Dion shot open the door. It hit the wall and indented itself. The nun had to walk to it, close it and inspect the doorknob shaped hole. She rubbed her face. The lights shook with his presence as he strolled through the kitchen. His stride was tall and quick. A slight optimism was in his hips as he swayed stiffly through. Apollo watched him, and how the fireplace fluctuated as he walked by and away, towards his room. He waited for the door to slam up above, waited for the house to settle to a natural still state, before he lifted himself from his rocking chair.

"What's gotten into him?" The nun asked.

"He’s been going out lately. It’s better than being stuffed inside."

“Going out doing god knows what.”

“As long as he stays out of trouble,” Apollo said.

“Do you think he’s staying out of trouble?”

“What do you want from me?” Apollo asked. She frowned. He could read that face, the scrutinizing, hostile, patronizing face.

“I don’t want to prod. He’s already in an unstable metal space-”

She strained it further. So tight, he was afraid she’d compress herself into a black hole. Hopefully, she’d take him out too.

“Alright, I’ll ask a couple questions. That’s it.” Apollo followed up through the steps, making sure to hit every creaky plank on the way up up. He opened the door, with tamed curiosity at first as. He just wanted to know if he was possessed, if he had gone insane. He eyed the inside of the room, scanning it and spotting Dion who sat in his little chair. Rocking up and down, not turning his bible.

"We need to talk," Apollo said, he opened before he knocked. Dion sat there, talking to himself? Writing something? He had his back to Apollo. Apollo, now growing more anxious, took a step inside the dim room.

"Are you alright?" He asked again. He walked towards Dion who fumbled with something.

He stepped closer, his footsteps making no noise on the steps on the floor. He wasn’t equipped for a fight, not that he expected one, at least he told himself. He had only one arm, no reach, his eyes barely adjusted to the darkness. That fire had made him too comfortable, he thought. Had relaxed him too much. Dion kept rocking. His heart beat faster, his eyes turned crimson with a blink. He grabbed Dion by the shoulder.

Not a movement. He stopped rocking. Dion fidgeted with his hands. Apollo turned him, slowly. He was ready. Manic depressive? Apollo thought. From happy to sad, he had seen it (in dreams, which he didn’t understand still) in Astyanax. The comparison made him flex his muscles. He turned him. The chair scratched the floor. He was ready for a fight. And Dion. Dion-!

Was counting money.

“I found fifty more,” He mumbled.”That won’t cover anything…Maybe she’ll still take it. Maybe if I can just talk to her...”

“What’s wrong with you?” Apollo asked.

“Huh?” He looked up and leaned away from Apollo’s breath.

“What are you doing?” Apollo looked at the euros. “I gave you that yesterday. I thought you spent it on something stupid, you didn’t come home with groceries after all.”

He reached for the money. Dion shot his hands away.

“I need this.” He said.

“For what?”

His eyes went in circles, he was lying. He didn’t want to be hostile though, not intentionally at least.

“I’m…” He said. “Trying to get some souvenirs. I want to remember this city by, I want some good memories.”

“You can buy a postcard.” He tried again. Dion moved into the other direction. “You’re going to play like that?”

He had an upper hand, one to be exact. He couldn’t compete against the agility of a two-armed monkey like Dion. He sighed and went for the light switch. The room had a certain grit to it, a darkness that hid in the underbed and the closet and outside, in the overgrown pine forest, like tangled wild weeds.

The light struck him. He looked away for a second.

“Why were you running like a madman up here? What’s got you excited?” He knew he was only supposed to ask one question. He couldn’t help himself though.

"Oh, that," Dion said. He fumbled his wallet.

"Don't oh me." Apollo said. "You scared the shit out of me, I thought you were going to do something..." He looked up to the ceiling beam. The wood chopping axe somewhere in the closet. To every sharp and deadly thing. “Something...bad.”

"Like what?"

"I’m the one asking questions here," He crossed his arms (arm). “What’d you do yesterday? What are you planning tomorrow?”

“It’s none of your business.”

Apollo outstretched his neck, for there was pressure there. A headache in the making. He knew what that face was, the mischievousness of it. Refreshing, in a way. He wondered if it was even wrongness if it was that naive a sin.

