Norman slicked back his unruly shoulder-length hair, catching a glimpse of the original brown color above the fading black dye. He sighed, hair dye wasn’t exactly a high-priority item when it took everything he earned just to make ends meet. He breathed into his hand, trying to see if his breath stunk, and winced.
He shouldn’t have eaten that garlic bread for lunch.
Setting down the brain-filled cooler, he dug around in his loose short pockets. He was glad to finally be out of those itchy coveralls. Unfortunately, Norman didn’t have time to go home and change, but hopefully, Charise would overlook his appearance when he presented her with her gift. His hand came out of his pocket with a collection of random items and pocket lint.
“Where is it, I know I had a piece,” he growled quietly as he searched through the junk from his pocket until he found the breath mint he had swiped from his boss's desk a few days ago. “Score!”
He popped the mint into his mouth and tried to put on his most charming smile before he picked up the cooler and knocked on Charise’s door.
There was some muffled grumbling followed by footsteps. The walls in Charise’s building weren’t exactly soundproof and he was able to easily follow the sound of her footsteps as she walked toward the door. A shadow drew across the peephole for a moment before it disappeared. There was the clack of many locks before the door opened a little bit and Charise stuck her head in the opening.
Norman hadn’t seen her for a few months and was a little disappointed to see Charise had cut her long black hair and dyed it bleach blond. She still looked good with the less-than-shoulder-length blond curls but he preferred her dark and brooding look. Not the valley girl one she was now sporting.
“You look great, Charise,” he responded warmly, hoping the compliment would help wipe the frown from her face. It seemed to work.
Her grumpy demeanor instantly changed but not from Norman’s compliment, but from when her eyes landed on the cooler he was holding. “Did you bring it, sweetie?”
Norman held up the cooler and the woman squealed in delight before she shut the door and unlatched the chain. The industrial strength chain wasn’t anything like normal door chains, it looked like something you would tow a car with. Norman didn’t recall her having this level of security the last time he had seen her. It seemed a bit excessive, but then again maybe not. It may not hold up against one of the physical classers for long, sometimes it was the appearance of safety that mattered more than the reality.
Charise ushered him in from behind the door. His eyes were first drawn to the main room. It now made perfect sense why she was being as cautious as she was. She had a metric ton of weed in baggies laid out on the table in the next room over. When Norman turned back to ask her what that was all about, he was struck speechless.
Charise not missing the opportunity, took advantage of his stunned silence to snatch the cooler out of his hand. Holding it, she giggled like a little girl.
Norman had to blink a few times while his brain processed the scene in front of him, her almost total lack of clothing had short-circuited his neurons for a moment. He was only human after all. This nudist version was a new side of Charise that he would very much like to learn more about. He had seen her nude on plenty of occasions, but seeing her only wearing panties was somehow even hotter.
Norman took this as a good sign.
“So… I get my reward now?” He leaned toward her, hoping for a kiss, or maybe just her pressing her ample assets up against him. Hell, even a hug would not go unwanted by Norman at this point. Seeing her here, now made him realize how much he missed her over the last few months.
All of those feelings felt like a bottomless pit of despair as Charise turned toward him and used her free hand to hold him at arm's length. “Aw, not tonight, sweetie. I got to get this in the planters. Perhaps some other time? As a reward, how about you help yourself to a bag for your trouble. You can see yourself out, right? Tootles.” She waved to him blithely as she disappeared into another room.
“…Uh, what?” Everything had happened so fast that Norman was left stunned, confused, and anxious. Had he fucked up?
He waited to see if she was joking. After Clarise failed to return, Norman realized he had been duped into doing her dirty work for her.
With great effort, Norman pulled himself out of that spiral of negative emotions before it left him a complete mess. She didn’t deserve the effort it took to be mad at her. He turned toward the table filled with bags ready for sale. He grabbed three of the bags, one for the hassle of delivering the brain, one for the lost cooler, and one out of spite.
When he walked out of the apartment, he heard the door automatically lock behind him followed by muted laughing from deeper inside the apartment. He thought he heard two voices but he chalked that up to his mind trying to dredge up the worst possible scenario.
