Page 73 of Kiss-Fist
“Why do I need pointers? Oh shit. I need pointers.”
“You do. It’s not the same as hearing gatherings. There are differences. For instance, they will always stand in a circle to talk for visual ease. And they will congregate near light. Like Michael.”
“Deaf people aren’t groundhogs,” I interject, but Leaf waves me off.
“He loves my lights. Chewed through the wires while he looked into the cameras. He smiled when he did it.”
“Fuck off.”
“I mean it. He’s evil. Anyway, line of sight, circles, light. Oh, they will chat for ages. Lots of catching up with each other. And the goodbyes are never-ending.”
“What? Why?”
“They’re just long. You will start to say goodbye and leave thirty minutes later.”
That pulls a laugh from me. “That doesn’t sound so bad.”
“It isn’t until you have to say goodbye to ten people. Then you’re hungover and not home until four in the morning, regretting your life choices.”
“Shit.”
“Don’t worry. It’ll be fine. Mostly. Well, probably not, but I can’t wait to hear about it.”
I stare at him as he hands me a few wires and two cameras. The old kind. The ones you find at the thrift shop on discount.
“Seriously? Where did you get these?”
“Side of the road. Some guy said they worked. I couldn’t pass them up.”
“Dude.”
“Do not dude me. I know what I’m doing.”
“I don’t know if you do.”
“I do, and I shall persevere!” He shakes his fist in the air, and part of the wire knocks him in the eye. He blinks wildly and curses. “I need the goggles. Fuck! I should have left them on!”
That makes me bite back a laugh, looking for them before he completely loses his mind. I find them near the box where he discarded them.
When I hand them to him, he thanks me and pulls them on, his hair sticking up at all angles as he does. I don’t even bother to pat it down. It seems best to just let him have this.
“Come with me. Bring the sword.”
“What sword?”
“That one! The groundhog sword. The one to take down the enemy once and for all.”
I grab the stick that looks like it was snapped off a tree. “This one?”
“Yes. I sharpened it last night over a dirty martini. A very…verydirty martini.” I don’t know what that could possibly mean, but I have a feeling it’s not about vodka and olive juice.
“Leaf, I think you may need to see a therapist.”
Leaf blinks at me behind those goggles. “Why would I do that?”
“Um, because you’re talking about buying TNT on the dark web and getting drunk while sharpening tree branches and calling them swords.”
He blinks again and then laughs. Loudly. It scares the birds, makes them flutter and fly away.