“Are you breaking any rules?” Apollo said. “Just answer me that. You’re an honest man, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, I am,” Dion said. “And honestly, I am. I am breaking a rule. Maybe.”

“Why shouldn’t I stop you then?”

“Because it’s not immoral,” Dion said. “I don’t think so, at least.”

“You’re breaking a rule but it’s not immoral. Which rule is it?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Which rule is it.” He repeated with more vigor.

“You won’t let me go if you know,” Dion said.

"If it's that bad, why the fuck would I let you leave then?"

"Because I need it," Dion said. His face went still. "I think if I stay in this room, reading this bible, I might just go insane.”

"Fucking around isn’t a solution. Us talking this out is, getting it in the open. Exposing the light -"

"You can't talk things out of being bad. It helps, I know. And I'm grateful," Dion said. "But if there's anything I learned it's that my problems can’t be answered through a talk or a book. I need to go search for them."

"Can you at least give me a clue at what you're getting at? All you've told me is how bad a spot you’re in and how good this thing is for you -" He closed his eyes in realization. “Oh no,”

He looked at Dion. At his nervous face, at the anxiety and joy.

“Oh, no. It’s a girl. Isn’t it?” He asked.

Dion stayed quiet. Apollo nodded his head. He hung by the wall and broke into a quick laughter.

"Oh fuck, not again," Apollo said. "Holy shit, you really want to get your head cut off, don’t you? Relationships with normal people is one of the worst things you can do. It's the fifth tenant of the damn rose code or whatever! Do not mix beasts and man!"

"Let the blood of beast and man be unyoked..." Dion corrected.

"So you do remember. Don't you? You ever hear the rumor of Emanuel the fourth? Hmm? How he fathered three kids! Three, with some girl from Slovenia, don’t you remember how it ended?”

Dion nodded his head though still did not speak.

“Two of the kids went insane - were born insane more like it. They killed the mom and the dad. The third son had to kill off his siblings. You can go talk to him, Emanuel the fifth. He's a Hospitaller and he'll tell you the wrongness of Human and Vicar offspring. It’s just a nasty combination. You can’t expect a half-demon and a normal person to bring about anything decent. It just doesn’t happen.”

“So? I’m not even having, you know…” He whispered it. “Sex, or anything. It’s just a thing. A friendship.”

“A friendship, you? You’d stick your dick a tree stump if it said hello and smiled at you." He shook his head. "Think about it, Dion. A girlfriend? That’s decades in prison and given our record, more like a quick death sentence." He wanted to start laughing. It just sounded so terrible, so terrible a thing to die over. Dion furrowed his brow. He was getting angrier.

“You’re going to kill us for some tail?”

"It's not like that," Dion said

"Would you wear a condom at least?" Apollo slapped his chest, where the laughter was building up hardest. "Who am I kidding, you're Catholic."

"It's not like that!" Dion stood up, the Bible fell from its desk down to the floor. "And I'm not Catholic anymore, either." He raised his voice as if to add a humph to the claim. Apollo stopped giggling. He got himself off the wall. The air smelled of smoldering wood and of hot cocoa.

"Everyone is so fucking sensitive nowadays, what's your problem? I was just joking." He said. “About the condom part, not about the us-dying-a-quick-death part. I can see the guillotine now.”

He rubbed his neck out of reflex.

"Well I'm not joking," Dion said. "I'm trying to help someone, I don't need you harassing me while I do it."

Apollo stood, silent, awkward in the middle of the room with the light now showing the sweat coming off his forehead.

"Help? You sure it helps?” He stretched his arm out and let them fall to his side. “Alright, alright. Do whatever the fuck you want then. I don't want to hear any bitching when you need my help, though.”

“I won’t need it.”

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“You won’t get it.”

He walked out. The nun watched, from the bottom, having heard most of it. Having nodded her head, shamefully, to most of it. She waited for him at the bottom of the stairs.

"You're terrible at talking." She told Apollo. He walked past her, towards a hatchet shoot, a little square door leading to a room at the bottom, underneath the steps. He broke it open and moved quickly inside. He bumped his head. It only made him angrier. He tried to find space on the air mattress he had set up there. His feet dangled outside, from the little square space, out through the latched door, like a troll underneath his bridge.

"What's his fucking problem? He was crying just yesterday," He said. "I was trying to help."

