Calling it Home
Exact specifications are decent, better than Lucia’s at the university even.
I can barely stand in the bathroom, but it does come with a shower—and a bath.
The room has no textiles left over besides some cotton bedsheets and towels.
My casual clothes, shaded to only the most casually dark of brown, feel out of place with the aggressively black decor.
I can tell even the landline’s been painted just to match the overwhelming black.
Waste time planning out a purchase of new clothes or… just get it over with. It’s not like the call will be immediate anyway. The heavy ceramic mass fills my right hand while my dominant rolls out the operator number.
A brief period of ringing and… a voice. “Twenty-one hundred and four. Hello, this is Oliva Capello, operator. How may I direct your call?”
“Yeah, can you switch me to north-east Avenale, Silkflats, house of Cecilia de Alioni?”
“Of course, dear.”
I lean onto the end of the bed frame, waiting for the static to turn to ringing.
And then for ringing to turn to…
“Hello?” my mother’s voice calls.
“It’s me, Mom. Just having to say—”
“Catie, where are you? It’s nearly twenty-two hundred!”
About an hour off, but I’m not going to anger her more. “Sorry, I got caught up in an interview.”
“Still? They must really want to hire you. That’s my girl! But come home soon.”
“Well—I got the place, so I might stay here for a minute. I’m calling from the dorm.” Or, dorm-reminiscent room. Technically might not be an actual dorm dorm since it has its own bath.
“Dorm? What in the Ring…” She whispers something to someone out of the receiver’s range. “Where are you?”
“It’s just a parlour?”
“A parlour? Honey, no…”
“Not like that! I’m an apprentice… an actual apprentice. It’s fine.” A shallow and weak pride bubbles in my heart as I repeat it out loud. “I’m going to bed. I’ll be home for my stuff soonish.”
“I’m glad, but where are you? You know how annoying it is when you don’t talk to me.”
“Uh…” I’m not sure, actually. “Just north of Avenale. I’ll see you later. Bye.”
I place the phone back into its holder, accidentally with too much force. I freeze at the ceramic’s rattling, intently listening to the following silence to see if Vincenza will storm in and yell at me for already causing an audible disturbance.
She isn’t. I still have one or two mistakes left before I go home.
Hopefully two, as I’m about to make another one.
Unlike my own home line, I’ve actually memorized Lucia’s—my only friend who’d be awake at this hour. The wheel spins out a few more times, a static plays, and…
“Who’s the bitch?“ her familiar voice asks.
“Shut the f—“ I look around my room and continue in a whisper, “shut the fuck up.”
“Did your mom just fucking beat you? What’s the whispering for?”
What a thing to say when she set me up for the interview I’d get beaten for missing. Blood upon the Ring, she’s got me snickering.
I excitedly reply, “I just got a job! An actual one. With, uh… I’ll find out if it has pay or benefits.”
“You’ve called me from prison with more enthusiasm.”
Am I not enthusiastic? I feel like I am… Right! Forgot to smile.
“Of course I was happy. Making you pay bail is a lot better than an angry Mercurio.”
“For you.“ She follows her groaning with petty giggles. “What’s your new thing?”
“You know the parlour? The Necromancer’s Parlour?”
I don’t know why she would, actually.
Her second boyfriend’s voice, muffled by a slight distance, yells, “that’s by the waffle place!”
“Uh… yeah. I heard it’s by the waffle place,“ she replies. “You want me to get you some?”
“Yes! Please. I didn’t eat today, and I’m not sure if I’m getting paid or—“
“I would kill for some waffles,“ the boyfriend adds.
“You’re just exhausted. Aren’t you—“ She moves away from the receiver for a moment. “Yeah. Eight hundred?”
I anxiously tap my finger into my leg. “…Could you bring me the box? I’m not sure how early she’s making me work, and I might not be able to leave.”
“The diner is ratty anyway,“ the boyfriend comments.
“Of course I will. I need to see what crappy rebound job you got.“ She ruffles some sheets under her, or something. “Also, what insane woman hired you to be an apprentice?”
“I think I was the only person who showed up.”
“And she settled? Keep a gun tucked under your coat, I guess.”
“It’s back at home.”
“You’re sleeping there?“ She snickers, “you’re dead.”
“Won’t hurt me if that is her goal.”
“Ouch, you’re a sad thing… Decz’s getting antsy, so I’m going to hang up. I’ll bring you a pistol or something when I show up tomorrow.”
I realize I’ve been tangling up the cable between my fingers and start unraveling it. “Okay. See you then, Lucia.”
“You too. But also, Catie, if you’re ever desperate for a patron and one of my guys dies or stops paying, I’ll give you a pity fuck,“ she offers half-seriously.