Deciding not to dwell on the situation, he popped his mirror shades back on and started strolling out of the building. Norman couldn’t go home, not when he felt like this. If he did, he would just drink and smoke himself into a stupor that would probably cost him his job. Norman decided to meander about the inner town for a bit to calm down and see if he could come up with more spell ideas to test out.
Downtown didn’t look much different now than it did before the apocalypse, except maybe a bit more cluttered. That was until you got toward the edges of downtown and the new wall. Those in charge had built it up to create a ‘safe space’. Norman thought the whole thing was a joke when they first started it but people flocked toward the safety of the wall once it was completed.
The wall was made from a haphazard mishmash of building supplies, concrete, and large vehicles like buses with metal sheets welded to the outside. Even after two years, it hadn’t been completely replaced with a permanent structure. Norman walked past one section that ran between two sturdy buildings. This section had been torn down and rebuilt to resemble a medieval wall, all thick and crenelated, only made from poured concrete instead of stone. It was rather ugly and Norman hated it. At least the cobbled-together sections had a bit of flair to them.
Norman didn’t know the logistics involved in getting that much concrete to build a wall around the entire downtown and was glad he wasn’t in charge of something like that. Besides, he thought the whole thing was a waste of time and effort. He had lived outside the wall without much issue for two years. Sure you had to keep an eye out for rycors and elves but he had only ever seen one rycor and the elves never came close to the city.
Smoke coiled lazily away from the lit joint hanging from Norman’s mouth as he strolled down the open-air market that had sprung up. It was helping to calm him down and get his mind back to where he needed it to be.
The city still had electricity in most places thanks to a hydroelectric dam. And all of the buildings downtown, which had been empty, had been reclaimed by the mass of people that fled into the safety of the wall. It made the downtown feel alive and cramped all at the same time.
There wasn’t nearly enough room for everyone to have their own storefront though and the unlucky or poorer merchants were forced to set up shop in the streets or on the sidewalks, wherever they could find space. This meant most of the road was taken up by tents and stalls and made certain streets a maze. Very few streets remained clear for actual traffic since cars and gasoline were hard to come by.
Norman kind of liked the change, it beat the boring square block layout that was repeated throughout every city in the US.
There were still cars of course but gas was at a premium and electric cars were few and far between even before the apocalypse. Most people had to get around by walking or biking. There were even a few people on horseback if you could believe it.
Norman didn’t understand the drive to get behind a wall for protection. It wasn’t like the alien animals were all that much of a threat. They weren’t monsters hell-bent on killing everything in sight. They were just strange and dangerous animals, no different than a bear or wild cat. And most animal attacks had stopped over a year ago, or at least Norman hadn’t heard of anyone being dragged away by a rycor recently.
The real threat was from the jorik, their new neighboring state to the east, but those assholes didn’t venture this far from their lands. Everyone just called them elves because of their pointy ears and haughty attitude. Not that Norman had ever gotten close enough to have a conversation with one.
Lost in his own world, Norman wasn’t prepared when someone ran into him.
“Oof.” Norman hit the ground hard, his hand smacking the ground and knocking the joint he had been holding out of his hand. Norman watched in horror as it disappeared into a nearby storm drain. He was going to cuss out the person that ran into him but when he looked up to see who it was he was surprised to see a short blue-skinned man with pointy ears.
His brain tried to process what a jorik was doing in the downtown area when three more strolled over. It brought back memories of an encounter with a jorik patrol and he began to hyperventilate a bit.
“Guard! Why are you on the ground.”
The man Norman had run into glanced at Norman before quickly getting to his feet. “I believed this man to be a threat to your safety, My Lord. So I tackled him to the ground.”
The other Jorik that had been called ‘Lord,’ sniffed disdainfully. “While I admire your alertness, I doubt this,” the man waggled his hand at Norman, “human would be any threat to any of us. I mean look at him. He looks like he lives in a gutter and the man is clearly terrified of our very presence. As if we would ever lower ourselves to harm such a lowly specimen.” The other joriks laughed daintily at their Lord's joke. “That being said, you have sullied my guard’s uniform and honor with your filthy presence, human.”
