old wounds quietly bleeding

leaving behind a trail of unresolved heartache and longing

Outside, the sky had begun to deepen into indigo. The Four Forty-Four exhaled a soft creak as it settled—the same way an old cat might sigh before it fell asleep.

Fenner muttered something under his breath. “It better not be starting any shit.”

He glanced at the creaking window frames, then at Orrin. “No more nonsense tonight,” he said, pointing his cup of tea like a warning. “If something starts humming or talking or—gods forbid—entering my room to choke the shit out of me—yes I’m talking about that plant—, you deal with it. I’ve earned a full night.”

Orrin didn’t bother to look up from his letters. “Your rest is sacred.”

“It better be,” Fenner grumbled. He got up then and crossed the room to the smaller set of stairs leading up to his own room, his steps an echo of someone who both expected to wake up the next morning and deeply resented that fact.

The shop dimmed itself in response, lanterns softening into amber. The hush that followed was not quite silence, but perhaps an attempt at an apology. Fenner, however, couldn’t care less and when the door in the upstairs room slammed shut, Orrin gave a clipped nod.

“You did tease him a little too much today. No wonder he’s done with you.”

The shop didn’t respond. But a lantern up in the wooden ceiling flickered once, petulantly.

Orrin shook his head and leaned back in his chair. The letters on the table stared back at him with the unblinking gaze of unfinished business—ink still fresh, words half-hearted.

He had no intend to reply to any of them, let alone read them properly.

Upstairs, the faint sounds of Fenner preparing for bed faded into stillness. A door creaked. A curse. The thud of something. More cursing, until finally—quiet.

For a while, Orrin remained at the table in the kitchen, twirling a mail opener between his fingers. Down in the shop, the booth hummed low and steady, like a heartbeat buried under floorboards.

Eventually, he stood.

The letters could wait.

“You know,” Orrin said, stepping carefully over a vine that had wrapped itself around the leg of a chair, “most plants climb toward the sun. Not toward their nearest possible victim.”

The ivy, for its part, made a lazy curling motion toward a stack of books. He reached to untangle another vine from the cupboard handle. “You’re lucky I like you.”

The vine retreated. But just slightly. Barely enough, to be precise.

Orrin poured himself a cup of tea from the still-warm pot—half expecting a stray leaf to try and sabotage the mug—and carried it to the worn window seat. Outside, the stars were beginning to show, distant and unaffected. The kind of night that promised nothing.

Somewhere below, a wooden board creaked.

Which wasn’t odd. The shop was old, after all. And yet…

Another creak. Then the faintest thump—like a small body hitting the floor gently. Not hard enough to be worrying. Just… unexpected.

He set the tea down and rose. Crossing the small distance to the apartment’s door, Orrin opened it, only to pause at the top of the stairs. The railing was warm beneath his hand, the wood alive in the way only the Four Forty-Four could be when it wanted something. The air smelled of dust, varnish, and something older.

He descended the stairs slowly, footsteps muffled by the runner rug that hadn’t been there yesterday.

On the bottom landing, he paused.

“What in the five heaven’s sake are you doing here.”

An arm length away from him, Little Sir Menace stood in the center of the cramped shop entrance. Completely still. Clay body angled toward the front door. His tiny arms stiff at his sides.

Orrin stepped closer, crouching to inspect him. His hollow sockets stared forward, one small hand clutching a button—a copper one. Not quite anything that was fitting to be part of the little knight.

“Where did you get this?” Orrin reached for it but Little Sir Menace jerked his hand behind his back.

Orrin blinked. “How did you get down here? I put you to bed long ago.”

But Little Sir Menace did not answer. He just stood there, facing the door, clutching the button. At a loss, Orrin rose again, slowly, alert. The air smelled different now. Not wrong. Just…false. Like parchment left in the sun too long, like a shadow crossing the front step.

And that was all it took. That and the sound of footsteps on old tile. Soft, measured. Familiar in the way nightmares are.

That’s how Orrin knew.

Not by the creak of the floorboards or the pull of cold air trailing behind him—but by the silence.

Grant stopped just short of the counter.

“It still smells like you,” he said. Voice low. Indifferent. Orrin exhaled through his nose, only giving him a quick glance before he focused on Little Sir Menace again.

“That’s the cinnamon. Fenner says it keeps the moths away.”

A beat of silence.

“Fenner?” Grant asked, tone not so indifferent anymore.

Orrin looked up.

And there he was indeed; Grant—the same, and not; stern-eyed, pupils sharp with cold anger, dark hair —that wind-tossed ashen tone Orrin had yet to find in anything again— dressed in his uniform—black pants, black shirt, a cloak. That very same cloak Orrin had once mended, the stitch still crooked at the collar.

Orrin swallowed what felt like glass.

