Corazon 4: Signs and Signals

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“It’s 2019, you know,” Lilith called from around the closet door. “Why are you still listening to stuff that was released in the 1980s?”

Caleb shook his head, snorting softly. He rested a hand on the record player. The needle scratched out Fleetwood Mac’s music. She wouldn’t get it. All of the sentimentality between the Vatore siblings had undoubtedly gone to him. “For the memories, mostly,” Caleb answered.

She was in the closet looking for something to wear. She’d told him what for, but by now, he’d forgotten.

He could ask. “Where are you going again?”

“I’m meeting Ines and Ella in the fashion district,” Lilith said. If she was annoyed at having to tell him again, she didn’t show it. Caleb loved that about her. “There’s a new bar opening today. It’ll be a good introduction to the city, you should come. We’re living here now and all.”

Yes, and he should get used to it. Caleb didn’t like San Myshuno. He was only here because she was, and if anyone asked him, they should’ve stayed in Forgotten Hollow. Everyone was safe from them when they were hidden away in the mountains.

Lilith decided she’d rather be in the city for whatever reason. Caleb didn’t hate it. It was that it was foreign and strange to get used to. Or maybe he was being old and stubborn. There might be a touch of crankiness in there.

“I’ll stay here,” Caleb said. “You’re the one that wanted to come here, not me.” Caleb reached over, stopping the needle and turning the record player off. Then, he stood up and moved into the living room, sitting on the couch and clicking through television channels.

He could almost hear the eye roll in her tone. “You came anyway,” she said. “I could’ve moved here on my own, but you insisted on coming.”

Caleb hated to admit it, but she was right. He could’ve stayed in Forgotten Hollow by himself. Lilith wouldn’t have made him sell the manor, so it would’ve been his, and nothing about his life had to change. Of course, Lilith would be gone. He and Lilith had stayed together since France. It’d be strange, not having her around anymore.

Caleb wasn’t interested in seeing what he was like when left alone to his own devices. He couldn’t imagine it’d be good. Caleb had a habit of falling into depression at random.

“I just miss our friends,” he said with a shrug.

Lilith snorted. “What friends?” she asked. “You’d be a lot happier if you got over the Hollow and you know it. And it’d be good for you to join the modern world now. Caleb, you can’t spend your whole life waiting for someone that’s never going to come back.”

Caleb’s lips flattened into a line. He glanced back towards her, and then turned determinedly towards the television. “I’m not,” he said.

Of course he was. How couldn’t he? Celio was a different person than Caleb was and that time was long over. And yet he still missed Ezio so much that sometimes it hurt just to breathe. Even if Ezio was alive, and Caleb had never believed he wasn’t, he couldn’t be the same either.

“Sorry,” Lilith said quietly. “I’m just worried about you. I’d like to see you move on and have a life again. It’s not good to live in the past like this.”

“He was my life,” Caleb answered.

Lilith released a sigh and moved to stand behind the couch. “He can’t be now,” she said.

Caleb shrugged. “I guess not.”

Some part of him wanted to believe that someone as intelligent as Ezio wouldn’t have been taken out, even by now. If anyone could outrun death, Caleb believed it was him. Spellcasters had a habit of simply not remaining dead, and figuring out how to make it through even situations and obstacles that seemed impossible to navigate. Perhaps it was done messily, but Caleb would easily bet his life Ezio still had his.

“I just don’t want you to keep living a half-life forever,” Lilith said. “It’s not good for you. Make new friends, find new things to be interested in, maybe fall in love with someone else.”

Caleb didn’t want to fall in love with someone else. Grey eyes looked over at Lilith. Her heart was in the right place and she had every right to be worried about him. If Caleb was any less depressed, he might have the mental presence to be worried about himself.

He reached over and took Lilith’s hand. “I’m fine, Lil,” he said. “It’s not like I’m unhappy. I’ve still got you, my career’s going places. Even if it’s not ideal to you, it’s just fine to me.”

“I would rather it was great, not just fine,” Lilith said and frowned. Her features managed to make her look like she was pouting when she frowned.

Caleb snorted softly and patted her hand before letting go. “You worry too much,” he said.