Norman looked over to the guard in question, the one wiping some blood from his lip with a fancy-looking handkerchief. Norman’s panic was quickly being replaced by confusion. If Norman were in some unknown alien market, he would have been checking out all of the stalls and not watching where he was going, he figured that was why the man had run into him. Norman hadn’t been paying too much attention himself, which probably didn’t help. The man was also doing a good job hiding his smirk from his Lord behind the handkerchief but Norman could see it from his vantage point.
Then Norman realized what was going on, the pointy-eared bastard was throwing him under the bus to save face.
“Ugh, I feel dirty, my Lord. May we retire so I can burn these clothes and cleanse myself of this lesser’s filth?”
“Yes, let's. We have spent enough time in this place, we all could use a good cleansing.” The Jorik snapped his fingers and a human came running up.
“Yes, Regent?” the man asked subserviently, trying to bow and not appear to tower over the five-foot alien.
“Deal with this malfeasant while we return to our accommodations.”
“I will deal with this at once,” the man bowed again as the joriks started walking away.
The one with the bloody lip spit a wad of blue phlegm onto Norman’s sandaled foot, then gave him a self-satisfied grin before turning away and joining the others.
Norman gagged at the wet sensation as the phlegm landed on his bare foot. He was about to wipe it off when his eyes caught the man’s that had come over after the jorik snapped his finger.
Norman froze at the cold anger in those eyes. He recognized that look all too well.
The unnamed man waited until the group of jorik was out of sight before he bumped Norman with his boot to get his undivided attention.
“Listen here. I know it was the elf's fault and I don’t care. If that elf fucked your mother it would make no difference to me. You keep your mouth shut about this incident. If you don’t, I will personally visit you to make the rest of your short life a living hell. Do I make myself clear?”
Norman quickly nodded.
“Now get the fuck out of here before I call a guard over and have them toss you in lockup for a week for loitering and doing drugs in public.”
Norman didn’t need to be told twice as he scrambled to his feet and hurried off while rubbing the bruise that was forming where he hit the ground.
After making sure he was well out of sight, Norman took a moment. “Fucking elves,” he cursed, using the pejorative term everyone referred to them by in private.
While Norman hadn’t had any personal interactions with the jorik until today, it didn’t mean he hadn’t seen them from a distance. It had been over a year since his last encounter with the jorik, back when Norman was doing salvage runs. The last time he encountered them was when a group of them attacked the foraging party he had joined to earn some extra money.
Nobody died during that encounter mostly because the jorik party that attacked them was only doing it for a laugh. It still cost a few people limbs but Norman had gotten away unharmed. Thankfully, healing magic was a thing, and the people that were wounded eventually recovered when the churches treated them.
It was safe to say nobody really liked the jorik much. The fact that the city's leadership was catering to them did surprise Norman. He figured they probably wanted to get their hands on more jorik magical items or magic knowledge in general. Not that he thought it likely the jorik would give that up. It was more than likely that the jorik were just humoring the town leaders as part of some sick joke. That seemed to be the blue-skinned bastards' favorite hobby from what Norman had witnessed of them so far.
All of this excitement had caused Norman’s high to wear off. But at least this encounter had distracted him from his earlier thoughts. He looked down at the already-dried spit on his foot with disgust and a bit of worry. Norman could feel an itching sensation and tried to rub the substance off the top of his foot with the bottom of his other sandal but that only caused him to get dirt on his foot. He didn’t want to walk all the way home with this nasty blue goop on his foot, if it was itching now, who knew what it would do to his skin?
There was one option, Norman didn’t like it but he started walking back towards the morgue. There were showers available there that he could use.
It was late afternoon by the time he arrived at the building and the doors were locked. Norman had a set of keys to get in since his boss required him to come and go at all hours of the day. Norman unlocked the back door and made his way to the shower room. He was almost there when an unmistakable voice called out to him.
“Norm… I’m glad you’re back. Could you step into my office?”
Norman cursed under his breath, from his experience, these words never resulted in anything good. With a tired sigh, Norman turned around and walked into his boss’s office to find out what he was in trouble for.
