The House of Grey- Volume 3 (17 page)

Monson shook his head, trying to flush out his anger. Getting angry at God was about as stupid as getting angry at a bedpost and kicking it out of spite. It could not help and would probably end up hurting him more than helping. Even so, he knocked over a stack of clean clothes just to make the room a little messier. Once that was done, he had to confess that he felt a bit better.

He put his forehead to the cool glass.  He needed to direct this thoughts towards something helpful and if not helpful, at least not stupid. He decided he would watch some TV. The soap channel usually had something good on.

Monson stood and moved towards his sitting room, yawning outrageously as he did. He retrieved a soda from the icebox and sat down with the wireless touchscreen controller. He touched the button to open the entertainment center. It took him some time to remember how everything worked, realizing now that Casey was the one who usually handled the electronics. After another few minutes of annoying button pushing, the TV flipped on.
The image of Taris Green greeted him.

He lifted his eyebrow in surprise. It still shocked him every single time he was reminded of Taris’ fame and desirability. Despite the months of knowing her, he was still amazed.

One could not help but watch Taris, focus on her. She absolutely lived for the camera and did she look good on it. She was especially attractive today. A green blouse with a plunging neckline and push-up bra made her look bustier then she really was. Covering her narrow shoulders was a creamy half-jacket that cut off just below the bust. Black pants and green heels rounded off her outfit. An annoying-looking host spoke to her about her new song and video while suavely leaning towards her. The twenty-something fool was obviously entranced by his guest and was having a hard time hiding his attraction. Taris pretended not to notice, smiling in a slightly artificial way and even touching him on occasion, but nothing overt that he could take out of context. No, she was too much of a professional for that. Simple movements and gestures, that was all it took. A few more minutes and the grease-haired host would be wearing a collar and begging for table scraps.

Monson shuddered. Now that was a horrible image. 

The host took some phone calls next, a thirteen-year-old boy from Iowa absolutely ecstatic he got through, an eighteen-year-old high school senior from Idaho asking about Taris’ tour and new CD, and a nineteen-year-old foreign-exchange student living in California who came on speaking a mix of English and German. Taris took a conversational type of breath, deep, but not so deep that she would choke on your own biological process of converting oxygen into CO
2
. She let the breath out almost as soon as she took it, her face appearing slightly red.  Within seconds, a translator with massive coke-bottle frames was at her side, speaking in German to the student, who responded with enthusiasm.

Wow, they really do prepare for everything, don’t they,
thought Monson. The exchanged lasted for a few moments. The camera, however, was edging closer to Taris who was completely oblivious to the impending close-up. He scrutinized her face, reminded of how long it had been since he had last seen her. He found that he suddenly missed her.

A slight movement, like a fleeting shadow, halted the rest of Monson’s thought.

The expression on her face,
thought Monson.
She looks annoyed and impatient
. He laughed. She was so readable.  She started to answer even before the translator finished relaying the question.
He tossed his head back picking up his phone. That girl lived in an entirely different world.  Being with her at school, talking to her the way that he did, it was sometimes easy to forget how famous she was. The awareness returned in full force as he watched her on MTV. He turned the interview down. This was another one of those girls he would never understand.

He turned his attention to his phone. He touched the link that would take him back to Gossip Guy’s home page and waited for the browser to load. The initial article and the update Monson had just read about Damion and his unfortunate encounter in his private weight room dominated the very top of the page as expected.  Monson scrolled downwards hoping to find something more appealing to read about, but stopped abruptly when a picture of Cyann, one that he had not seen before, popped out at him like a jack-in-the-box. The picture showed Cyann on some white sand beach wearing a
-

“A long-sleeved shirt?” said he aloud. “Who wears a long-sleeved shirt on the beach?”

That was exactly fair. There could be any number of reasons she was wearing a long sleeve shirt. Maybe it was cold? He rebuked himself, who was he to criticize?  Covering up the body is something that
he
would have done. Granted, he was not a beautiful girl like Cyann and he had much more of an excuse then she did. He would not want people to gawk at his scars. Regardless of his initial stupor, it would be a lie to say he was really surprised; it was not like Cyann was the flashiest of individuals. That was Taris. Heck, Taris was flashy enough for the both of them.

He looked down at his phone again and was irritated when he found his address book pulled up. He did not have many names in there. Artorius, Casey, Cyann, the Taris “My Princess” designation he had never gotten around to changing, and Molly who was under Alison, her middle name. He had entered her as Alison on the off-chance that she might see it. It was really fun to annoy her.

He, Monson Grey, a scarred, unimportant, semi-intelligent boy, had a total of five people in his phone. Two of which were among the most beautiful women he had ever seen. Thinking about it, there was no way he should know these two girls, let alone be on semi-cordial terms with them. Was he worthy of such friendship, and not just theirs, but that of Casey, Artorius, even Brian and Mr. Gatt? Did he have the right to this? After all, he could be dangerous.

He hesitated, daring the premise of the argument to proceed to its natural conclusion.

He
probably
was dangerous.

Monson brought a hand to his head, rubbing at his temple.