“I don’t think there’s a such thing as worrying too much when it comes to you,” Lilith said.

He wouldn’t admit it, but Lilith was probably onto something. He decided a long time ago, if there was an Ezio to find Caleb would find him. In his heart, he felt like if Ezio was dead and he was looking for a gravestone, he’d have found it a long time ago. He’d know if Ezio was gone.

Maybe he would’ve a long time ago. It’d been many years since Mortain, so many they could be measured in centuries. Still, Caleb liked to think that Ezio would’ve found a way to let him know he was gone. There were a few bonuses to falling in love with a necromancer. There were a few drawbacks, too.

“I’m fine Lilith,” Caleb said again. “I just liked things how they were. And I liked Forgotten Hollow.”

Lilith snorted, reaching out and ruffling his hair. “You only think you liked Forgotten Hollow. No one really likes Forgotten Hollow.”

“Vladislaus seems pleased with it,” Caleb answered, turning back to the television.

“Vladislaus may or may not count as ‘someone,'” Lilith mumbled under her breath. “Just, promise me that you’ll try not to get so focused on what’s gone that you miss what’s right in front of you.”

That hinged on Caleb caring what was there, as opposed to what wasn’t. It was much easier to think about what was gone than to focus on what remained. That was likely to be a depression thing, something Lilith wouldn’t understand.

Caleb had gotten all of the emotional range between them, and he knew that. She was different once. Lupita had been louder and bolder, but that was a long time ago and didn’t matter anymore. Lupita was gone, just like Celio was.

Caleb smiled and released a breath. “Try not to worry so much,” he said. “You live your life the way you want to live it, let me live mine.”

Lilith raised her hands slightly and then dropped them. “I’m not going to win this, am I?” she asked.

“I wouldn’t bet money on it,” Caleb said with a quiet smile on his face.

“Fine,” Lilith said and turned back around to return to the closet. “Red or purple?” she asked.

“Red,” Caleb answered. “You also look good in blue.”

“I have nothing blue. Red it is.”

~*~

Caleb knew that his clinging to Ezio’s memory the way that he did was very unhealthy. He clung all the same, even in knowing that, because for perhaps too long Ezio was the only touchstone he had. When Ezio was gone, very little crossed Caleb’s mind besides finding him again. Caleb may not have said it the way Ezio had, but he’d promised to find him someday too, in his heart.

He did hope beyond all reason that life had been kinder to Ezio once he was loose of Jean. It was difficult to say. When Caleb had finally gotten him free amid the manor’s invasion, Ezio was in his mid-twenties. He was sixteen when he’d come to the Dussault manor, a mess of hissing and spitting.

Caleb remembered the day they met almost as if it was yesterday. That was the day that had changed his life forever. He’d become almost a different person that day. That was the day he’d gained reasons to live. He’d gained reasons to move forward, even as he had no idea where he was meant to be going.

One of the two of them had to be the strong one. It wasn’t like Ezio wasn’t. He was the strongest person Caleb ever met, and when things went wrong, he was always the one taking charge. But he couldn’t be that strong forever, even as Ezio liked to pretend otherwise.

When it was just them, it was like a side of Ezio that most didn’t see, the side that was sensitive, kind, and vulnerable, shone through. Caleb liked that side of him. He liked that Ezio let him see it.

Quietly, Caleb focused on washing the dishes. The bar he worked in went through a lot of glasses, of course, and sometimes those glasses disappeared. Caleb wasn’t always set to washing them. The boss usually had him working the bar because he was popular with customers (particularly the ladies). Caleb’s heart wasn’t in it today. He was still attractive a personality when he was brooding but he’d rather be on dishwashing duty.

Dunk the glass into the soap water, scrub, rinse, dry, repeat.

The work was mindless, the sort of thing he could do in his sleep. Fortunately, he was very awake and quite present when he was at work, but his mind wandered. He may be there physically but mentally was another story.

Dunk into the soap water, scrub, think about Ezio for the fifth time in the last hour. Was he doing okay? Rinse the glass. Caleb could be lying to himself about whether he was alive or not. Dry the glass and repeat.