“You’re early,” he choked out. “Shop won’t open until another couple hours.”

“Didn’t come to deliver,” Grant said. “Who is Fenner?”

Orrin shrugged. “A Harbinger appointed him to my shop. He’s the new attendant. Not very happy with being here, but I suppose he’ll settle in nicely sooner or later. Not like he has a choice.”

Grant’s jaw ticked. “So. A human.”

“Yes.”

The silence that followed wasn’t loud. It was colder than that—sharp and thinned out.

Orrin moved to pick up Little Sir Menace, just to keep himself busy and his hands occupied. The urge to reach for Grant, to just have his fingertips ghost across Grant’s hands… it was almost unbearable.

The loss of a piece of his immortality wasn’t what worried him. His heart demanding, longing, starving however…

He cradled the knight against his chest but Little Sir Menace gave no reaction, the copper button hidden behind his back like it was classified knowledge.

“I wish I could say it was you, but he’s been behaving like this since I came down here,” Orrin muttered under his breath.

“That’s new,” Grant said.

“What?”

“You explaining yourself before I’ve asked.”

Orrin straightened slowly. “Well. You used to know what I meant without asking at all. Not anymore.”

Grant’s jaw ticked again. “Well. You used to mean what you say. Not anymore.”

And there it was.

Orrin’s hand twitched. He was glad he was holding Little Sir Menace. Otherwise he might have grabbed the man and shaken him until that cold, stern look dropped from his face; until he could see his Grant. The man with a smile like a crescent moon and eyes as warm as sunlight in a mirror. Grant who’d wrap his arms around him whenever possible, Grant who’d kiss his neck, his wrist, and his forehead just because he has a second or two to spare.

Grant stepped closer to the counter. His presence was wrong in the shop—not incompatible, just unwelcome, as if the walls couldn’t quite hold him. Like someone wearing funeral black to a birthday party.

And Orrin, despite wanting the man closer, warmer, softer, couldn’t help but wishing he would leave.

Seeing him now, after he had helped him when he had collapsed… well, it hurt. And it started to feel pointless.

He’d had a long, tough day. He wanted to rest. To hole up in his room, tend to the cut on his chest from when the collector had collected the price, and then he wanted to fall into his bed and close his eyes.

Just for a little.

Just until he stopped hurting.

Orrin’s throat was dry. “Is there something you came here for?”

“You wrecked our house,” he said. No accusation. No heat. Just truth, unwrapped and handed over.

Orrin couldn’t deal with that tonight. He was tired. Hurting. And now not only physically anymore. Like he needed more pain, right? There was no moment where he could draw back and rest. Fenner needed someone to act like everything was under control. The man was a human. And the shop, while not unkind, was not exactly kind, either.

He really needed a break.

Orrin closed his eyes. “That’s hardly business.”

He hated how his voice trembled. How his breath hitched and how bitter the words tasted.

“You don’t even say we anymore,” Grant said coldly.

“Because you left. There’s no we. How low do you want me to sink until you’re satisfied?”

That did it. A crack in Grant’s mask—so small, it could’ve been imagined. But Orrin saw it. Knew it. Had lived with the ghost of that expression for centuries.

“I left,” Grant said, “after you picked a coffin with a door and called it a home.”

“It’s not a coffin.”

“No?” Grant’s gaze swept the shelves, the quietly whirring booth, the wood beams that bowed inward like a ribcage, until they briefly rested on the painting of Illo and Beau. For a heartbeat, Grant’s eyes were full of longing, hunger even.

“It sleeps. It breathes. It eats your hours and devoured your heart. What else would you call it?”

“Nothing left for it to devour. You tore that apart.”

Grant flinched—so severely, as if struck by a hand, that Orrin regretted the words the second they landed, but he didn’t take them back. Not because they were fair. Just because he didn’t know how to say ‘I need you please don’t leave again’ without it turning into another fracture for the both of them.

“I tore it apart?” Grant said, voice barely above a whisper. “I wasn’t good enough for you, obviously. Because you needed this. The rotten, little corner where humans come to for a pick-me-up.”

Orrin’s laugh came out crooked and wet. He shook his head, eyes suddenly burning, and he turned away, setting Little Sir Menace gently down onto the counter like something too precious for his shaking hands.

The tiny knight stood between them, one small hand lifted like he might ask them both to please, stop.

But they didn’t.

“You left,” Orrin said again, voice hoarse. “You didn’t say a word. Not a letter. Not a whisper. I waited. But all I ever get is your anger, your frustration; you looking down on my shop, my duty.”

Grant’s hand curled at his side, knuckles white. “You were too busy to bind yourself to this—this thing. This shop that will never love you back.”

