulders.

"Tell me." I rolled on my mattress to face him and dipped my feet under my blanket.

"You took way too long at Krystal's," he said.

"Shut up, Isaac." I turned away and faced a blank wall. The sunrise was dawning a pink hue across the pages on my bedroom wall. The works from Atwood, Saki and Pope stared back at me. I wanted to crawl into a page and live there instead.

"Seriously, what were you doing in there?" He prodded. I could hear him getting up and grabbing clothes for the day. He was always an early riser, very fitting that I couldn't stand the sun.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" I joked.

"Whatever it was, cut it out," he said sternly. Drawers opened and closed. "People were turning on lights, Eris! Next time you take more than 30 minutes, I'm out. I'm gonna take the car and go without you. I'm only good for the CCTV and alarm system anyway."

I rolled back around to face him. His eyes looked bleary as he spoke sad words.

"You don't really need me after that," he said. I sat up in my bed.

"Isaac, I-"

"Sod off, Eris." He wiped his brewing tears with the back of his sleeve. "Just don't cock up like that again, or I'm out."

He went into the hall and closed the bathroom door behind him. Harsh.

'I'm out' pounded in my brain. It felt like an overwhelming, droning beat that I couldn't shake. I hated it and I didn't even know what it fucking meant.

'I'm out' as in 'Find a new hacker.'

'I'm out' as in 'Find a new roommate.'

'I'm out' as in 'Find a new twin.'

I turned to face my wall of stolen artifacts again. Margaret was talking about how water flows and caresses and never resists. I loved her words. Some people found her to be a bit weird and that's probably why I liked her so much, we had something in common. I tried to be like the water she wrote about. Make my way and carve an everchanging path for myself, but somewhere along the way, people start to get angry at you for being so ferocious.

"You flooded my house," they would say or, "you ruined my garden," or, "you drowned my dog," people would tell water.

But, water never meant to and water does not care. Whenever I was like water, people scolded me for different things.

"You fucked my boyfriend!"

"You crashed my car!"

"You can't rip out those pages - these are library books!"

But I am water, and you can't tell water what to do when it's already pooling in your basement.