Cowboy Bebop Fan Fiction ❯ Smoking Lessons ❯ In my room ( Prologue )

Smoking Lessons 1/?

By Nix

Waking on the couch felt…. Normal, so normal, just like it had always been and for a few minutes, he just lay there, letting himself feel at home. His mouth felt.. empty, but he resisted opening his eyes. He felt lucky, as if he'd avoided a really bad hangover somehow. A smirk slipped onto his face, hide his eyes with the arm nearest the back of the couch. The white satin felt cool against his skin, smelled like.. he searched his mind for the right word, like cinnamon, and felt completely and utterly… not him. He wrinkled his nose and sat up, way too fast, and pain like his belly was being opened with dozen manual can openers all at once. He snarled at the pain and swung his legs over the side of the couch and glared at the white satin pants. That was just wrong! Not that he could explain why, but it was wrong.

Worse, his fingers wouldn't stop twitching on his left hand. It was kind of surreal to just tilt his head and watch them. Forefinger and middle finger kept opening and closing as if they could catch something between them. His whole hand wanted to spasm in complaint of wanting something that he just didn't know what. In frustration, he smacked his chest where there was nothing but white silk now, but in his own clothes would have been inside jacket pocket where he kept his cigarettes. Now, there was just the impression of a crane in silk. His nose twitched and he caught just the glimpse of red hair and spying green eyes slip behind the other couch.

"Um." He said. That person, he felt.. like it was a girl. He ran a hand through his hair, scratching and shaking the green fluff back up to something that felt more … homey. Oddly enough, an orange, he felt oddly pleased with himself for knowing what to call it, and more than a little worried that he felt proud of that, but anyway, an orange rolled from behind the other couch towards him and he reached down and caught it. Those green eyes poked over the couch again, and the hair stood up on the back of his neck. Whatever else was true, he did not like being watched. "This for me?"

From behind the couch there was a, "Uh uh.!"

He sniffed it and felt some kind of possessive instinct over the orange then. Though, he wasn't sure he really liked them and he had the slightest shadow of memory that someone had made him angry over an orange and the couch. The anger didn't feel… bad though, not uncomfortable. It felt familiar. It felt 'him' somehow. He opened the orange with his teeth and started peeling, trying to look like he was focused on the orange, while he was really watching for the green eyed kid to stick her head back out.

The ship he was on seemed to be in a night time cycle with just him and the green eyed kid awake. It seemed like a beautiful opportunity and the smile that slipped across his face seemed to drip a wicked satisfaction deep into his soul. He scratched the back of his head and then ruffled his hair again. It was just too not right with it all neat and orderly. He wondered, as he stood up and started to stretch, the whole peeled orange already in his mouth, if he was maybe a pickpocket, at least that's what came to mind, that this feeling satisfaction was like having gotten real nice loot from someone's pocket.

He felt, free in a way, and lost in another. His mind was clearer than... than he could remember it being. Then he thought, measured, he could remember, really his memories started when he got to the top of the stairs of the room he was still in. That emotional woman and the tough guy, and he wasn't sure if they were family or not, but seeing them, that was the earliest memory he could find. The ship felt like home too, felt like he was on safe ground. He yawned and quite without thinking he slipped into a forward stance and moved through a very small blocking kata, the grace of which wasn't diminished too much by the orange in his cheeks. That felt so right, but when he opened his eyes and tried to repeat it, it was gone. He moved, but his arms found no favorite path, just an awkward flinging of long arms. Irritated, he shoved his hands into pockets that weren't there, and chopped his orange.. He made a face and quickly closed a couple of the frog closures, so his chest wasn't hanging out for all the world.

He was here in this place now, and he was going to look around. Obviously he wasn't a child and he wasn't born yesterday. He swallowed the second half of his orange and decided he felt like sin itself, but not really guilty, more .. cocky? He decided he didn't know if he liked himself or not, but anyone that self assured deserved the benefit of the doubt, so, fingers laced behind his head, he went back up the stairs he'd nearly fallen down earlier and went to look around.

Thinking about earlier, he remembered the look in the dark haired man's eyes, the way those fingers had almost caressed him and he made a face at the memory. Something damn tweeky was happening with that. When he didn't hear anyone following him, he turned and looked back into the living room. "Hey, kid, you gonna follow me around or what?"

"Okay!" She jumped up from behind the couch a dog on her head, of all things, spun in a circle and raced towards him. "Edward will go with Spike-person! Does Spike person know where he is now?"

