Chapter Twenty-Six
Delilah
This morning is sponsored by rage, sexual tension, and the government’s inability to fund proper satellite infrastructure.
The tracking app is down. I know this because I couldn’t verify Benji made it to work without visually confirming his safety from the parking lot like a sugar-baby sniper with attachment issues and a Swarovski scope. Cute, right? Just girl things.
And then Detective Nosy McTrauma-Trigger calls me for the third time after asking, “Where were you Monday night?”
Bold of him to assume I even know what day it is.
I let it go to voicemail because I’ve already lied once and I’m not about to freestyle perjury until I’ve got a glitter knife and an alibi forged in morally ambiguous sparkles. Priorities.
I have shit to do.
Step one in my very spiritual, very artistic healing arc: Call the art center.
When the desk drone answers, I say, “Hi, yes, I’m just calling to confirm who’s modeling Friday. I have a very specific aesthetic vision I’m preparing for.”
Translation: I need to know if that bitch Kira is still breathing the air meant for me or if I need to escalate this politely and with glitter.
The man on the phone sighs like he’s fighting the urge to report me and confirms, yes, it’s Kira.
Fabulous. Stunning. Unacceptable.
I gave her a chance to make the right choice. A little message. A little encouragement. A little artistic terrorism.
And she chose wrong.
Which means: Target run. Shopping for symbolic weapons and sparkly intimidation props that say, “I’m beautiful, unwell, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll back the fuck off.”
The knife needs to be cute. Not just murder-y, festive. Glitter. Hearts. Maybe a pink handle with a dangling Hello Kitty charm.
I swing through the toy section for potential blood substitutes. Glitter slime? Red kinetic sand? The kind of goo that gives parents nightmares and smells like regret and strawberry chemicals?
That’s when my phone buzzes.
I almost come in the slime aisle.
It’s Jett.
The man has texted. He wants to do this now?
I am in public. I am in heat. I am unwell.
His name lights up on my screen, and I short-circuit with the kind of full-body tension that could power an entire emergency grid.
I’m busy, with Rhys-related activities, obviously, but Rhys is playing hard to get, and if Jett texted “I’m outside,” I’d throw myself onto his bitch seat like a debutante with a death wish.
I type back: On my way. Just need an hour. Running errands. Stay hard.
One hour to wrap up Operation Sparkly Knife.
I rush to checkout, burning with purpose and poorly contained sexual static.
And, of course, I get stuck behind Pinto Bean Apocalypse Lady and her Fifty Fucking Cans.
The cashier is scanning them one. at. a. time. Like my god-given right to mount Jett’s motorcycle bare-assed isn’t hanging in the balance.
I stare daggers into the woman’s back. I manifest psychic violence. I imagine the security footage of me leaping over the conveyor belt and double-scanning her beans just to free myself from this bureaucratic purgatory.
I can do this.
Fifteen minutes at Kira’s, tops.
Then Jett.
Then maybe I die.
Glitter in my veins. No panties. Smile on my face.
I finally claw my way out of checkout hell and peel out of the parking lot fast enough to feel holy, but slow enough to dodge flashing lights and felony charges.
Goose Bitch HQ hasn’t changed. Still smells like dryer sheets, low standards, and emotional damage. The buzzer works. Miraculously. I jab it and wait with the conviction of a woman who absolutely has threatened someone here before.
The lock clicks. Someone buzzes me in again. Still no security. Still no sense of self-preservation. I love a consistent brand.
Up the stairs I go, heels tapping like a countdown to divine retribution, only to be met with nothing. No robe ghost. No pink slippers. No haunting whispers about birds. The hallway is eerily empty.
I pause outside Kira’s door. Same cracked paint. Same energy as a vegan influencer caught photoshopping their smoothie. I uncap my lipstick, Chanel red, shade: “unhinged, but you’d still fuck me.”
In large, dramatic cursive, I scrawl directly across the door:
TAKE FRIDAY OFF, KIRA. THE MUSE IS ANGRY.
Then add a little heart. For flavor.
Next, I pull out the knife.
It’s adorable. Glitter handle, soft pink grip, a little heart charm dangling from the hilt. I brace. I stab. Or… I try.
The knife bounces off the door.
I grit my teeth, reset my stance, and go again.
Bounce.
Nope.
Apparently, the door is made of retired tank armor and spite.
“Ugh. Why is violence so heavy?” I say, halfway to giving it a good kick for sass when I hear a door open.
Out drifts the man. Him. Fuzzy robe. Bluetooth headset. The Hollow-Eyed Poultry Prophet himself. Only now he’s shirtless underneath the robe and holding a mug that says: Cluck Around and Find Out.
I freeze, knife in hand, halfway through attempting to commit door-based intimidation art.
He watches me. No blinking. Just that slow, birdlike bob of his head.
“Hi again,” I say, like we’re old coworkers at a psych ward reunion.
“Only the chosen may pierce the bird’s domain,” he whispers.
I don’t blink. I stand there, halfway between fear and fan club membership. “I just wanted her to feel vaguely unsafe on her own welcome mat.”
He narrows his eyes. “Intentions are seeds. Some grow into corn. Some into crows.”
“Would you mind?” I make a door stabby gesture. Because at this point, why the fuck not? Entrusting a knife to a poultry cultist is the most logical choice I’ve made all day.
Without breaking eye contact, he takes a deliberate step toward me and extends one bony hand.
I hold out the knife.
He takes it. No hesitation. Like we’ve done this before in another life.
And with eerie, unshaking grace, he plunges it into the door, right under my lipstick message. Buries it to the hilt.
I clutch my imaginary pearls and inhale like a bitch in a corset. “Wow. Thank you. That was incredibly validating.”
He nods. Serious. Grave. As if this was a spiritual act.
“You have… tremendous stabbing energy.”
He clucks like he’s calling down thunder and points at the knife.
“The beak breaks the shell. The shell bleeds truth,” he says. “Blood must be offered to enter the aviary.”
My soul briefly leaves my body to go Google what the fuck he just said. The vibe he’s giving is somewhere between ‘guy who talks to mannequins’ and ‘guy who might keep teeth in a jar.’
I get the sudden, overwhelming urge to gift him something, the way villagers used to leave out food for gods they didn’t want to piss off.
I reach into my purse and pull out the emergency candy bar I’ve been saving for my next sobbing-in-a-parking-lot moment. “This is for you,” I say, smiling the way people smile when a bear sniffs their picnic basket.
He accepts it with the trembling reverence of a man touching God’s toenail.
“The nougat will silence the feathers. For now. The beak will remain clean until the solstice. The pecking shall commence.” Then he bows like I’ve just knighted him with chocolate.
“Tell the knives they are remembered. The coop never forgets.”
I stare at him like he just offered me a prophecy wrapped in poultry shit and hallucinogens. “Uh-huh.”
I swear to God I hear faint windchimes as he slips back into his apartment.
The door creaks closed behind him.
I stare at the empty hallway.
“I need more therapy.”
But now. Kira.
I pull out the bottle of glitter slime with the flair of a feral art witch who’s just been blessed by a poultry cryptid, because that’s exactly who I am now.
I unscrew the lid and flick fat globs of sparkly, viscous warning all over the door. It spatters over the lipstick, trails down around the blade, oozes like Barbie blood. Then I toss a handful of loose glitter on top for garnish.
Now the door reads like a cursed Valentine’s card from a sleep-deprived banshee.
I smile. Job done.
Sticker heart. Threat energy. Glitter crimes.
Check that off the list.