The Past Inside

Written by CPrebble

          After a hard day of work at the studio, Zack was exhausted as all-get-out. As soon as he got home, he slumped his belongings onto his kitchen table and headed straight for his bedroom. When his clothes slid off his body, he crawled onto his bedspread, and when his head hit the pillows, he was in an instant slumber.

          His dreams were quite troubled that night, as one could imagine. His demons from the past were haunting him again. All those years of bottling up certain emotions and actions from his personal history and past career had finally caught up to him.

          The fact is, and this is not being sugar-coated at all, Zack used to be an assassin. Not the most glorious of professions, of course, but he was paid quite a sum of money by the United Nations Special Tactics Force, as he traveled around the world doing what he did best: killing "targets" off, one by one.

          When Zack got around to remembering his old targets, he tossed and turned in his sleep, as each face floated by his mind's eye. When he reached his final target, he jolted awake. Sweat had entirely soaked his fur from head to toe. He was out of breath and he had a splitting headache, almost migraine-like in proportion. It eventually subsided and he got back to remembering his final target again, and he reached a shocking and sickening realization: he had failed.

          He glanced at his bedside clock and saw that it was about two hours earlier than when he usually got up. "Oh, well," he thought, "I can just grab a nice, long bath, instead of my usual shower."

          He got out of bed and drew his bath when he reached the master bathroom. He still felt shaken and tense, so he decided to add a few drops of concentrated menthol to his bathwater. He eased into the water and its warmth completely enveloped him. He shampooed and conditioned his fur, then totally relaxed.

          He jolted awake as his alarm went off in his bedroom, and he realized that he was now soaking in a tub of lukewarm water. "Oh, great. Now I'm going to be all puffy and wrinkly." He pulled the plug from the trap and allowed the water to drain from the tub before he clambered out and dried off. He was very glad that he had bought the full-body fur dryer, especially when it was this dire of a situation.

          He finished his drying ritual and, as he had predicted, his fur puffed up making him look like a walking pom-pom. He smiled at his reflection in the mirror, as he knew that Holly would think him to be cute in this state. However, he only thought himself to look rather pathetic.

          He brushed his fur down as much as time would allow, even while he ate breakfast. This morning, he was quick to eat it, consisting of only 2 eggs, half a grapefruit, and a glass of orange juice. He then jumped into his car and headed of to work, realizing that he was still a bit early. On the way, he heard one of his favourite songs on the radio and sang along with it. He pulled into the drive-thru of his favourite coffee shop, and grabbed some coffee for himself and for Holly.

          Once he had arrived at the studio, he slowly gathered up his lunch and other belongings and headed inside. The tenseness of his nightmare last night had caused his knee to pay dearly for it. He headed for the visitors' bathroom, and popped a few painkillers so he could get through the day as fluidly as possible. With that done and out of the way, he headed inside and handed the coffee to Holly.

          "Good morning, Zack," Holly said, as cheerful as ever.

          "Hey, Holly. Here's a coffee for you, I got you a french vanilla, as you like it."

          "Mmm," she sipped at the coffee. She then looked at Zack, and became a bit skeptical. "Are you okay, Zack? Something seems... out of place with you."

          "Oh, I'm fine. Just a bad dream last night, and it shook me up a bit. That's all." He smiled, liking the fact that she cared for him.

          "Okay, then. By the way, hope your knee gets better today." She winked at him, then got back to her work. She liked doing that to him, catching him off guard with her deductions. She liked how it made him react; seeing him get all flustered and shy was cute.

          Of course, Zack reacted as expected. "Oh, well... yeah, I hope so, too. See you later, Holly." And with that, another day of hard work began.