Spike, he guess that was his name, but what kind of name was that? He thought his name ought to be … Stephen or Vin, Michael maybe.. something.. something that didn't sound like a syndicate hitman. He sure hoped this kid wasn't actually related to him either. She seemed nice enough, but not quite all there, and well, he sure hoped he hadn't had anything to do with that. "I'm here." He yawned, licked orange juice from his mouth. "Thanks for the orange."

"Yippeee!" Edward jumped up, spun, toes pointing, and Spike thought he might get dizzy just watching. "Edward didn't fail all the way! Spike-person knows what an orange is. What is Ein?"

Spike almost held his breath. He hated tests, especially ones that asked questions that were supposed to be answered in a foreign language. "Ein? Is that usually dark red, comes in bags and the expensive stuff in glass bottles?"

She snickered, and the dog on her head barked, not very loudly, just a small scolding yip. It made Spike look down at his finger, which didn't have even a scar, but he thought, he could almost feel that dog's teeth closing around his finger. "Peking duck. I wanted Peking duck."

"Ein is on top of Edward! That's Ein! Here! You hold Ein! Maybe you'll remember more! More more more more more more!!!! More is good!" She thrust the short brown dog off her head and into Spike's arms, which unbalanced them both, sending the dog clawing at his chest and Spike staggering back into the wall. Ein clawed at the pink scar on his belly and Spike yipped dropping to his knees and cursing in words even he didn't remember the meaning to. The Edward though was gone, run off down the hall and then down the hatch and Spike was .. grateful.

The dog whimpered and licked at him again, and Spike sighed, petting and feeling the softness of floppy ears. "She confuses me. How about you?"

"Bark," Ein said, backing up just a little, and Spike was half sure the snout was smiling, not snarling so, but just a little more expression than he would have expected from a dog. Dog!

"You're a dog. Do you have any idea what happened to me?" Spike sat there, legs wide and opened the white shirt to look at his belly again. It wasn't bleeding, but where Ein had clawed was red and it hurt. He touched, poking it gently, face screwed up as if he could expect at any moment to have some unpleasant memory to deal with, but nothing came. It ought to, from the look of the scar, healing wound, he wasn't sure which, but it really looked like something had tried to chop him in half. Someone had been pretty pissed at him, and really, that felt pretty right, felt quite true, and he thought, the echo of that was that he'd wanted to kill someone else too. "Say, Ein, do I look like a killer to you? Uh? Dogs don't hang out with murderers, do they?"

Ein barked again and walked closer, close enough for Spike to start petting him again. Ein remembered when Spike had veered away, brought his big red bird over to save Ein, brought him home, kept all the scary people away. Spike had done that, as far as Ein was concerned. Spike had saved him from the bad biting thing too. Spike took good care of Edward too and Edward was Ein's best friend, who didn't treat him as if he were less than all the rest of them. So, this time it was Ein that veered to save Spike, at least as much as he could. "Bark," he said, wishing he could figure out why Edward could understand him, but no one else could. Still, he trotted down the hall, and hoped that Spike would follow.

Spike got onto his knees, then pulled himself up the wall and decided that this whole weak thing felt WRONG. Not quite as wrong as the white suit, but more than enough wrong. Ein paused at the stairs and waited. Spike got the idea and hurried up, holding his belly as if that could do more than ease his subconscious. He picked Ein up and not too much longer they were at a door that looked more rusted than not, narrow and black. It didn't look like anything at all really. Ein barked. Spike grimaced. Worse, he didn't know how to open it. The handle seemed to have been taken off with a blow torch, on purpose.

He tucked his tongue between his cheek and teeth and considered… now what made sense? Intrigued, he ran his finger tips along the edge of the door, then down to the amputated handle, trying to think, or at least feel where it ought to open. He was sure that it did. It felt even more his than the couch, more his than anything else he'd seen, and frustrated that he couldn't get it open, he kicked it, hard, and that might have been a mistake in the white silk slippers he was wearing, but it opened, creaking like an unforgiving landing. Ein barked and jumped through the oval door and Spike followed.

Inside, he wasn't sure if he'd gone to heaven or hell. It smelled stale and salty, and delicious, completely and utterly delicious. His hand started twitching again and he brought his fingers to his lips, though had no idea why he wanted to kiss his own fingers. It made the inside of his teeth itch, this smell. He wanted something and he wanted it bad.

The room itself wasn't so great. A small mattress lay on some metal boxes. There was a small computer terminal near the head of the bed. The sheets were not quite as clean as the couch, but there was also a closet, which he opened reverently, as if the answers to lift might be in there. His heart beat, fast, fast enough to make breathing harder, as he reached out to flick on the little light.

