TRACK 2: Bad Day 

> You had a bad day

> The camera don't lie

> You're coming back down, and you really don't mind

> You had a bad day

> You had a bad day

>

> - Daniel Powter

Yema wasn't sure why she'd taken a shower.

She wasn't sure about a lot of things, honestly. After her stomach had finally stopped trying to eject what had never been there in the first place, her brain had sort of switched to auto-pilot.

Time and space had blurred together into a dull drone of nothingness, interspaced with sporadic flashes of consciousness; a glimpse of cold water splashing onto her bare feet before running down the drain, the rough texture of a towel on her cheeks, the bubbling of water boiling in a kettle. They all felt disconnected from each other, like the fragments of a dream that you try and fail to piece together before the whole thing slips away.

It took the strong smell of instant coffee wafting up her nose to finally break through the fog in her brain. She didn't drink it, not fully trusting her stomach's ability to keep things down yet. But she did take it with her to the sofa, enjoying the familiar warmth and weight of the mug in her hands.

The 24/7 news streaming feed she'd left on had paused on its own, asking her if she wanted to 'continue?' or switch to what looked like an old compilation of cats in zero-gravity.

Because, of course.

For once, Yema was glad for that obnoxious message. She didn't think she could handle the news cycle right now. Not until this whole mess died down, anyway.

But the lack of background noise also meant a lack of distractions. The complete silence was oppressing, tightening around her neck like a noose. The urge to fill it with something, any kind of noise, was overwhelming. Anything would be better than being left alone in her small, shitty apartment with her shitty self and her equally shitty thoughts.

Feeling the tell-tale signs of a panic attack start to build up in her chest, Yema fidgeted, looking around for anything to focus on that wasn't that stupid tabby cat in the video's thumbnail. Without meaning too, her eyes shifted to the screen on her watch.

The last message she'd received was still there.

We have your address... Be ready in fifteen minutes.

The ominous words blinked up at her, black on stark white.

Yema glanced at the timestamp on the upper right corner of the screen, not too surprised at the fact that nearly an hour had passed since she'd gotten that message. But the tight feeling in her chest refused to go away.

Slamming the coffee down on the table, she hung her head between her legs and groaned deep in her throat.

"Get your shit together, Yema. It's just a stupid message from people who probably already forgot all about you. No one's gonna just barge in here and–"

The shrill, broken sound of her door chime rang behind her.

Yema let out a garbled, high-pitched scream and jumped out of the couch. She nearly tripped over the table, but in her haste to right herself she ended up knocking over the mug instead, spilling hot coffee onto her bare feet.

"Motherfucker!"

"Request accepted." The monotone voice of VALL, the in-building A.I., echoed throughout the apartment. "Activating intercom signal."

"Wait, no!"

Another voice joined in after VALL's. Though muffled, it more than made up for the lack of quality and volume in the audio with its sheer, unbridled rage.

"Yema, do you hear me? I know you can hear me. Open this goddamn door, you good-for-nothing lazy ass! I heard you screaming, so I know you're there."

Crouched down next to the table, Yema clutched the towel she'd pressed down on her feet even tighter and gritted her teeth to stop the frustrated scream that desperately wanted to get out. After a string of curses and a couple of deep breaths, she slowly got up from the floor and awkwardly hopped over to the door on one foot.

The person on the other side of the intercom was still yelling out threats by the time she made it there. The small screen on the wall next to the door showed a grainy, washed out video of the figure on the other side, but Yema didn't need the visual confirmation to know exactly who that distinct voice belonged to.

Still, she watched and waited a few more seconds, listening to the progressively more colourful insults coming in through the audio feed with a growing smirk on her face, before finally punching in the four-digit code on the screen.

There was a beep and a dull sound of something unlocking, before the big metal door slid open. Or at least it tried to, getting stuck one third of way with a screeching halt.

A hand, big and made of a crude metallic structure, shot through the gap, grabbing the edge of the door.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Great, you broke my door. Again!"

"Excuse me," Yema said, raising her voice to match the other's ear-splitting volume. "It's my door. And maybe it wouldn't break all the time if you actually did your job in maintaining this trashcan of a building."

Stepping aside, she raised her foot and aimed a hard kick at the flat, bottom edge of the door. The motion, coupled with a rough push from the metallic hand seemed to do the trick, forcing the thing to slide open the rest of the way.

But Yema didn't have much time to commemorate that small achievement, because as soon as the entrance was clear, the same hand from before shot out and grabbed the front of her shirt, yanking her half-way out of her apartment.

She was greeted by a large man, broad at the shoulders and thick at the waist, tall but still short enough that he had to yank her down so they could be at eye-level. Forced to bend awkwardly at the waist, Yema found herself inches away from almost smashing into the man's equally broad, rounded face.

Mr. Ramirez, who seemed more than happy to be within spitting range, raised his non-metallic hand to jab a finger right above her chest. "The only trash I see here is you."

"Yeah, well, takes one to know one!"