She walked over to him and looked down at him, the little woman somewhat imposing with her shadow cast over Apollo.

"I'm sure he appreciates it. But he has to figure things out by himself, too. You can't keep sheltering him. That's not good either."

"Sheltering him? I’m rehabilitating him. Just a week ago he was breaking into sweats and seizing into paralysis from every loud noise. Now he’s metabolized that strange behavior into some sexual fuckery and I don’t know what’s going on in him.”

“He’s trying to make a friend. It’ll help him clear his thoughts, you know, think.”

“Yeah, he’s thinking alright,” Apollo said. “Thinking with his dick.”

She made a bitter face again. He opened his mouth and shut it quickly, he had to censor himself around her, he knew it.

“How’s a fling going to help him?”

“Didn’t you listen? It’s him helping her, that’s how he’s dealing with his trauma,” She said. “He wants to help others to help himself.”

“There’s a fine line between selflessness and self-sacrifice. I don’t want him fucking around if it’s only going to do him more harm in the long run.”

“If he can’t see or feel or hear God in the Holy book, then he’ll do it through the hearts of man. For where else is God if not in you and me? He’s trying to find God, let him.”

“Who the fuck are you?” He asked. “Walt Whitman?”

She touched his leg. It was comforting. He hated that.

"He’s on his own. There are bigger problems I have to deal with.”

She smiled.

"Your plan and his are both the same, you’re just...seeing the road differently is all.”

“Yeah, sure.” Apollo said. “A road already determined. A road we’ve been on. A road we’ll be on. Forever and ever…” His eyes narrowed. “Excuse me.”

She smiled and closed his door. He tucked his feet in and turned on the little light bulb clinging on the under-staircase. He had papers scattered about him, books. In one hand he put a translators dictionary, on the other, the newspaper.

“I’ve lived this life a thousand times before and I will live it a thousand times more,” He whispered to himself. “So remember,” He compared the letters, “What happens next?”

The paper read, in small print, somewhere on the sixth page, away from inattentive minds,

‘Mord in Club’ it said. He followed the words to their appropriate place, sifting through the papers, trying to keep the thoughts of Dion and of his lover, and of the danger felt coming towards him. A nervousness that had followed him since Dion opened the door. He translated it,

‘Murder in the Club’ and sighed and put the pages to rest, wishing Dion had listened. Wishing him to stay away from it all. He couldn’t sleep for hours. Until, perhaps, he just became too bored of the echo of his fearful thoughts. He slipped, only for a moment, and went into that snoozing sleep.

He dreamt of swans.

•

“Don’t wait up for me, I won’t be home early,” Dion said to the wind that blew past him. His dark hair split at the middle.

It was barely a goodbye. He just took his coat, counted the euros in his wallet and ran straight into the morning snow. It wasn’t enough to pay for the damages, he knew. But maybe it was enough to reason his coming to the market. He stretched out his legs as he went through the snow. He didn't even take his little bible of which he was getting bored of.

He was torn a bit, as he waded through the crowds and maneuvered past the flocks of tourists in their small carts and cars, for though he was obligated, he was also happy. Happy, even, to have ruined the girl's stall (he still didn’t know her name, he’d get it this time), for it brought him the opportunity to meet her. He smiled at the thought. For a moment, only because then he had to think about what scared him; the obligation. Because obligation reminded him of duty, and the pain those kinds of principles got him into. It was familiar, familiar mistakes from old days (still young). It was enough to even his face out. But he trudged along anyways. Hopeful to meet the girl.

•

She waited at her stand. Around her were the little pottery trinkets, with no sheen or gloss for they had not been shined properly, for there was no time to shine them. These were not intended for sale, not yet at least, but had been forced on the market. Stefanie sat on her stool, both legs dangling as she watched with woeful eyes for people to come up, for people to walk by the little blue tarp topped stall, for people to say in a low whisper, ‘those are ugly’.

She sat there, her hands clasped together and her head falling down at the snow-covered concrete. She couldn’t fake a smile. He watched from a distance, an abrasive feeling hurting his hands. He must have gone back and forth half a dozen times before he decided to speak to her.

“I’ll take all of them,” Dion said.