Two things told Norman that this wasn’t the normal type of ass-chewing he might expect for screwing something up. One, the boss left the door open. Normally he liked to close the door before speaking with another member of the staff. The second was the cheap cardboard box on the desk. Norman recognized the items inside the box as his. He didn’t leave many things in his locker at work, but all of them now resided in this small box.
Norman went to take a seat but the boss stopped him. “Don’t bother, you won’t be here long,” the man spoke harshly as he took a seat behind his desk.
“You know, I first installed security cameras when some of the staff complained about items going missing. I was a bit surprised to catch you on camera after less than a day, stealing from the storage closet. A few pens here and there, a roll of toilet paper, or even a bowl of mints are things I can overlook, Norm.”
Norman noticed the mint dish that usually sat atop the boss's desk was nowhere in sight.
“Then you started your ‘experiments’. I can understand the appeal of magic, Norman. And you weren’t harming anyone so I let it go on. It probably wasn’t one of my better judgment calls in hindsight but you were a decent worker. At least until today.”
Embarrassment crept up Norman’s cheeks as his boss twisted his desk monitor around to face Norman. The video on the screen was paused, showing Norman trying to shove a dead man’s brains into the cooler. One hand on the brain and the other on a bloody saw. The worst was the look of pure concentration on Norman’s face in the paused video.
“I kept you around because while you may not have liked the job, you stuck it out and that is more than most people are capable of when dealing with corpses. So I ignored and overlooked the petty theft. But stealing the remains of the dead is… completely unacceptable.” Norman’s boss paused, sounding like he was going to be physically ill. “You know, I never thought I would have to utter those words to someone. Norm, we have a responsibility here to ensure the dead are handled with care and compassion. Something you have shown today that you clearly lack.”
“Boss, I can exp-“
His boss held his hand up. “Please, I don’t want to hear whatever excuse you have. It doesn’t matter why you did what you did. You did it. And I’m going to have to let you go. But let me be perfectly clear about one thing, Norm. If I see or hear about any undead running around town, I’m going straight to the guard with your name. Now, please leave, your presence here is making me physically ill.”
His former boss pushed the box of personal effects toward Norman.
Norman grabbed the box and handed over his set of keys before being escorted out of the building.
After an embarrassing walk through town with a box that clearly told everyone he had been fired, Norman arrived outside his house.
“At least I still got you.”
Norman walked up the creaky and worn stairs. He looked past the peeling siding, the deteriorating roof, and the slightly tilted porch as he wrenched the stuck screen door open. It scraped across the deck of the porch, adding to the gouges along its usual path, leaving a distinctive arc of scraped wood in its wake.
Norman turned the handle on the inner door and shoved his shoulder against it. The door moved open a few inches and Norman repeated the maneuver, getting the door to open the rest of the way. He picked up his meager box of belongings and made his way inside, shutting the door behind him.
“Home sweet home.” Norman tossed the box of belongings from work onto the floor and promptly forgot about it as he flopped onto his favorite broken couch with a sigh.
He dug into his shorts pocket and pulled out the bags he had taken from Charise. He shoved two of them deep into the old couch cushions in case someone broke into his house. Not that anyone would want the old take-out boxes, dirty dishes, or leftover roaches left in the ashtrays or scattered around the living room.
Looking around at the mess made Norman realize he might be worse than his former boss. His former boss only worked in filth, Norman lived in it. It was no wonder everyone kept leaving him. That thought made him even more depressed and he cleared a spot on the coffee table and pulled his bong toward himself. He wanted to forget today the only way he knew how.
Norman gave the water a sniff and winced at the smell but he was in far too sour of a mood to pour it out and get some fresh stuff. Instead, he packed the bowl, lit it, and inhaled the heady aroma from Charise’s latest blend. The woman may have been a siren in disguise but she did grow the best stuff around.
When the bowl was empty, he relaxed against the back of the couch and let his mind drift away from the shitty day and loneliness he felt. Or that’s what he tried to do. As he crossed his legs to relax, he caught sight of the blue goo still dried to the top of his foot. All of the shit he had just been trying to forget floated right back to the forefront of his mind and he cursed.
