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It leaned upright to the right of the apartment door frame: a long slash in the sparse but familiar comfort of their home. Shoulder-height, with a black leather-wrapped handle and loop at the top. White down the long, thin length, with a ball embedded in the tip.
John eyed it suspiciously as Arthur briskly tapped the morning edition of the newspaper closed and tucked it under his left side, evidently assuming that John would oblige his wordless request by holding the paper under his arm.
He did.
"Rex Murphy at the Arkham Advertiser," Arthur repeated, with the chipper tone of a man with a fresh lead under his nose. "That's who we need to see. What time–"
The clock they'd recently added to the mantle started to chime the quarter hours.
"It's quarter to te–"
"Shh."
John dug his fingernails into his palm as Arthur stood still in the middle of the room, counting the chimes, for what felt like ages. He hated that clock. It was loud, it was obtrusive. It would have been quicker if Arthur had let him read it – was he in a hurry or not?
"Let's stop by the newspaper offices," Arthur said. John watched him trace the edge of the desk with his fingertips until he reached the corner, then turn on his heel. "If he's out, we can at least get his contact information."
Arthur strode confidently toward the door. He had the direction perfectly, and he lifted his toe enough to avoid tripping over the rug. His hand reached out to touch the cane, long fingers gliding up until he reached the handle and took it up.
"You don't need that," John groused, pointedly not opening the door handle. "It's not far to the Advertiser , I can tell you the way."
"Got to practice," Arthur said. His voice held the impatient sigh of a hundred repetitions.
Their 'practice' in the apartment had been a joke. Standing in the entrance and waving the cane around, rolling back and forth on the floor, banging against furniture and baseboards. John had tried to help, naming the objects they bounced off of or, God forbid, warning him ahead of time. "Lamp." "Coat rack." "Desk on the left." "Bathroom ahead."
Arthur had roundly sworn at him for ruining the point of the exercise and tied a kerchief over their eyes. After that, John was useless – left alone and disoriented in the dark, hand outstretched to keep his friend from bruising his hip bouncing off his surroundings.
Gradually that had happened less and less. Arthur had found a rhythm of sweeping the cane back and forth, and the bangs turned into light taps. There was less swearing, but John still felt just as abandoned, shunted aside and roiling.
The streets of Arkham were always a busy rush of people going back and forth, stacked into smoke-stained brick buildings like termites spilling out onto the earth. Often he liked to let it wash over his senses in a wave like it had that first day, but now John's focus narrowed to every newsstand, every lamp pole, every raised crack in the sidewalk between them and their destination.
John narrated their path out of habit as the cane swept back and forth, tapping each little obstacle in succession. They moved slowly, feeling their way down the street. Or, at least, Arthur moved slowly – John resented how their gait unsettled, thrown out of their usual coordination, as though he were perpetually waiting for Arthur to catch up to him.
People parted in a wide berth around them, some even stepping into the street as they passed. It undeniably made their way easier, but John didn't like how people openly stared as they went. They were conspicuous enough, he thought.
"This isn't working," he said at last. "Let's just forget it."
"It's working fine," Arthur retorted through his teeth.
"Fine? People are staring at us. At you."
"So? Let them stare." He made an abortive motion with his arm, as though he had forgotten about the cane in his hand. John could easily picture the exact dismissive wave he would have made. He'd seen it plenty of times. "They would anyway, given the state of us."
"They might stare less if you weren't dragging on your side."
"This will help us, John. It just takes some time to adjust."
"We shouldn't have to adjust! We were doing just fine before."
Arthur scoffed. " You may have been doing fine. It's easier for you, all you have to do is see and describe, give direction. It's harder than it looks, groping around in the dark, I have to rely– and to trust–"
"You still don't trust me," John accused. "After all we've been through–"
"Stop," Arthur snapped. "Just listen to me, John."
John supposed it may have been an unfair accusation – he wasn't sure. Sure, they had already talked about it, but… the hurt felt fresh and raw as it had done then, and he wanted Arthur to feel it along with him.
Arthur sighed, slowing the sweep of the cane in front of their feet. Accordingly, John eased his pace to match – it wasn't as easy as Arthur assumed either, he thought, to keep their movement natural and coordinated.
"It's not that I don't trust you," Arthur began.
"It's just that you don't need me."
"John, of course I–"
John flinched hard as a stranger's hand grabbed him around the elbow and pulled them into the crosswalk ahead. Reflexively he yanked his arm away, but their grip was insistent.
"What the fuck," he barked – a younger man in a loose grey suit walked on his side, arm under his own, walking them across the street.
"What's going on?" Arthur asked, panic in his voice, dragged alongside them. He'd lost the smooth back-and-forth sweep of the cane in the commotion, and it dragged along as well.
"Allow me, sir," the young man said brightly. "The other side is just up ahead."
