I Won't Be Home This New Year

AURRA RALIN, WEEK 32 DAY 11, 23:55

    ‘Twas the night before New Years, and all through the apartment, everything was stirring, even the carpet. The cockroaches were starting to get cocky, no pun intended. I believe they had noticed that there was no longer anyone to squash them. I would’ve, but it would be rude to murder my only guests. Well, they were more like roommates at that point, they never left.
    They didn’t have the same numbers the week before, when Cassie was still living there. But she had left for some tour across MiddleGround, and I knew I should’ve been happy for her, and I was, to an extent, but I couldn’t help but be angry. She was all I had left, and she knew it. Every other person that ever cared for me had either died or just hated me for no good reason. Or maybe yes good reason. No, nevermind, that's not how grammar works.
    Anyways, back to Cassie. She was my  best, and, since I came out, only friend. She hadn’t even emailed me since she’d left, and I was fairly certain she didn't plan to come back. All of her stuff was gone, all but her air mattress that no longer held air and a polaroid picture her mom took of us eating mint chocolate chip ice cream—our favourite flavour—as kids that was taped to the refrigerator. I relocated it to the trash can and set  it on fire the morning after she left, after taking a couple pictures of it. I was mad, but not that mad.
    I knew we wouldn't always live together, but I figured she’d at least say goodbye before she moved on to her inevitably better-than-me future.
So she was gone, and it was just me and the roaches, at eleven fifty-five PM on New Years Eve. That's depressing, even for me. I usually had at least one person to hang out with, but I suppose I should’ve seen that coming. Life always slaps me in the face at times like that, always has, always will.

    After thinking about that little not-so-fun fact for a minute or two, I decide to stop staring at a dark television screen and move over to the table, grabbing an apple on the way.                         There's two reasons Cassie and I decided on this place: the absolutely breathtaking view of the city, and the incredibly low price. Which started to make sense about a week in.
    The view was almost worth the overall grossness though. Almost. It featured a beautiful outline of the city, which was absolutely beautiful at night when all the colourful city lights came on. Cassie and I used to sit and watch the sun sink below the skyscrapers almost every night, if she didn't have a show that is. Eventually she stopped watching it with me, always said she was too busy with practice or something along those lines. Always too busy for little old Aurra.
    Wait, am I crying? I thought, looking down at the wet spots on the table.
    “Oh!” I exclaimed. I never cried. Ever. I didn't even cry when my parents kicked me out.
    “Guess I really do miss her, huh?” I said to my insectoid roommates, blowing my nose on one of my old handkerchiefs.
    Technically they weren’t cockroaches, or insects. They evolved past the point of their earthen ancestors, who, I'd been told, only had six legs, not ten, and definitely weren't purple. Cockroaches hitched a ride with the Old Race when they fled Earth and almost immediately spread over Proxim (formerly known as Proxima Centauri B, but that name was way too long). The Council tried to get them exterminated, and in those days it was fairly cheap because they were still weak to the environment, but they tended to stick in Sector Three. Which was just plain rude, if you ask me.
    At least they were good listeners.

    After a couple hours of sitting at the table and watching my apple turn brown, I stood up and tried to figure out what to do next.
    “What would I normally do?” I whispered to myself, so quiet the roaches couldn't hear me. I scrolled back through my memories, remembering what I’d usually do in this particular situation. The first thing that came to mind was crawling into bed with Cassie, which immediately brought a fresh surge of tears.
    Eventually I stopped crying (I checked the clock, it took me exactly four minutes and thirty-three seconds) and decided to go for a walk. Which was probably a terrible idea, given that I lived in a crime-infested neighborhood. Oh, and it was New Year’s morning, which almost guaranteed that there'd be even more creepy drunk guys than almost any other time of year.

    Keeping this in mind I grabbed a stun gun/flashlight combination thing and made my way out the front door, locking it carefully behind me. Just because I had nothing worth stealing and I lived on the seventh floor doesn't mean I shouldn't lock my door; it was a good habit. A habit Cassie never could get into. She used to always forget to lock it, even after I gave her twenty minute lectures on why it was necessary.
    I made my way over to the stairway, which I was honestly surprised hadn’t collapsed since the last time I used it. The people who built it decided to make the support wooden and the stairs themselves some kind of metal, which was just a waste of precious resources if you ask me. Which, obviously, no one did when these were constructed. I didn't so much walk down the stairs as skip, due to the fact that I did not want to fall through a particularly rusty bit or step in what was hopefully old gum.
As I emerged from the stairs to hell into the pathetic excuse for a lobby I noticed a small cluster of cockroaches in feasting in the corner. I smiled and wished them a happy New Year. Will the manager have chased them off by the time I'm back? Hopefully not, they seem friendly, I thought. I frowned and shook my head, I hadn’t been alone long enough to be insane. When I stepped outside I immediately shivered, it was way colder than I expected. It was the middle of heat wave season, I should have been baking. I suppose the Christian folks of the world might just have got their wish, a white... Er… Something-mas.

    The area was oddly silent for a holiday, but I didn't really question it. This place was almost never what I expected it to be, anyways. The alley I used as a shortcut to the convenience store seemed even shiftier than usual, and I almost decided to walk around the block instead. Then I realized how much more time that would take, and I wanted to buy some hot cocoa before I froze to death, thank you very much.
    So, against my better judgement, I strolled on through. I wasn’t even smart enough to pull the flashlight out of my bag, so I ended up wandering aimlessly through a dark alley in a bad part of town(who am I kidding, they’re all bad parts) without light or protection. On the bright side, I had yet to run into anything.
    Okay, scratch that last bit. I’d just rammed into some huge blobby thing. Who in their right mind would leave a bag of trash this huge in the middle of an alley? That was punishable by three years in the Containment Sector!
My hands instinctively reached out to touch it, and what they found felt more like a bearded face than a garbage bag.
    “Oh,” I squeaked. I reached for the stun gun, only to find that the bearded man had stolen my bag and was digging through it. I tried to take it back, when another person grabbed me from behind and pinned me to his chest.
    “Not so fast, sweetheart,” he half-whispered. His breath smelled like tuna.
    I attempted to scream, but that didn’t work. Probably because he put his hand over my mouth. Biting would probably work, so I decided to try that.
He whisper-yelled a series of curses in both English and Mandarin. It worked.
“Hey!” I shouted as loud as I could, “Can someone help me? I’m being mugged!”
    “Shut up! We’re not mugging you!” Trash Guy whispered.
    “Well technically-” Tuna Breath started.
    “We were told to kidnap her, not mug her, so technically we aren't mugging her.” Rubbish Guy said. I think they forgot I was there. Running would probably have been a good idea at that point, but I was far too entertained. Instead I just listened intently to the goons’ argument.
    “Well you're digging through her purse!”
    “Only to make sure she doesn't have any weapons, not to steal anything!”
    “Oh sure,” Tuna Breath said, sarcasm practically dripping from his mouth, “you're obviously going to give it back to her.”
    “Why in the world would I do that?” Rubbish Guy asked, oblivious.
    “Because you're ‘not’ mugging her,” He held up air quotes as he said “not”. I couldn’t help but laugh, which immediately brought their attention back to me. Tuna Breath grabbed me again, this time picking me up and rushing over to a van parked on the other side of the alley.

    This was going to be fun.