It wasn't much. Three blue suit jackets, all pretty much the same. A couple tee-shirts, two pair of dark blue pants, a pair of shorts. To the side, covered in nice plastic hung a clean suit of the kind a martial artist might wear, flawless black, with a black belt hanging around the hanger. There was a pair of sticks with a chain between them hanging from a hook at the back and he reached out to touch them, throat closed off and tears slipping down his cheeks. He knew, felt deep in his bones that they were his, that his hands had polished the wood from using them, but he couldn't remember. He couldn't remember any of this stuff, even though he knew it had to be his. Squatting down he found a pair of boots, big and ugly, complete dirt kickers, and he smiled, pulling them out of the bottom of the closet. They were worn out, pretty much, the soles thing near the ball of the foot, and he threw the silk slipper off, slipped his foot in, wiggled his toes and came home one more time. His shoes, they were his shoes.

"Hey," a woman's voice said, and he turned from where he sat, back to the bed, one foot in the blue boot. "Cinderella."

"What's that supposed to mean?" he glared at her, at all the smoke around her face. She wore the oddest clothes, little more than shrunken shorts and a yellow halter top, held together with straps that were more suggestive than practical. It was really, the thing in her hand that held his attention… long and white, glowing at the end. Staring at it, he licked his lips.

"You want a cigarette? You only had two packs. I took them both.. sorry," She said, sounding like she meant it, "I thought you were dead, you know?"

"You thought I was dead," no, really he didn't know. "Why?"

Her mouth fell open, smoke curling over her lip, and then she snapped her mouth shut and glared at him, really glared, hateful. "You ought to know."

He swallowed and moved back to the closet to hunt for socks. "Anyone ever tell you that you're a bitch?"

She smirked, then laughed, drawing a long puff of the cigarette before holding it out to him. "You, all the time. Prick. You know, I'm gonna kill that bitch when I get my hands on her. Here, you finish it. It's the last one, unless we can get some off Jet." She held it out between her thumb and forefinger, a bit of lipstick on the end.

"What bitch," he asked, careless of his words as he studied the thing she was offering him. He swallowed and reached out for it, taking it with his thumb and forefinger too, licking his lips, not having any idea what in hell to do with it next. He brought it close to his lips, enjoyed the heat, but there was more to this, he was quite sure.

"Try with your other hand, idiot. You smoked with your left hand. Only person I ever knew who would shot and smoke at the same fucking time."

He looked down at his hand. Those fingers were scissoring again. He let them take hold of the cigarette, and even if the lipstick tasted wrong, all wrong, his body remembered what to do next and he sucked in long and hard on the thing she called a cigarette. He leaned back against his bed and held the smoke a minute, feeling, light and wonderfully happy at the moment Slowly he let the smoke back out, tucking his lower lip in and blowing it over and down, just like he had some fucking idea what he was doing. He wanted to thank her, but he needed to that again, just to be sure he'd remember it. The whole cigarette was gone before he felt comfortable opening his eyes again.

She was sitting there, on her knees, that so black hair hanging by her face, crystal tears running down her cheeks. He sure as hell didn't want to deal with that, but he grinned and ate the last bit of the cigarette, laid it on his tongue, let her see it and swallowed.

"OH gross! Oh Spike! You'll make yourself sick! You're not supposed to do that! Jet! He ate the cigarette! Oh my god, spit it out! Come on!" she had him by the open edges of his shirt, just about shaking him and he started to laugh, letting his weight prevent her from shaking him as he leaned back against his bed, head laying on the dirty sheets. He wondered only half concerned that she might straddle him and try giving him mouth to mouth or some shit. "JET!" She screamed.

After a minute the dark haired man appeared in the door way, a spatula of all things in his hand. "What is it woman?"

"He ate a cigarette! He ate the butt of my last cigarette!" She looked nearly hysterical and Spike wasn't sure he was okay with that, but figured it was just left over from whatever she thought he'd died from.

"Good," Jet said, smiling. "Sounds like he's back to normal to me. Spike, want some bacon and eggs?"

Spike hated to admit that he didn't know what exactly that was, but it smelled damn lovely. "I'd love some, thanks."

Some crazed impulse had him reach out and grab Faye's barely covered ass too. He hadn't even said thank you, though he really had thought it, and her eyes went wide and she slugged him, hard, right in the chest before stomping out of his room. He started laughing again, one hand petting the dog that had laid down beside him. Okay, so he definitely wasn't dead. Bringing the cigarette butt back up and out of his mouth, he decided, that maybe he was just really glad not to be dead. Yeah.