This was the story of his life by now. Even when Caleb tried to forget the dark-haired ghost of his past, Caleb’s thoughts always sooner or later returned to thinking of him. One would figure, after a few hundred years, he’d have forgotten him. It was true in a way. Caleb hardly remembered what he looked like now.

What he remembered, now, were Ezio’s bright eyes, so like Caleb’s own and so very different, and the sound of his laugh.

“Caleb!” someone shouted.

The vampire startled, nearly dropping the highball glass in his hand as he jerked around towards the sound. His boss stood in the doorway, looking somewhere between perplexed and concerned.

Caleb sighed. “Yeah?” he asked.

“You spaced out, that’s all,” his boss answered. “Are you okay?”

Caleb was quite sure he did space out. He always had a lot on his mind. Caleb shrugged a shoulder, and turned back to the dishes. Dunk into the soap water… “Yeah,” he said. “Washing dishes just isn’t the most exciting job, boss.”

“I can move you back onto the bar,” the bar manager answered.

“I know,” Caleb said, starting to dry off the glass. “Today’s an off day, though. It’s probably better that I’m back here washing dishes and spacing out than offending someone.”

“You can offend anyone you want,” the bar manager said. “I’d rather have a few offended patrons and a very good mixologist.”

Caleb snorted softly. “I’m not going anywhere, boss,” he said. No, he didn’t think he was.

The manager sighed, arms crossing and leaning against the wall. “I’ve noticed,” was the smooth response. “You’ve got to want something more than washing dishes in the back of a bar. Your talent is wasted here, Caleb.”

It was debatable if Caleb even had any talent. He spent his time working in the bar because it had late night shifts and was something to do with himself besides mope. Though his instinct was to withdraw from others, he knew that wasn’t the answer. It only made him feel worse.

Work existed to make sure he didn’t squirrel himself away and hide for the rest of his life, tempting though it was.

“I guess,” Caleb said. “I don’t want anything that leaving this place can get me.”

“Nothing?” the manager asked.

Caleb smiled. Whether he worked here, or somewhere else, made no difference in whether Ezio came back to him or not. “I had someone that was important to me, once,” he said. “Now they’re gone. Working here doesn’t change that.”

“I see,” the bar manager answered. Something scraped across the floor, and the bar manager sat in a stool next to Caleb, gesturing that he should hand the glasses over for drying. Caleb did so gratefully. It’d make the work go a little faster and perhaps he’d space out less.

“What kind of person was this?” the manager asked after a moment.

Caleb was quiet a moment, considering it. Then he raised one shoulder and dropped it. “Unbelievably kind,” he said. “I remember that the most. I remember how inspiring he was, and how his laugh could light up a whole room. No matter how much pain he lived with, he only ever became kinder. He never turned into the bitter person I expected him to.”

The manager dried off a glass and set it where it went to be stored. “Have you been apart a long time?” the manager asked.

Caleb nodded. “A very long time,” he said. It’d been well over two hundred years now, Caleb suspected, but he knew better than to tell his manager that.

“Maybe you’ll still find him someday,” the manager said. “I hope, if you do, he’s just as kind as you remember him being.”

~*~

Trudging into the foreign, too-modern entryway of their apartment unit was more depressing than Caleb had been expecting it to be. Every time he wandered in after work, it felt a little drearier than before.

Maybe they should get a cat. No. Lilith seemed like more of a dog person, and Caleb wasn’t fussed one way or another. It’d be less sad to come home to a dog trying to lick his face off, that was all.

Caleb closed the door behind him and tossed his keys onto the table in the entryway. Lilith wasn’t out, he found, as he went into the living room. Then he heard the banging from Lilith’s room. She was home, it’d seem.

Girls were weird. Caleb didn’t understand them, but he was beginning to think he wasn’t meant to. He sat down on the couch and watched the city lights out the window. Lilith and his boss were right. He’d spent too long focusing on things that were gone and over. He didn’t want anything else. He didn’t know how to want something else.

Caleb stood up, moving to stand by the window and crossing his arms.

“Ah, you’re home,” Lilith said, moving into the living room from the hallway.

Caleb looked over at her and smiled. “Yeah,” he said. “Maybe we should get a dog.”