She turned her head, hopeful for only a half of a second. But as her eyes adjusted to the sun covered figure, all hope seemed to drain from her face. It went back to glum, her blue eyes narrow and her lips thinned and sucked in.

“Are you here to finish the murder? This is all I have left,” she said. Dion stood there, sweaty, with his hands shaking in his pockets, as they moved closer to the woman. There were two hundred euros in his hands.

“That won’t cover even yesterday's damages.” She said. He kept his hand out. He couldn’t tell what face he was making, constipation or anger or nervousness, maybe it rotated through the three.

“Are you alright?” She asked.

“No,” Dion said. He shook his head. “I don’t feel good. I want to pay you back is all.”

“You won’t do that with two hundred euros.”

“What can I do then?”

“Nothing, you’re scaring customers away. So just leave.” She said. He looked down and moved to the side and of course, no customers came yet. And he posted himself, a full block away in the corner of the street thinking it was his presence. He stood next to a beerhouse whose drunk patrons came out in full jolly hand-swinging stupidity. They tried balancing bottles on his head and shoulders.

No customers came. Not for the hour he stood at least. He didn’t want to make a face, it came naturally. One of sympathetic sadness. She didn’t want to look at him, he could tell, by how often she looked away. He wondered if this whole thing would have been easier if he was drunk, and looking at a half-full bottle, he felt an urge to take a swig. He reconsidered when he saw someone, five feet away, vomit on the street.

People kept avoiding her stall. He wanted to scream something, encouragement, anger at the poor taste of customers. He decided against it again. All conviction was out of him today, he had to bear it just as she did. She closed and rubbed her eyes, and with apprehension, raised her hand. He felt tingles. For me? He thought. She gestured at him and he ran across the street. A Volkswagon honked at him. It almost hit his leg as it drove away, cursing.

He couldn’t help himself but run, though.

“You know you’re a creep, right?” She said. “I should call the police.”

“Why haven’t you?”

She rubbed the bridge of her nose and looked him over, up and down.

“Because you owe me,” she said. He tried to stop himself from grinning, he pinched his leg. He slapped his arms behind his back. Stop grinning, he kept repeating, stop grinning.

“Pay attention,” she said. He stood straight. Her accent was easier to listen to when she was angry, which was odd to him. “Here’s what you’re going to do, alright? Don’t mess this up. You’re going to go to the corner of that street, and you ’re going to pick up this sign,” she pointed to the red arrow to her rear with the smiley face. “And you’re going to flip that and spin it until you fool someone into coming over here.”

He looked at the poor showing in front of him. He didn’t want to say something, he had a feeling she knew anyway, that what held her back was the product not the brand or the advertisement.

He listened anyways and hoisted the sign over his hand and when to the corner of the street where traffic was greatest, with a hopeless optimism. He made sure to be cheery. To smile, to spin and dance. The cars zoomed past them, the families walked away from him. Children ran. The homeless sat, on the icy asphalt next to him, getting more business from their panhandling than he did attention from his sign spinning. He looked periodically to the stall, to the girl too. He smiled. She didn’t. The sun was coming up harder. His shadow stretched out, the snow blinded him with brightness. His eyes were dreary and used and weak. No one was coming. He thought.

“No one came,” He walked towards her.

“No,” she played with her thumbs. “Who would have want this shit?”

There was nothing left to say, the evidence of a failure was laid out before them like the aftermath of a war, the pottery, like beaten soldiers, sprawled out dirty and ugly looking. She sighed. Dion scratched his head. They both waited there, in silence, hearing the footsteps and cheap conversation to their rears. Stefanie was the first to start unraveling the tarp. Dion followed.

“You don't have to do this,” A pole fell down. He caught it.

“Yeah, I think I do.” he smiled.

“Can you promise not to break anything this time?” It wasn’t a joke. She wasn’t smiling. Her eyes seemed small, cautious towards him.

“You really don't like me, do you?” he asked. “I’m not surprised though. Not many people do.”

“Don’t take it personally. I probably wouldn’t have trusted you even before your little accident,” she said. “People always disappoint.”

“I have a friend who's just like you,”

“Must be a smart friend,”

“Sort of,” He rubbed his chin. “When he pulls his head out of his butt. Sure.”

She took down the tent, or rather it collapsed on top of her.

“Are you alright?” Dion rushed to take the cloak off her. The poles clanged as they hit the floor.