There was a pause. A full ten seconds of just heavy breathing and heated stares passed between the two, before Yema's hardened expression slipped up and she broke down into a fit of laughter.

The older man frowned, raising an eyebrow at her shaking figure. Sighing, he let go of her shirt and stepped back, crossing his big, mismatched arms.

"What's so funny?" he asked with a grunt, rubbing the black hairs of his goatee. "Finally gone insane, heh, baldy?"

It took some deep breaths and a couple of false starts for Yema to get anything intelligible out of her mouth and through the occasional bouts of giggles. But the feeling of light-heartedness that followed was more than worth the growing annoyance in her landlord's face. It was like a huge weight had been lifted from her chest.

She shrugged at the man. "I don't know, maybe."

Whipping off a lone tear from the corner of her eye, she stood at her full towering height, a smirk stretched across her face. "Guess I'm just happy to see your ugly mug of a face, for once."

The man scoffed, no real anger in the almost tired glare he threw her way.

"Then there really is something wrong with your head." The tan, scarred skin around his eyes crinkled with the barest hint of a smile. "Should I call an ambulance for you?"

"Don't have the money for that."

"Or for rent."

"Huh, right..." Yema let out a strained, dry chuckle, shifting from one foot to the other while doing her best to avoid the man's pointed stare. "Why did you decide to come scream at my door, again?"

The man perked up, the faintest of sparks lighting up his dark beady eyes. "Oh, that's right. Something strange happened."

Yema's whole body went rigid at those words. The faint echoes of her earlier conversation with Neil bounced around in her head as she searched the landlord's face for any hint of possible trouble for her.

"What do you mean?"

Mr. Ramirez's organic hand was back on his goatee. "Some lady with a weird accent called my number a while ago, asking for you."

His eyes were unfocused, clearly lost in his engrossing memory, so he didn't seem to notice at all when Yema's breath hitched and her hands balled into fists at her sides.

"What?"

"Yeah, pretty weird stuff," he said, though the heavy drawl in his voice made him sound more bored than excited about the whole thing.

"She knew your name and full address, but just wanted to know if you were," he stopped there, clearing his throat before continuing in his best impression of a high-pitched, pretentious female voice, "'currently inside or in the vicinity of this condominium building'... Or something like that." He shrugged. "I don't know, I don't speak snobbish."

"And you told her?" Yema asked, her tone low and careful.

The man didn't reply, but the heavy silence that followed and the way he averted his eyes was all the answer she needed.

"Goddammit, Javier, I though we had a deal!"

"Yeah, well, sorry." Mr. Ramirez spat out the word, left eye twitching, same as the crooked metal fingers on his right hand. "But there ain't no deal if you don't pay your rent on time."

Yema was about to retort when the man spun around, turning his back to her, and proceeded to just storm off.

"Maybe stop being a terrorist and a good-for-nothing low-life if you don't want reporters and cops on your ass," he said, yelling at her over his shoulder while giving her the middle finger.

For a brief second, Yema just blinked, brain still stuck on the fact that the older man had just decided to up and leave mid-conversation, and taking some time to even process his words. By the time she had an answer, the man was nearly at the end of the corridor, and Yema had to step further out of her apartment to keep him in her sights.

"It's called activism, you snitching oaf," she said, uncaring if her neighbours could hear her yelling bouncing off the corridor walls. "Learn the difference! I'm actually busting my ass out there on the streets, fighting for dying breeds like you."

Mr. Ramirez let out a loud, gross sound, somewhere between a snort and a laugh. "Takes one to know one, right?"

His large figured disappeared around the corner, but his faint, angry voice still managed to echo back to her. "I want my money by next month, you hear?"

"Fine!" she said, screaming and glaring at nothing but walls and empty space at that point. "See if I care when you get replaced by a robot. At least a walking tin can would be easier on the eye and actually fix my goddamn door."

She punctuated the last sentence with a well-aimed kick at the ridged edge of her metal door.

"Request accepted." VALL's voice echoed somewhere on the ceiling above her. "Closing door."

The door slid shut in front of her. All the way. Faster and smoother than a maglev train passing people by on a platform.

"Fuck you, VALL!"

With one last frustrated scream, Yema slumped back against the door and slid down to the cold, rusty floor. Drawing her legs up, she crossed her arms over her knees and buried her face in the tight, dark space she'd created for herself, all but ready to disappear.

"This day can't possibly get any better," she muttered.

Honesty, she regretted those words the moment they left her lips. She knew better than to tempt fate.

But that didn't stop her from nearly jumping out of her skin when something beeped in her ear. Sitting up straight, she noticed the blinking, pulsating blue dot on her screen and the 'new message' text that followed.

Forgetting how to breathe altogether, Yema brought a trembling finger to the screen. It hovered there, in hesitation, for what was probably just a couple of seconds, but ended up feeling like a lifetime to her.

Finally, she sucked it up, gritted her teeth and tapped the screen to open the message.

Your ride is here, Miss Alade.

Before she could even process that text bubble, a whole new one suddenly popped up beneath it.

Go to the roof.