“A dog?” Lilith asked. After a moment of silence she shrugged. “Maybe we should. I was thinking of enrolling in university.”

That was news to him. Caleb blinked and his eyebrows raised. He wasn’t aware she was considering something like that but it made sense. Lilith was better at most things than he was. Getting into university should be no concern for her. Whatever she wanted to do with her life, she’d be good at it no doubt.

Caleb smiled if sadly, and turned back to watching the street lights turn off as the sun came up. He felt like he’d died or something. Maybe that was why his lack of direction bothered Lilith so much. If their roles were reversed he thought it’d bother him too.

“What for?” he asked.

“Language and literature,” Lilith answered. “At least, I hope so. I’m not sure if my writing skills are good enough to get into the distinguished programme at Britechester, but I hope so.”

“You’ll get into it no problem, Lil,” Caleb said, looking over at her. “You’re talented at everything you put your mind to.”

“Aww, thank you Caleb,” she said. “I’m still nervous, but that’s really nice of you to say.”

Lilith moved around the couch to stand beside him. Her dark eyes, so unlike his pale grey eyes, looked down at the street. It would be autumn soon. That was Caleb’s favourite season, though he did have a soft spot for winter. (Of course he did.)

“Where do you see yourself in five years, Caleb?” Lilith asked, looking over at him.

That was a question for the ages. Caleb tried not to instinctively answer with ‘standing here at this window still wishing Ezio would come back to me,’ but that was the first thought he had.

That was pathetic, wasn’t it? He was coming to understand that. Maybe he’d like to work at a better bar. Or maybe he wanted to own his own bar. (Did he like bartending? He may not. How did one tell? That was a pathetic question, wasn’t it? He was full of pathetic this morning.)

“I don’t know,” Caleb said with a shrug. It was the only honest answer he had for her. “I don’t want anything to change Lilith.” His forehead tapped against the glass.

Lilith sighed, reaching over and taking one of his hands. “What do you want?” she asked. “More than anything in the whole wide world.”

Caleb snorted. “You know the answer to that.”

“Besides that,” Lilith said. “You’ve got to want something for yourself.”

He hadn’t the faintest idea. It wasn’t like he had a load of hobbies that he could potentially turn into a career, or even just decide one based on. What would he enjoy doing? He had no passion left to speak of.

Helping others was nice, but he didn’t think it was something that could be turned into a career, at least not easily. Sometimes Caleb sketched, but he didn’t think he was good enough to become an artist. He’d taught himself, and the only reason why is because he didn’t want to forget what Ezio looked like.

He’d forgotten anyway.

“I have no idea,” Caleb said. “I guess that’s a personal failing of some kind.”

“There’s time,” Lilith answered. “It took a while before I decided I wanted to be a writer. Maybe you just need to think about it some more. And friends to introduce you to new things.”

“I’m not interested in new things,” Caleb said, turning away from the window and moving back over to the couch.

Lilith sighed, dropping her arms to her sides.

“I’m just depressed again I think,” Caleb said, sitting down. “I’ll go away like it always does.”

Lilith was quiet for a moment, and then shook her head. “These episodes last longer, every time you have them.”

And what did she think he could do about that? He tried not to be annoyed by that statement. It was normal. She was worried, he was depressed for longer and longer. He’d considered therapy, but finding someone that could deal with some of the things he would inevitably say was harder than it sounded.

He was a few hundred years old, and could tell some very interesting stories. Even leaving out definite time spans, it’d become somewhat clear he wasn’t speaking in a modern time frame when he started talking about the right things.

Caleb needed more vampire friends, maybe. Lilith seemed to be doing alright with her vampire friends, but then Lilith always seemed to be doing alright in general. Anything related to her likely wasn’t a good metric to go by.

“I think it’s normal,” Caleb said.

“You think?” Lilith asked.

“I don’t make a habit of talking about my depression issues with strangers, no,” Caleb said.

“Sorry,” Lilith answered. “I’m just worried.”

Caleb sighed, sliding down on the couch and turning the television on. “I know,” he said. “I’ve lived with it this long. I’ll keep living with it.”

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