She struggled. She found a hole and let her head breath, her face was eerily calm. Collected, or perhaps empty.

“I’m fine,” She brushed him away. “Stop trying so hard. I’m just a stranger.”

“Sorry,” He blushed. “I’m a sucker. I don’t know what to do any time, but I always want to help. Like you said. I’m a meddler.”

The tarp looked like a tsunami wave. It rose high and overwhelmed her from the waist down. She flailed about, her hands pulling and grabbing until it finally sat on her feet, wrapped around, chasing the gusts that brushed past them.

“I don’t need anyone's help. I’ve gotten by just fine till now,” she said. “My problems are too big for you anyways, American.”

“Your big problems?” He scratched his head. “It was just a couple gnomes. A horse or two.”

She stopped and tilted her head. She looked over Dion, with curious respect.

“I don’t get it, what’d I say?”

“No, no.” she laughed. “This. This isn’t about the gnomes or the little toys or anything. No, my problems are worse than that.”

She came down from her high. Dion was still staring at her, still ruffling his face, feeling mocked by the second, mocked yet still eager to help. Like throwing your hands into a burning building, through the rubble. Hurting and still eager.

“Well, what are they?” Dion pressed. "Your problems?"

“Are you touched?” She asked. “Do you know anything about social cues?”

“What?”

She looked down at her table, her smile deteriorating like a corroded cliffside. She looked moody again.

“I barely know you,” she said.

“So?”

She looked off to the distance where the people wandered in happy, almost aimless, flocks. He could tell at least that she didn’t know what to say, which of course made him want to know what her ‘problems’ were even more. She sucked in her lips, thought to speak and closed her mouth again. This happened three more times, three more false starts before she rubbed the back of her neck and gave up.

“Listen, you said you wanted to help, right?”

“Yes,” Dion said.

“Then help me close.” She pointed to the gear sitting to her rear, the table (half folded), the lawn chairs, the boxes of fragilities.

“You want me to help you get home -”

“No.” Her eyes locked to his. They didn’t blink.

“Right, right. I don’t want to impose. That’s a little creepy of me,” He said nervously. “Sorry.”

She nodded her head though, yes, it was creepy. And it was only a half-truth, Dion could read it though he could not think about it. He had the gut feeling she kept something from him, perhaps it was all the time spent with Apollo and liars (were they different? He didn’t know) that made him easy to spot the shifting tones and weird hiccups of people caught in a lie. She was lying about something. He wanted to know. But he couldn’t impose, no. So he sighed and walked up to the boxes laying about and counted.

“Well, what are you waiting for? You’re a big boy, aren’t you?”

He smiled. She did too. Maybe she liked him? He didn’t want to start fantasizing, he kept the thought deep in his subconscious. He could not fantasize, could not romanticize. It was just a smile. Oh, a very cute smile from him.

Stop it, he thought.

She settled a heavy box down. It made a loud noise. Dion shook in awareness, he lifted a stack of four boxes. She seemed impressed, a little annoyed too.

She pointed him where to go and they went through, to a parking lot, where he fixed the boxes in the back of her car.

“What’s your name?” She wiped the sweat from her forehead.

He poked his head out, grinning, through the mess in her car trunk.

“I'm Dion.” His had to dry his hand and the thought of having to dry his hand made it even sweatier, more twitchy, more awkward.

“Oh,” she said. “I’m Stefanie.” She extended her hand (thank god it was her and not him).

And they shook hands, smiling, Dion too dumb in his pleasure to know when to stop. Too simple to know what was awkward. He just knew two things, nervousness, and pleasure, and lived in that moment for those two things. Which was refreshing for him, to finally put aside the mental space of all his tragedy and to finally have out of mind those scenes of Hell, all for a brief moment with a cute girl (she was cute to him, and that’s all that mattered) in this cold German winter. He shook. She had to separate herself. Oddly though, she didn’t seem that bothered. Maybe even a little flattered. And Dion, smiling still, rubbing his sweaty hand back on his pants, asked.

“Can I see you again?”

She thought about it, or maybe she already made her mind and just waited to make him nervous. She shrugged her shoulders, casually, looked to the corner of her eyes and said: “Sure.”

It was cold today, but he was warm and hot and happy.