Norman slicked back his unruly shoulder-length hair, catching a glimpse of the original brown color above the fading black dye. He sighed, hair dye wasn’t exactly a high-priority item when it took everything he earned just to make ends meet. He breathed into his hand, trying to see if his breath stunk, and winced.
He shouldn’t have eaten that garlic bread for lunch.
Setting down the brain-filled cooler, he dug around in his loose short pockets. He was glad to finally be out of those itchy coveralls. Unfortunately, Norman didn’t have time to go home and change, but hopefully, Charise would overlook his appearance when he presented her with her gift. His hand came out of his pocket with a collection of random items and pocket lint.
“Where is it, I know I had a piece,” he growled quietly as he searched through the junk from his pocket until he found the breath mint he had swiped from his boss's desk a few days ago. “Score!”
He popped the mint into his mouth and tried to put on his most charming smile before he picked up the cooler and knocked on Charise’s door.
There was some muffled grumbling followed by footsteps. The walls in Charise’s building weren’t exactly soundproof and he was able to easily follow the sound of her footsteps as she walked toward the door. A shadow drew across the peephole for a moment before it disappeared. There was the clack of many locks before the door opened a little bit and Charise stuck her head in the opening.
Norman hadn’t seen her for a few months and was a little disappointed to see Charise had cut her long black hair and dyed it bleach blond. She still looked good with the less-than-shoulder-length blond curls but he preferred her dark and brooding look. Not the valley girl one she was now sporting.
“You look great, Charise,” he responded warmly, hoping the compliment would help wipe the frown from her face. It seemed to work.
Her grumpy demeanor instantly changed but not from Norman’s compliment, but from when her eyes landed on the cooler he was holding. “Did you bring it, sweetie?”
Norman held up the cooler and the woman squealed in delight before she shut the door and unlatched the chain. The industrial strength chain wasn’t anything like normal door chains, it looked like something you would tow a car with. Norman didn’t recall her having this level of security the last time he had seen her. It seemed a bit excessive, but then again maybe not. It may not hold up against one of the physical classers for long, sometimes it was the appearance of safety that mattered more than the reality.
Charise ushered him in from behind the door. His eyes were first drawn to the main room. It now made perfect sense why she was being as cautious as she was. She had a metric ton of weed in baggies laid out on the table in the next room over. When Norman turned back to ask her what that was all about, he was struck speechless.
Charise not missing the opportunity, took advantage of his stunned silence to snatch the cooler out of his hand. Holding it, she giggled like a little girl.
Norman had to blink a few times while his brain processed the scene in front of him, her almost total lack of clothing had short-circuited his neurons for a moment. He was only human after all. This nudist version was a new side of Charise that he would very much like to learn more about. He had seen her nude on plenty of occasions, but seeing her only wearing panties was somehow even hotter.
Norman took this as a good sign.
“So… I get my reward now?” He leaned toward her, hoping for a kiss, or maybe just her pressing her ample assets up against him. Hell, even a hug would not go unwanted by Norman at this point. Seeing her here, now made him realize how much he missed her over the last few months.
All of those feelings felt like a bottomless pit of despair as Charise turned toward him and used her free hand to hold him at arm's length. “Aw, not tonight, sweetie. I got to get this in the planters. Perhaps some other time? As a reward, how about you help yourself to a bag for your trouble. You can see yourself out, right? Tootles.” She waved to him blithely as she disappeared into another room.
“…Uh, what?” Everything had happened so fast that Norman was left stunned, confused, and anxious. Had he fucked up?
He waited to see if she was joking. After Clarise failed to return, Norman realized he had been duped into doing her dirty work for her.
With great effort, Norman pulled himself out of that spiral of negative emotions before it left him a complete mess. She didn’t deserve the effort it took to be mad at her. He turned toward the table filled with bags ready for sale. He grabbed three of the bags, one for the hassle of delivering the brain, one for the lost cooler, and one out of spite.
When he walked out of the apartment, he heard the door automatically lock behind him followed by muted laughing from deeper inside the apartment. He thought he heard two voices but he chalked that up to his mind trying to dredge up the worst possible scenario.
