day twenty-one

She’s mighty annoyed, now, taking these deep heaving breaths and blowing up a storm. Watching the refuse skitter down the street as she tips things over; a power line came crashing through the window, startled me something awful. Calmed down pretty quick, and she didn’t like that, but she couldn’t do more than rage.

Like a storm assailing a stone. Seems pretty useless, in the end. I’m getting stubborn in my old age, I suppose; little self-deprecating, to say that. Homelessness, that ages you a good twenty years I suppose, so I’ve got all the right in the world and no right at all to say things like that.

Now, for hours, she just kept it up. Moving around, making the wind screech and blow windows in, and the shadows were moving like they were restless. It was a proper tantrum, let me tell you. I just sat, waited, stared out the broken window.

Eventually she calmed down, and that’s when I gave her what she wanted. Picked up the laptop – reasoned that if no one had come back for it in so long, it was free for the taking – and started tidying up the street a little. Set the overturned trash cans back upright, grabbed the litter scattered all over the street. Avoided the glass, it wouldn’t do to get a cut when there are no doctors in sight.

Didn’t take long, and soon, she looked as good as new. Pressed my ear to the ground, and listened to her breathe. She was calm, now.

day seventeen

The living city, she’s having a tiff with me. Every time I blink, she’s changed something. Trying to throw me off-kilter. She doesn’t like that I’m staying put, I don’t think, but she’ll simmer. Best way to deal with tantrums is to ignore them.

She tosses this little café this way and that way. Went to the washroom once and came out to find pieces of the floor were falling away, into black. Shadows fluttering in the corners, but I’m comfortable enough. I haven’t had a computer in forever. Let’s say, in my time they certainly weren’t light enough to hold in your hand. I can spend hours in front of it, and the power source never depletes. I have worlds at my fingertips, now, and you can’t get lost with the world in your hand, now can you?