She's going to be pissed. I should be flattered that someone like her wants to hang around, but I knew better than to let her think we might have a future together. We don't. Not even as long-term bang buddies.
She places a bagel on a paper towel in front of me at the breakfast bar, then turns to the counter to prepare hers. Who knew the rockstar was domesticated?
She has her back to me. “Do you work today?”
I take a bite of my breakfast. “Not that I'm aware of.”
She brings her bagel around to my side of the bar and claims the next stool, turning sideways to face me. Her pale bare legs intertwine with the legs of the stool. She's wearing just panties and one of the small, tight shirts. Her hair and makeup are a tamed mess. I would do her again in a nanosecond. But she has to go. My brain can't wrap around any other feasible option. I have two major issues. Problem numero uno: Silvia will go postal if she finds out about my escapades. I've kept them hidden so far, but it's really just a matter of time before she crosses paths with my guest. Problem numero dos: Syd is only going to tolerate my jerk off behavior for so long.
I would tell her the truth, but I can't. Literally. I never would have guessed how much of a problem that would become. This life is always full of unpleasant surprises.
When I was growing up, I spent a lot of time in the Walker household. Karl treated me as well as his own offspring, but differently. He would routinely ask my father what I weighed and how I was doing in my studies, like he kept track.
He probably was keeping track. Making sure I was good stock. Decent stock, anyway.
At the time, I didn't know any different. My father would leave me in the care of the mansion staff, sometimes for a week. Silvia and I have sparred since birth. I had no idea. Otherwise, I might have reconsidered busting a Lego USS Enterprise over her head when we were six. Or gluing the used pages of her journal shut when we were nine.
I knew my father had a “secret special job” but I didn't know what any of it entailed until I was ten or eleven. Then my father laid it out. He told me what my future would be like. What I had to do. I thought I understood. Thought I was prepared.
I was fifteen when that day came. My father took me to the mansion, a place that had once been a second home. That day was different.
He led me to the summoning chamber. I hadn't even known such a room existed. I would have been taken in by the exoticness of it, but the argan infused air was tense. My father clutched my wrist, something he hadn't done since I was a small boy.
We stood facing Karl. Everything was off. Karl sitting in a big chair, like a throne. Looking down at us from a stage, a strange look on his face. I tried to rationalize to myself that the man was still just Silvia's father, but I couldn't quite believe it.
Standing there, ready to assume my new role, I realized I didn't understand anything at all.
My heart was pounding. I was sweaty, lightheaded. My father had told me not to show weakness, so I choked down the fear.
Two of Karl's house staff—men who had shown me how to fly balsa planes and throw darts when I was little—pushed a cart toward me. On it, two flat burners.
Swallowing hard, I glanced over my shoulder at my father. His face was set so deeply in a scowl I thought he might never show another expression again. Maybe he didn't.
My words were tight. “What are they—”
The two men grabbed my hands and shoved my fingers against the silver disc. Hot pain shot through my fingers, across the front and back of my hands, and up to my elbows. The agony settled in my joints. I tried to pull away, but they kept my hands in place until my fingers went numb. Then they let go.
In hindsight, it was all kind of superficial. The burns healed with a week of aloe gel and not using chopsticks. Now Karl and I revisit our little ritual once a year or so. Doesn't really bother me anymore, but at the time, I felt violated. Little did I know then how much the Walkers would invade my life. Just like they had done to father, and his father before, as far back as anyone can remember.
My bloodline is born with the genie bond, and the Walkers are born with the master bond. We have no way of preventing it. As soon as the current genie or master takes his last breath, the role auto-magically switches to the next in line. One master, one genie.
The genie bond does a pretty good job at keeping us under control. The hum, for example. But the master bloodline likes to take an extra step. A precaution.
After searing off my fingerprints so I could be a better criminal, Karl stated the rules. They are commandments, given to each genie by his master, generation after generation. The fine print. The no escape clause.
We cannot harm our master.
We cannot take our own lives.
We cannot tell anyone our secret.
The master can retract those orders, like Karl had done so my father could prepare me. Otherwise, we are bound to them, like it or not.
No harming our master. No taking our own lives. No telling our secrets.
Until today, I never realized that those are perhaps the darkest wishes of all.