But half’s enough for me to shut up and stumble my words.
The line’s cut in the middle of her cackling.
I slowly unwind from the high and hang up the phone. My mind is flush with feelings to express, but my social circle is filled by university students and laborers who should be asleep by now. Lucia’s at least busy with her vampire paramours at these hours.
Time to settle in, I guess. No gun, but knives have managed to kill people.
There’s no windows in this room. I would suspect that the wall is shared with the next door building, leaving me no way to tell that it’s morning.
Except for slightest taps against my door.
“Wake up. You’re earning your stay,” Mistress Vincenza demands.
“Okay… Okay.” I roll out of bed and toss on my clothing from last night.
Not clear on the shoe policy. Given I’m probably not leaving, I should get slippers. Or, just bring some in from home.
She waits in the hallway, fully clothed and booted—guarded—when I exit. “State of your physical health?”
“Fine?” I lock the door.
“Can you stand for hours while shelving books?”
“I’ve done labor before.”
Not well.
Books are hopefully easier on me.
“Good.” Her eyes study me an extra moment, then she sighs and relaxes her posture. “I understand that I probably showed unduly little enthusiasm for a moment which, for you, must be life changing.”
She pauses, crumples whatever movement was in her lips, and suddenly snaps to walking downstairs.
I don’t know if I was bitten by a joke, or if she bit away something I’ll never hear.
Mistress Vincenza drags a small cart, filled with books along its top platform. “This shouldn’t take more than an hour, even for you, but I’ll watch you, this first time.”
I nod passively.
“Example.” She picks up a book and points to the tag on its side. “This is NF dot seven dot five dot four hundred and sixty thousand and nine hundred and seventy-three dot ‘QEL.’ The shelves are organized from zero at the top left to nine at the bottom right.”
“Where do the letters go then? They’re not… numbers.”
“In order. A starts on the left. But not the first two numbers—those are the sections. NF is for non-fiction, which is what this shop is mainly…”
She drones on into a, though intermittently helpful, long rag about the exact books held by this parlour.
“There’s no more fiction section since people got confused about the presence of diaries in it. Now it’s separated into the ‘JOURNAL’ shelf, the ‘YOUNG FICTION’ shelf, the ‘POETRY’ shelf, and the ‘NON-BOOK’ shelf.”
Really… really drone on.
“Non-books?”
She grabs a bundle of flash cards set aside from the books. “These used to be included in the ‘NF’ section, but their cases deform under pressure. Now, can you begin with shelving that first book?”
“Yes, Mistress!” I timidly grab it from her hand and brave into the shelves. The sections seem so overwhelmingly many for a small parlour, but… uh…
“Stop. You went past the dot seven section.”
“Sorry!” I freeze and turn around, eyes glazing over.
She drills her eyes into me. I’m afraid to even get close and check the numbers without her getting angry at me for being so off.
Heart’s racing.
It’s so simple, and the longer I can’t figure out how to start, the more embarrassing it will be when I do.
She taps the spine of the book. “What’s the first number after the section?”
“...Seven?”
“Up here, it’s six.” Her finger drags across the books until hitting the end of the shelf and starting on the next. “And seven… starts here. Second number?”
I double check. “Five?”
“Then follow the spines until you hit five.”
She’s making a joke of me. Her skewering glances, weighty gazes. It’s obvious. It’s easy. It’s…
“There’s a dot four and a dot seven. No dot five?”
“So there isn’t,” she echoes.
I create a gap and slowly add the book in.
“I have a card for them, but the ‘seven’ section is industrial practices. Seven dot five is”—she turns her head at the book—“artisanal products.”
“Did I do it?”
“Yes. Now, the books are put into the cart in order. Just pick out the next and repeat.”
Still stressful, but I can slowly ease. She’s not yelling particularly much.
She just dislikes me.
The door opens, leaving a grating ringing from its bell.
“The space is open, Piero,” Mistress Vincenza coldly greets.
“Wonderful, but I do hope you’ll introduce me to your new apprentice when she’s less busy!” The man with a rough suit and eyes of orbiting blue lights—a sign that he’s a Ringborn with at least one patronized consort—appraises me. “You don’t seem to have clothed her yet.”
“I’m giving her the opportunity to run first. The robes are binding.” Despite her words having the texture of something humorous, nothing in her tone feels like levity.
“Learned that lesson from the last one?”
“Have I…” She slowly coaxes a breath.
“Yeah—Sorry. Have you seen the Lights Festival posters they’re putting up?”
Mistress Vincenza and the man converse, heads and words above me. I dance between committing myself to continuing or to listening.
I shouldn’t continue; she can’t correct my mistakes if she’s not looking.
“...wiring, and now the chairs don’t feel the same. You really need to bring your own pillows.”