Deciding not to dwell on the situation, he popped his mirror shades back on and started strolling out of the building. Norman couldn’t go home, not when he felt like this. If he did, he would just drink and smoke himself into a stupor that would probably cost him his job. Norman decided to meander about the inner town for a bit to calm down and see if he could come up with more spell ideas to test out.
Downtown didn’t look much different now than it did before the apocalypse, except maybe a bit more cluttered. That was until you got toward the edges of downtown and the new wall. Those in charge had built it up to create a ‘safe space’. Norman thought the whole thing was a joke when they first started it but people flocked toward the safety of the wall once it was completed.
The wall was made from a haphazard mishmash of building supplies, concrete, and large vehicles like buses with metal sheets welded to the outside. Even after two years, it hadn’t been completely replaced with a permanent structure. Norman walked past one section that ran between two sturdy buildings. This section had been torn down and rebuilt to resemble a medieval wall, all thick and crenelated, only made from poured concrete instead of stone. It was rather ugly and Norman hated it. At least the cobbled-together sections had a bit of flair to them.
Norman didn’t know the logistics involved in getting that much concrete to build a wall around the entire downtown and was glad he wasn’t in charge of something like that. Besides, he thought the whole thing was a waste of time and effort. He had lived outside the wall without much issue for two years. Sure you had to keep an eye out for rycors and elves but he had only ever seen one rycor and the elves never came close to the city.
Smoke coiled lazily away from the lit joint hanging from Norman’s mouth as he strolled down the open-air market that had sprung up. It was helping to calm him down and get his mind back to where he needed it to be.
The city still had electricity in most places thanks to a hydroelectric dam. And all of the buildings downtown, which had been empty, had been reclaimed by the mass of people that fled into the safety of the wall. It made the downtown feel alive and cramped all at the same time.
There wasn’t nearly enough room for everyone to have their own storefront though and the unlucky or poorer merchants were forced to set up shop in the streets or on the sidewalks, wherever they could find space. This meant most of the road was taken up by tents and stalls and made certain streets a maze. Very few streets remained clear for actual traffic since cars and gasoline were hard to come by.
Norman kind of liked the change, it beat the boring square block layout that was repeated throughout every city in the US.
There were still cars of course but gas was at a premium and electric cars were few and far between even before the apocalypse. Most people had to get around by walking or biking. There were even a few people on horseback if you could believe it.
Norman didn’t understand the drive to get behind a wall for protection. It wasn’t like the alien animals were all that much of a threat. They weren’t monsters hell-bent on killing everything in sight. They were just strange and dangerous animals, no different than a bear or wild cat. And most animal attacks had stopped over a year ago, or at least Norman hadn’t heard of anyone being dragged away by a rycor recently.
The real threat was from the jorik, their new neighboring state to the east, but those assholes didn’t venture this far from their lands. Everyone just called them elves because of their pointy ears and haughty attitude. Not that Norman had ever gotten close enough to have a conversation with one.
Lost in his own world, Norman wasn’t prepared when someone ran into him.
“Oof.” Norman hit the ground hard, his hand smacking the ground and knocking the joint he had been holding out of his hand. Norman watched in horror as it disappeared into a nearby storm drain. He was going to cuss out the person that ran into him but when he looked up to see who it was he was surprised to see a short blue-skinned man with pointy ears.
His brain tried to process what a jorik was doing in the downtown area when three more strolled over. It brought back memories of an encounter with a jorik patrol and he began to hyperventilate a bit.
“Guard! Why are you on the ground.”
The man Norman had run into glanced at Norman before quickly getting to his feet. “I believed this man to be a threat to your safety, My Lord. So I tackled him to the ground.”
The other Jorik that had been called ‘Lord,’ sniffed disdainfully. “While I admire your alertness, I doubt this,” the man waggled his hand at Norman, “human would be any threat to any of us. I mean look at him. He looks like he lives in a gutter and the man is clearly terrified of our very presence. As if we would ever lower ourselves to harm such a lowly specimen.” The other joriks laughed daintily at their Lord's joke. “That being said, you have sullied my guard’s uniform and honor with your filthy presence, human.”