"I'm fine, there's no need," Arthur stammered - but the young man didn't let go.
John knew the man wouldn't hear him, but regardless he couldn't help himself from growling, "Get the fuck off of us, you–"
"Really, thank you, that's not necessary–"
It wasn't until they reached the other sidewalk that the young man released his arm and waved them off with a cheerful tip of his cap.
John silently flipped his middle finger at the man's back as he slipped back into the crowd.
Arthur tried to catch his breath as the flow of people parted around them, slowly releasing the startled tension from his shoulders.
"Jesus, I thought–" he began.
"Is that what you want?" John interrupted him. "People to pity you? You'd rather have this 'help' from strangers than to listen to me?"
"That's not fair, John, it's useful ."
"It seems to me it's just making us more of a target, which is exactly what we need."
"Oh, fuck you, John."
They both fumed in silence for the next block, John watching the sweep of the cane with irritation. Let him step into traffic then, if he didn't want John's input.
Arthur drew up to the next curb and John watched with detached curiosity, waiting for his moment to intervene. For his part, Arthur stopped relatively smoothly as the tip of the cane traced the edge of the curb. He muttered to himself, something about four blocks straight and two right, and turned them in the right direction.
Irritation churned with relief as they waited at the corner – it seemed he didn't need the direction after all, at least in this moment.
John experimentally closed his eyes. His hearing focused on the rush of car traffic, the footsteps and susurration of people moving around them. When the sound of wheels grinding on pavement moved from in front of them to the side of them, and when he heard the clicking of heels alongside them into the street, he also caught the soft tap of the ball at the end of the cane feeling out the height of the curb. Then he had to catch up as Arthur strode them out into the crosswalk.
"Look, John," Arthur sighed at last. "One day you're going to get a body of your own, right?"
John hesitated, taken slightly aback. With all their running – chasing down leads, escaping monsters in all their various forms, trying to save innocent bystanders, thwarting schemes and conspiracies – it was hard to remember sometimes what exactly the end destination was. It simply felt like running was what they did now, together. Every time he was reminded of their ultimate goal, he felt less and less certain about it.
"I– perhaps, but–"
"Right. We've got to assume that's going to be the case. Otherwise… we've just got to."
Did they? Was the alternative so unbearable to think about?
"Arthur–"
"And I don't know what's going to happen to me, then. Perhaps I'll regain my sight, but perhaps I– won't. Perhaps I'll always be missing pieces of myself. In any case, I've got to be ready. I need to be able to get around on my own. As much as I can."
The thought of Arthur moving through this dangerous world without him, with his sight or without, made something in John twist and twine sickly, grasping and tight.
But he couldn't dispute the logic in Arthur's words, nor take issue with preparing for any eventuality.
"Listen, John. I know you want to feel useful…" After a long pause, Arthur shook his head and changed the subject. "What's the weather look like? It smells like rain."
Begrudgingly allowing himself to be distracted, and hardly knowing what to do with the tangle of needful emotions churning within him in any case, he took his eyes off the sidewalk and looked up at the sky.
"It's dim and grey. A flat blanket of clouds covers the city, punctured by the spires and steeples of the skyline. It's hard to tell the direction with the sun behind the cloud cover, but it's noticeably darker toward downtown, with a bluish tint low near the horizon."
"Hm," Arthur considered. "I didn't think to bring an umbrella. And anyway, my hand is– busy."
"I could have held it for you."
There was a trace of a smile in Arthur's voice as he said, "That's true. I didn't think to ask."
"Perhaps we could get a cab back," John offered. "If this trail goes cold."
"I think Murphy will have answers for us, if we can find him," Arthur insisted. "But either way, yes, that's not a bad idea."
Passers-by continued to openly watch them as they passed, giving the sweeping cane a wide berth. John stared back defiantly, then wondered if he shouldn't keep his eyes ahead to maintain the illusion that this blind man didn't have an entity looking through his eyes.
Some of the faces were pitying; most were merely curious. John tried to let his defensiveness ease, like relaxing a tense muscle, and be curious about them in turn. He wondered what secrets of their own any one of them might be carrying with them.
"We must be getting close, yes? Six blocks?"
"Yes, I can see the sign for the Arkham Advertiser up ahead at the end of this block. The staircase to the entryway juts out onto the sidewalk on the left side; it's filled with people bustling in and out."
"Alright, let's have a chat with Mr. Murphy." Arthur's tone was playful, conspiratorial, piquing John's interest for a covert mission.
"Okay!"
Arthur turned them toward the stone staircase - as the tip of the cane tapped the first stair, he stepped forward and cautiously climbed up.
"You're more than just my eyes, John," he said with warmth in his voice. "Keep your wits about you – he may be reluctant to share details of an ongoing investigation with us, and he'll know the usual tricks."
"A tough nut to crack."
"Exactly."
"But he won't see us coming."
"He certainly won't."