"Do you have any idea we still owe on the mortgage?" Kathy got right up in my face.
I looked at her, my expression stone cold.
"This stall is mine. I built it getting up before dawn and grinding every single day. I want to shut it down, I shut it down."
Kathy's face darkened instantly.
She grabbed a fistful of my apron and glared at me. "Job, don't you dare bite the hand that feeds you."
"Without that three grand my great-aunt lent us back in the day, you think you could've even opened this stall?"
"You make a little money and suddenly you think you can pull this crap?"
There it was again. The great-aunt card. Every single argument, she played it without fail.
Like I'd owe the Matthews family for the rest of my life.
"I paid back every cent of that three grand, plus interest." I pried her fingers off my apron.
"But today, I need to figure out what's going on."
I crouched down and scooped up Marmalade, who was trembling all over.
He thrashed in my arms, wild and frantic, refusing to go anywhere near the back room on the east side.
"Look at him." My own voice was shaking.
"You know how bold this cat usually is? Now he won't even go inside."
"Animals sense things we can't."
Kathy shoved me back. "You've lost it. You're as crazy as that cat."
She yanked out her phone, pulled up the local forum, and jammed the screen in my face.
"Read what people are saying under that post you made."
I glanced at the screen.
Someone called me a clout-chaser who'd lost his mind, using rats for attention.
Someone else said I was spreading superstitious nonsense and the cyber police should ban my account.
Another commenter made up a rumor that my stall failed a health inspection, that even the rats wanted out.
"See?" Kathy's jaw was clenched so tight the words barely came out.
"You want to humiliate yourself, fine. But I still have a reputation."
"My great-aunt's bringing some big clients to buy meat tomorrow. If you dare close up shop, I swear you'll regret it."
I stared at this woman. Five years sharing a bed, and this was what it came down to.
"Kathy, if something really happens, is your reputation going to save your life?" My voice cracked.
"Stop with the fear-mongering." Kathy yanked the rolling shutter down with a bang.
She pinned me with a stare full of venom. "You close this stall for one day, and we're done."
"Then we're done. Tomorrow I'm going to the western suburbs."
Kathy froze. She clearly hadn't expected me to push back that hard.
She jabbed a finger at my face. "Fine, Job. You've got nerve."
"You walk out of this stall tomorrow, don't bother coming back. Ever."
The door slammed behind her.
That night, I sat in the pitch-dark stall with Marmalade in my arms.
He still wouldn't close his eyes.
Five a.m. The sky was barely starting to lighten.
I locked the stall door behind me.
Outside, the early morning streets were empty.
I looked down and saw them along the base of the wall: rats in a single-file line, hugging the concrete, racing west.
I took a deep breath and followed.
The west side of Harbor City was nothing but a stretch of abandoned factories, derelict for over a decade.
The farther west I went, the worse the air got.
What had been a clean morning breeze slowly turned acrid, threaded with a sharp, metallic stench.
Marmalade started slamming against the door of his carrier.
His cries had pitched into something unrecognizable.
By the time I reached the abandoned chemical plant on the outskirts, I was breathing through my hand pressed over my nose and mouth.
The rats had stopped in a concrete clearing just outside the plant's perimeter.
Splitting the clearing open was a massive fissure, at least forty feet long.
The rats poured into it without hesitation and never came back out.
I forced myself closer.
The second I got near, thick black fumes erupted from the crack in the earth.