No, not
probably
, he
was
dangerous. That was what he had to assume, as he could not rule out that he wasn’t. Logical fallacies aside, he had plenty of reasons to consider himself a threat to others. He might have been responsible for Damion’s incapacitation and the destruction of the Horum Vir weight room, there were also those rare moments of angry bloodlust. That was totally dangerous if not to others then probably to himself. There was no other way around it. Gone was the time of pretending there was not something seriously wrong with him. To do so was to risk the chance of hurting others. It was not a chance he was willing to take. 

His conclusion forced him to do something that he really did not want to do. He knew now he had no choice.

Resolution enforced, he tapped the new message icon on his phone. He clicked another button and waited patiently for his minuscule list of friends and quasi-family to load. He selected Cyann’s name and started to text her, avoiding the cutesy abbreviated language he used with Taris.

TO: CYANN

h
ey its me…

3:44
am

He stopped almost immediately. “Hey it’s me”
-
what a stupid opening line.  How was she going to know who it was? Dumb. Seriously dumb. He started again.

Cyann,

TO: CYANN

this is Monson…
listen I
m

sorry Im texting you…
I got

your number from Kylie (long s
tory)

3:45
am

He stopped a second time. OK, so far so good. Now how was he supposed to phrase this? He thought a lie was probably the best way to accomplish his design. If it worked with Cyann, it would probably work with Taris.

TO: CYANN

i dont know if i
ve given

you the impression

th
at we are friends

or something…
but I get a

lot of unwanted attention

because of you…im sorry
but do

you think we could just avoid

one another in the future?

we
re different people from

different worlds…it just

wouldnt work…i don
t want

you to get hurt. I’m sorry

3:48
am

He sent the message, ignoring the strange bout of apprehension welling up like a knot in this throat. This was for the best.  A similar warning to Taris should do the trick. It’s not like she would be broken up about it. She was a pop star, after all. He wanted to take similar precautions with the others
-
Artorius, Casey, Molly, Mr. Gatt, Brian
-
but that would not end well. They would tell him to piss off and do so with a smile. A point of consideration for another time.

Just as he started his message to Taris, a little envelope flew across his screen.

It was from Cyann. Monson literally did a double-take, which up until then he considered cliche. It was like four in the morning. There was no way….

He opened the message, attempting to steady his slightly trembling hand.

FROM: CYANN

Monson…
we’ll

talk about it later

3:52 am

“We’ll talk about it later?” He hit reply.

TO: CYANN

d
id you not understand
?

theres nothing to talk about…

3:53 am

He hit the send button and another envelope came swooshing across his screen within a couple of minutes
.

FROM: CYANN

like I said…
we’ll

talk about it

later…s
weet dreams
…

3:57 am

Monson sighed. This could be a long night.

In spite of himself, he smiled.
Stubborn girl.

He tapped the reply button.

***

Coren’s Unreasonable Quarantine, a name coined by Gossip Guy, lasted through the weekend and into the early part of the following week. For Monson and his friends, it was actually a nice break. Monson was not one to be out and about anyway and he had the opportunity to catch up on some anime and movies that he’d been slacking on. They started with some of the classics, watching for hours on end with little talking. It was glorious.

The situation just got
weird
from there, and as inarticulate and strange as that sounded, it was the only word to describe it. He was not even sure how it happened. But a knock at the door, and a half-greeting later, Ignace, Indigo and a couple of her followers were in his apartment with popcorn, blankets and soda in overloaded arms. Before he knew it, they had a regular party on their hands.

The group continued their movie experience with a string of scary movies from the late 1990s. After their last one of the evening, a particularly terrible film about good and bad ghosts who fought each other to stay away from the afterlife, taking the living with them and generally causing mayhem, ended, the conversation took a turn for the entertaining. It all began when Indigo started complaining.

“And why did we watch this?” Indigo sipped at bottle of cola. “Of all the movies we could have wrapped up with, we had to watch that one?”

“Yeah Case, I’ve always wondered why you like that movie so much.” Artorius shifted uneasily in his seat. Sitting next to Indigo was making him happy
-
almost creepy happy.

At that point the small group focused its attention on Casey. He cleared his throat, coming across more thoughtful than the situation warranted.

“Well, first, it should be said that the book is great. Written in the sixties and still one of the best horror novels out there.” Casey stood and adjusted his warm-up pants. He removed the movie from the DVD player and returned it to its case. “I don’t know why I’m so attached to it. Maybe it just reminds me of the novel, so I look past its faults.”

“I knew we should have watched
Floating Hope
,” said Indigo. “But here’s the thing….”

Casey yawn. “What’s that, little Harrison?”

“So the little ghost kids
-
the good ghosts
-
were trying to get the main character lady’s help, right?”

Casey nodded his head. Others nodded their agreement as well, though most appeared unsure of where Indigo was going with this.

“So the ghost kids were trying to get the help of the main character. OK…I’m OK with that. They need her help. They being good ghosts is a twist on the story because ghosts are usually bad, but in the process of trying to get her help, the little dead people ended up scaring the crap out of her. How does leaving bloody footprints, moving statues around, and making weird warning noises in the night help? All that does is scare everyone.  Doesn’t that seem stupid to anybody else?”