Chapter One - Part Five - Tango In The Dark

There wasn’t much the mayor could do about it now anyway, of course other than continue to pretend it wasn’t a problem. It had always worked for him, so that’s what he did, ignored it.

It wasn’t really my problem anyway; I had gotten use to the smell.

Not being able to afford continuous refills for the deodorizer, forced me to just sucked it up and learned to live with the stench.

I stood on the corner of Maple Street and 6th Ave, looking in either direction I saw nothing; I started to get a tad curious. Was there something on that I was missing out on?  Regardless I crossed the street, my heels clicking on the asphalt, it was so dead around here that someone six blocks away could hear the echo of my shoes.

Once across the road I turned back towards my building. What a dump. I envied the thought of a normal life, with pretty guest towels and brunch with girlfriends.

Slowly I turned back and continued to walk towards Black Cats.

Two blocks down, just three to go.

Even though I was now about two hours late, I would never run through these streets, you always became the target of a mugger if you ran anywhere around here. I don’t know what it was, guess they must have seen it as a challenge; either that or they thought you where already scared so they might as well make you shit your pants.

Thus I walked. Although I did always have one hand in my pocket, clutching onto my pepper spray.

Can’t be too careful.

Besides at this time of the night my boss would be either so high that he will think I’m early, or he will be so drunk that he has passed out in his office. So there was really no reason to hurry.

I continued my agonizingly boring walk towards Black Cats, with each step bringing me closer and closer to running a can opener across my wrists.

It wasn’t that I hated working or anything; it was just that tonight I just cannot be bothered.

My heels were still the only noise in the streets, clicking with each step, and echoing through every dark alleyway and through the dead and silent streets that surrounded me.

It wasn’t right, it was just impossibly quiet; there wasn’t even the sound of stray cats in the alleys fighting over a sewer rat, there was nothing.

Struggling to think of anything other than the fact that there was no noise anywhere around me, I crossed the street, without even bothering to look and see if there was any traffic.

My heart began to race.