“It doesn’t need to love me,” Orrin snapped. “It needed someone to stay. Someone to clean the blood off the door and sweep up broken magic and hold people’s hands. Someone had to take it. And in case you didn’t notice after all those hundreds of years: Your name is far higher up in the alphabet than mine. Go figure.”

That silenced them both. For a moment, the only sound was the hum of the booth, the faint creak of wood shifting overhead like the shop itself was listening. And Little Sir Menace, who shifted and tumbled, holding out the button between them.

Not to Grant. Not to Orrin. Just... there. But neither took it.

Orrin braced his hands on the counter, trying to breathe. Then Grant spoke again, and his voice had lost its blade.

“There’s blood on your chest.”

Orrin didn’t respond. Just closed his eyes.

Grant stepped closer. Not all the way. Just close enough for Orrin to feel the shift in air between them. Close enough that if he reached out, just a little, he could—

“Back off.”

“I didn’t come to fight,” Grant said, softer now.

Orrin opened his eyes. He looked at Grant, really looked—at the still-crooked stitch in the collar he had once sewn himself, the faint shadow under Grant’s eyes, the tight line of his mouth that, once, used to smile so easily at him. He looked like a ghost. Not the kind that haunted houses but the kind that was haunted by a choice.

“The things from the list are labeled. You’ll find them somewhere here. The booth remains.”

With that, Orrin hastily reached for Little Sir Menace and strode up the stairs, fleeing into his apartment. He locked the door once, then twice, before he slid down against it, hands trembling.

He didn’t move for a while —couldn’t—and Little Sir Menace rested in his lap, limbs slightly askew, hollow sockets tilted toward him as if in question.

“I know,” Orrin whispered. His throat hurt.

He let his head fall back against the door with a soft thud. The wood was cool against his skull, grounding. Everything else felt distant—like he was watching his life through a pane of fogged glass. He could still feel Grant in the air. In the hum beneath the floorboards. In the not quite closed door downstairs.

Why did it hurt like that? It hadn’t in hundreds of years. Was it really only because of the punishment for gifting Illo and Beau eternity?

Orrin lifted his shirt just enough to inspect the wound. It wasn’t deep. Just shallow enough to be ignored until the sting began to pulse with his every heartbeat.

If he was lucky he’d be asleep by then.

He didn’t know how to heal the cut. The words of a collector were sharp, they carried an edge unknown. They either spoke to soothe or to harm. And in this case, it had been the latter.

He sighed and finally stood, placing Little Sir Menace on the shelf beside his kitchen window. “Keep watch,” he murmured, and the little knight nodded—no movement, no sound. The ivy had taken over half the room in his absence, clinging possessively to the bookshelf, the kitchenette, any cupboard in reach, furniture, and its newest tendril was reaching for a mug left half-full on the windowsill.

Orrin sighed. “You know what. I’ll call you Lord Stranglewood. Now stop attacking my apartment. You’ve got your name.”

The plant made a faint whish-sound as it retracted, a pouty motion—if Orrin had ever heard a plant do so.

“Do you like the name?”

There was no reply, but some of the leaves gently moved in a non-existent breeze, as if dancing.

“I suppose you do.” Orrin muttered into the silence as he prepared tea. Not because he wanted it, but because it was what you did when your hands needed a task and your heart was caving in.

Grant was still downstairs. He felt it. The way the air was slightly charged, how the hairs on his neck and arms stood up, the faint smell of chimney smoke in cold night air…

He was right there. A couple steps, a staircase away. If he’d rush down… apologize…

The cupboard door sighed and so did Orrin. Until sighs turned to sobs.

He set the kettle down harder than necessary.

What was he doing? He hadn’t cried in decades. Not when their house had written its own ending. Not when Grant had walked away without a word, like he was scum; a shame.

Not even when Illo had looked at Beau on that seat by the fireplace; like he was something tragic and beautiful and worth every sacrifice.

But now… now the sting behind his eyes was unbearable. Pathetic.

He’s just downstairs. Just there. Standing in a shop he hated but still served; down there, beneath lanterns that dulled their glow like eyes refusing to look at him.

Orrin dragged his thumb across the chipped rim of the mug.

It hadn’t hurt like this in hundreds of years.

Why now?

Orrin gripped the edge of the counter until his knuckles went white.

He’s still downstairs.

He could still call his name.

It would be so easy.

‘Grant’—just the one word. Just the sound of it in the air again, between them and the night and a starry sky. He could say it softly; the way he used to. The way Grant would hear it and turn, just turn and look at him like that again.

But he didn’t.

Instead, he poured the tea. Slowly. Hands trembling. Quiet tears burning his cheeks.

The cupboard door sighed again, as if disappointed, and Orrin sat there, in his small, dark kitchen, a breath away from breaking; old wounds quietly bleeding.

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