Chapter 1: Chapter 1: Edge 1:4

I wanted to cry at how pissed off I was. Fate, or maybe this was Destiny, had a crush on me. However, this crush had smashed my world into little tiny pieces. Both on a literally and figuratively speaking playing field. Finding yourself stuck in a different world, again, with your ticket out of there slipping through your fingers — and that too I meant in the literal sense, word for word — would piss anyone off.

In that literal sense, the word-for-word creature that was my golden ticket out of that hellhole was a slippery, fuzzy bastard. An elusive turd that was the sole owner of my misery from the last couple of months.

And it all started with stolen socks.

At first, I didn’t know this little fuzzy creature was the origin of my problems. I’d seen it around the neighborhood before, hanging out on top of Thompson’s bookstore sign on the corner of Evans St and Haggard, near Milan park that was only a few blocks away from my school, and on top of a trash can behind Southfield restaurant where I’d seen it poking fun at a cat that patrolled around there because the chef fed it table scraps on his smoke breaks. But after I’d witnessed it firsthand, stealing socks straight from the dryer, I mentally kicked myself in the ass.

Susie could go suck an egg.

So, when I collected the laundry for the day as my daily chores and had seen the little shit that was no bigger than my fist stealing a sock straight out from the dryer, I’d taken chase. 

The thing didn’t give me a choice. As soon as it had seen me, it took off like a bat out of hell and had slipped right past my feet before I could even react, up the flight of stairs that led to the first-floor kitchen and through an open window near the sink.

And let me tell you, that dingleberry was fast. You’d think a little ball of black static with white holes for eyes and stubby, static-y limbs would not be capable of moving fast, but the little shit could float and zip through the air while simultaneously taking bite size M&M shits on Newton’s Law of Gravity.

I did not know what it was, but I promised to myself that once I caught it, I was going to stick my green Nike Air Force shoe straight up its ass — if it even had one — for the months of me dealing with a shit-storm of blame because someone’s left sock would always go missing every time it was my turn to do the laundry. 

And why the hell did it only steal the socks when it was my turn to do the laundry? The little shit-ball had an agenda against me, for whatever reason. 

But if I would take a moment to think there was one reason I could think of . . .

And the little black turd had the audacity to stick the yellow sock with red stripes on top of its head! Taunting me around every corner as I raced after it through the alleyway near Thompson's bookstore. 

It zipped down the alleyway, taking a hard left down Evans St, but I was able to keep up with considerable ease, running in pace with the little turd while screaming profanity at it and not giving a crap about the weird stares I got from everyone I ran past. For some, this wouldn't have been the first time they had seen a short, pale, ten-year-old little white girl with dark brown hair and eyes to match racing down the street after an imaginary fiend. 

I was the only one who could see it. No one else could see these static balls.

I learned that lesson the hard way.

After another hard right of it flitting through the air, it took to scaling the side of an old brick building that housed a wine and cheese Brick and Mortar store until it reached the top of an outdated and rusted fire escape that stood two stories above the street. There was no longer a ladder attached where the turd flitted to. Either it rusted off, and the city took care of it, or scrappers got to it first.

From there, it finally came to a halt. Suspending its round, fluctuating static-like body above the side railing, it began to dance across it in a piss poor attempt to mock me from above. Rolling its round body across the railing, the static material of its body pulsated with glee at escaping its pursuer, thinking it was in the clear to gloat its victory without any consequence.

Normally, it would be in the clear to act like the major dick it was transpiring to be, but I wasn't a normal person.

Or, more precisely, I wasn't a normal human.

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My hands clenched into fists, but instead of surrendering or glaring daggers at the little shithead like I knew it anticipated, I smiled. It stopped dancing when it noticed I wasn't doing what it had expected. The static-like body that had pulsated and frizzed out like crazy as I'd chased after it no longer quivered in rapid concession throughout its body like before. Now, it thrummed in slow, small waves, looking more like a black fuzzball than a static, frizzed out ball. I interpreted that as its way of showing it was curious about what I was going to do next without any suspicion that it was about to be in immediate danger. 

I was going to give it a show. That was for sure.

Taking a step back, I bounced on the balls of my feet, my smile ever present and festering into a shit-eating grin when I jumped a standing leap, putting all my power into the upsurge; pushing an energy through my body that pulsated at my feet with an eerie blue glow. 

An electrical current drummed through my blood, and with it, exploited a rush of euphoric excitement that had me laughing at the now panicking static fluff. Before it could react to my sudden leap, I already had my hands clasped around its fluffy body, trapping it between my fingers while pivoting my tingling feet at the edge of the railing. The sock had fallen off and fluttered down to the sidewalk below, but I didn’t care to fetch it because that was Susie’s sock.

“Gotcha now, you little shit!” I laughed, hard, as I hunched my body over the creature, extending my hands at a safe distance a little way past my knees. I felt it wiggle in my grasp but it couldn’t escape as white, worried holes for eyes stared up at me in what I could only describe as fear. 

It squirmed between my fingers, unable to comprehend it couldn’t get free. Its movements were feather-soft. Almost unnoticeable. 

What was even more surprising was the fact the rusted fire escape held up my weight, not once teetering or threatening to collapse when I landed hard on it without putting much thought into my actions.

Staring down at the scared creature-blob in my hands and watching it struggle with little success, I felt a pang of regret frightening it the way I did. I always took things a little too far in my excitement, and this was no exception. 

The thing most likely thought I was going to kill it.

I opened my mouth to reassure the creature that I didn’t mean any harm, but snapped it shut when a voice startled me from below.

“Hey, kid!” The voice belonged to an older man, in his late sixties, if I had to take a guess when I looked over my shoulder and down at the guy below me. He was wearing a large beige overcoat and jeans. “What are you doing up there? That’s dangerous! You need to get down from there now!”

Just another grownup thinking he could boss around any kid that didn’t have an authoritative figure standing nearby.

“Ya, ya,” I mumbled, not bothering to give a proper response. If the guy only knew that I had fallen from heights greater than this one, both intentionally and unintentionally, without receiving a scratch, he’d most likely piss himself. My smile festered again as I imagined the graying old man’s bewildered look if I were to jump with no warning, how he’d be sputtering his words like all the others.

In fact, I was going to do just that.

However, when I looked back down at the man with the intention of jumping down and landing right next to him, I saw he already had that look on his face, like he was witnessing something paranormal.

Like he’d just shit himself.

And when I felt a strange and unexpected thrum coming from my hands, my attention diverted back to the creature; but instead of seeing the worried thing struggling in my grasp, a swirling, image-distorting vortex that had already engulfed my hands and was creeping its way up past my wrists confronted me. 

And the damned shitty static creature had a triumphant look about it. The static fuzz pulsated wildly, its white holes for eyes wide and unalarmed, narrowing in on me in what I could only describe as a cat’s arse look. 

The graying old man screamed.

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