Norman looked over to the guard in question, the one wiping some blood from his lip with a fancy-looking handkerchief. Norman’s panic was quickly being replaced by confusion. If Norman were in some unknown alien market, he would have been checking out all of the stalls and not watching where he was going, he figured that was why the man had run into him. Norman hadn’t been paying too much attention himself, which probably didn’t help. The man was also doing a good job hiding his smirk from his Lord behind the handkerchief but Norman could see it from his vantage point.
Then Norman realized what was going on, the pointy-eared bastard was throwing him under the bus to save face.
“Ugh, I feel dirty, my Lord. May we retire so I can burn these clothes and cleanse myself of this lesser’s filth?”
“Yes, let's. We have spent enough time in this place, we all could use a good cleansing.” The Jorik snapped his fingers and a human came running up.
“Yes, Regent?” the man asked subserviently, trying to bow and not appear to tower over the five-foot alien.
“Deal with this malfeasant while we return to our accommodations.”
“I will deal with this at once,” the man bowed again as the joriks started walking away.
The one with the bloody lip spit a wad of blue phlegm onto Norman’s sandaled foot, then gave him a self-satisfied grin before turning away and joining the others.
Norman gagged at the wet sensation as the phlegm landed on his bare foot. He was about to wipe it off when his eyes caught the man’s that had come over after the jorik snapped his finger.
Norman froze at the cold anger in those eyes. He recognized that look all too well.
The unnamed man waited until the group of jorik was out of sight before he bumped Norman with his boot to get his undivided attention.
“Listen here. I know it was the elf's fault and I don’t care. If that elf fucked your mother it would make no difference to me. You keep your mouth shut about this incident. If you don’t, I will personally visit you to make the rest of your short life a living hell. Do I make myself clear?”
Norman quickly nodded.
“Now get the fuck out of here before I call a guard over and have them toss you in lockup for a week for loitering and doing drugs in public.”
Norman didn’t need to be told twice as he scrambled to his feet and hurried off while rubbing the bruise that was forming where he hit the ground.
After making sure he was well out of sight, Norman took a moment. “Fucking elves,” he cursed, using the pejorative term everyone referred to them by in private.
While Norman hadn’t had any personal interactions with the jorik until today, it didn’t mean he hadn’t seen them from a distance. It had been over a year since his last encounter with the jorik, back when Norman was doing salvage runs. The last time he encountered them was when a group of them attacked the foraging party he had joined to earn some extra money.
Nobody died during that encounter mostly because the jorik party that attacked them was only doing it for a laugh. It still cost a few people limbs but Norman had gotten away unharmed. Thankfully, healing magic was a thing, and the people that were wounded eventually recovered when the churches treated them.
It was safe to say nobody really liked the jorik much. The fact that the city's leadership was catering to them did surprise Norman. He figured they probably wanted to get their hands on more jorik magical items or magic knowledge in general. Not that he thought it likely the jorik would give that up. It was more than likely that the jorik were just humoring the town leaders as part of some sick joke. That seemed to be the blue-skinned bastards' favorite hobby from what Norman had witnessed of them so far.
All of this excitement had caused Norman’s high to wear off. But at least this encounter had distracted him from his earlier thoughts. He looked down at the already-dried spit on his foot with disgust and a bit of worry. Norman could feel an itching sensation and tried to rub the substance off the top of his foot with the bottom of his other sandal but that only caused him to get dirt on his foot. He didn’t want to walk all the way home with this nasty blue goop on his foot, if it was itching now, who knew what it would do to his skin?
There was one option, Norman didn’t like it but he started walking back towards the morgue. There were showers available there that he could use.
It was late afternoon by the time he arrived at the building and the doors were locked. Norman had a set of keys to get in since his boss required him to come and go at all hours of the day. Norman unlocked the back door and made his way to the shower room. He was almost there when an unmistakable voice called out to him.
“Norm… I’m glad you’re back. Could you step into my office?”
Norman cursed under his breath, from his experience, these words never resulted in anything good. With a tired sigh, Norman turned around and walked into his boss’s office to find out what he was in trouble for.
