All In the Cards

Today was a rare for Micah. A friend was coming over and he needed to actually get himself out of bed and clean his room a bit. His room was a mess, clothing strewn everywhere, wrappers of food, and cans of soda all over the floor. The only thing that wasn’t touched was the record player that played a low drone of his current new favorite band. His boyfriend Narza had given it to him, but he was out for the day and had invited someone over. Narza always thought he needed company, and he would be right. Micah was actually happier with company, despite the endless times he stated he loved the solitude of the basement he lived in. First, a shower, his feathers were starting to get heavy with grease, and he needed to at the very least look good for his friend. After an hours worth of pruning, and getting the feathers on his head to lay exactly like how he wanted them, he finally got to cleaning up his room. Turning up the record player to almost full, he flipped the album, and set to getting things… As decent as he could get them. In picking up the trash and clothing, he found something he thought he had lost. A rather sizable deck of band themed trading cards. He had been looking all over for these! Maybe Blue would like them as well. A bit of a smile formed on his beak before it disappeared. Emo’s don’t smile, they simply sound a little less depressed in tone.

The room was clean, and he was ready for the visit of his friend. The knock on the door was all he needed to know that Blue was here. “Hey, make yourself at home. My mini fridge has everything from soda to arsenic. Pick your poison.” If one didn’t know Micah, they would think he was joking about the arsenic. He wasn’t. There really was a bottle of arsenic in his fridge. Like he would actually drink or use the poison, actually it was for Narza. His necromancer boyfriend quite liked using poisons in his magics. Besides, for a Spectrel who could commune with the dead, he had no interest in killing anyone. Why would he? He may sometimes want to kill himself, but he wasn’t about to make enemies with spirits. The two made it down to his basement home and the sofa was quickly occupied with the two. “I have something to show you that I found in my room.” He pulled the box of cards from the Sum 41 jacket he had decided to put on just before Blue got in. “What are those?” The calico asked with interest. He was always curious about the things Micah pulled out for him to show. The last time he had showed him a homemade ouija board he had made, and the time before that Micah walked him through every record he owned. It was so many, but Blue never tired of his melancholy friend, in fact he was more fascinated by every new find.

“They are band trading cards. I have a lot of them. I’ve been collecting these since they came out.” The eagle dumped the deck into his free hand and started to line the cards on the floor. “This one is Gerard Way, he is my favorite singer from my favorite band My Chemical Romance. And this is Lars Ulrich, the drummer for Metallica.” He went on showing band members from many different bands. “Do you have Green Day?” Blue asked, looking to the cards, considering getting some himself. He had never heard of these, but now that Micah was showing these to him, he wondered what other bands they may have in these cards. “Of course, I have all of them. Billie Joe Armstrong, Tre Cool, and Mike Dirnt, they were actually my first cards that I got. I was lucky to have gotten all three of them in one pack. That’s very rare.” He laid down the cards in question as he named the members of the band. “Wow Micah! These are so cool! How did you find out about these?” The bird Spectrel looked the calico dead in the eye before responding. “I found a pack of them displaced in a grocery store. I had intended to put them away until I saw Metallica on the package. I’ve been addicted ever since.” Of course, these weird things seemed to happen to Micah all the time, and he just brushed them off like they were nothing. But there was something in the bird that was not only uniquely expressive, but everything that came out of his mouth was almost strangely poetic. “If you are thinking of getting these and starting your own collection I’ll trade you for the rest of the members of My Chemical Romance for whatever you want.” He offered, a smile coming to the cat who nodded excitedly. “Yeah~ I’d love to do that.” A smile was nearly shown from Micah at Blue’s excitement, and he shuffled through his cards, picking a few out of the impressive deck and handing them to Blue. “Here’s a start for you. I had a few doubles that I don’t mind giving away.” “Oh, you don’t have to…” “I wanted to, you’re a friend, it’s the least I can do to thank you for temporarily taking away some of the misery of my everyday life.” As morbid as the comment from Micah was, Blue understood that it was one of the biggest compliments the bird could have given to him.

The two conversed about the cards, and their favorite bands for almost into the evening. Time passed quickly for the two friends, and soon it was time for Blue to go. Micah walked his friend out and bid him goodnight, and until next time. Normally this would be the time when Micah went back to listening to his records drone on like he always did before he went to bed, or hung out with Narza. But that wasn’t going to be tonight, he was actually hyped that his friend was willing to share one of his passions. Not that he would actually show that outwardly. Instead he took out his journal and started to write about his day and the… Well the fun he had with Blue. Of course ‘fun’ was described in his own way as an escape from the mundanity of the day. But it had been a good time, and the appreciation he had for his friend and his boyfriend was endless, even if his emotions didn’t show that very well.