Two things told Norman that this wasn’t the normal type of ass-chewing he might expect for screwing something up. One, the boss left the door open. Normally he liked to close the door before speaking with another member of the staff. The second was the cheap cardboard box on the desk. Norman recognized the items inside the box as his. He didn’t leave many things in his locker at work, but all of them now resided in this small box.
Norman went to take a seat but the boss stopped him. “Don’t bother, you won’t be here long,” the man spoke harshly as he took a seat behind his desk.
“You know, I first installed security cameras when some of the staff complained about items going missing. I was a bit surprised to catch you on camera after less than a day, stealing from the storage closet. A few pens here and there, a roll of toilet paper, or even a bowl of mints are things I can overlook, Norm.”
Norman noticed the mint dish that usually sat atop the boss's desk was nowhere in sight.
“Then you started your ‘experiments’. I can understand the appeal of magic, Norman. And you weren’t harming anyone so I let it go on. It probably wasn’t one of my better judgment calls in hindsight but you were a decent worker. At least until today.”
Embarrassment crept up Norman’s cheeks as his boss twisted his desk monitor around to face Norman. The video on the screen was paused, showing Norman trying to shove a dead man’s brains into the cooler. One hand on the brain and the other on a bloody saw. The worst was the look of pure concentration on Norman’s face in the paused video.
“I kept you around because while you may not have liked the job, you stuck it out and that is more than most people are capable of when dealing with corpses. So I ignored and overlooked the petty theft. But stealing the remains of the dead is… completely unacceptable.” Norman’s boss paused, sounding like he was going to be physically ill. “You know, I never thought I would have to utter those words to someone. Norm, we have a responsibility here to ensure the dead are handled with care and compassion. Something you have shown today that you clearly lack.”
“Boss, I can exp-“
His boss held his hand up. “Please, I don’t want to hear whatever excuse you have. It doesn’t matter why you did what you did. You did it. And I’m going to have to let you go. But let me be perfectly clear about one thing, Norm. If I see or hear about any undead running around town, I’m going straight to the guard with your name. Now, please leave, your presence here is making me physically ill.”
His former boss pushed the box of personal effects toward Norman.
Norman grabbed the box and handed over his set of keys before being escorted out of the building.
After an embarrassing walk through town with a box that clearly told everyone he had been fired, Norman arrived outside his house.
“At least I still got you.”
Norman walked up the creaky and worn stairs. He looked past the peeling siding, the deteriorating roof, and the slightly tilted porch as he wrenched the stuck screen door open. It scraped across the deck of the porch, adding to the gouges along its usual path, leaving a distinctive arc of scraped wood in its wake.
Norman turned the handle on the inner door and shoved his shoulder against it. The door moved open a few inches and Norman repeated the maneuver, getting the door to open the rest of the way. He picked up his meager box of belongings and made his way inside, shutting the door behind him.
“Home sweet home.” Norman tossed the box of belongings from work onto the floor and promptly forgot about it as he flopped onto his favorite broken couch with a sigh.
He dug into his shorts pocket and pulled out the bags he had taken from Charise. He shoved two of them deep into the old couch cushions in case someone broke into his house. Not that anyone would want the old take-out boxes, dirty dishes, or leftover roaches left in the ashtrays or scattered around the living room.
Looking around at the mess made Norman realize he might be worse than his former boss. His former boss only worked in filth, Norman lived in it. It was no wonder everyone kept leaving him. That thought made him even more depressed and he cleared a spot on the coffee table and pulled his bong toward himself. He wanted to forget today the only way he knew how.
Norman gave the water a sniff and winced at the smell but he was in far too sour of a mood to pour it out and get some fresh stuff. Instead, he packed the bowl, lit it, and inhaled the heady aroma from Charise’s latest blend. The woman may have been a siren in disguise but she did grow the best stuff around.
When the bowl was empty, he relaxed against the back of the couch and let his mind drift away from the shitty day and loneliness he felt. Or that’s what he tried to do. As he crossed his legs to relax, he caught sight of the blue goo still dried to the top of his foot. All of the shit he had just been trying to forget floated right back to the forefront of his mind and he cursed.
