Missing Pieces: Chapter 1

Hm. He must have gotten closer than I'd thought.

Jevan sat up in the bed, rubbing his hand over his face and cleaned the gunk out of his eyes and rubbed the remnants of drool from his lips where it had dried. His pillow contained a little miniature marsh where it had soaked and pooled in the indentation where his head rested while he slept. The opposite side of the bed was completely empty and looked as though it had never been disturbed. It wouldn't have surprised him if Zuka hadn't slept at all last night, simply picked up, packed up and left with his piece of Jevan he took. He'd even taken an easily accumulated piece. Obviously the relationship was more one sided than he'd thought, too.

Wiggling the now non-existent fingers, Jevan looked down to where his arm ended at the elbow. He could still feel his fingers, knew they were there, but they were absent, along with his hand and forearm. This was going to take some getting used to. At least Zuka hadn't taken his leg. That would have been problematic, almost as problematic as if he'd taken his dominant hand. Thanks for small blessings? At least there was some consolation that people couldn't just walk off with a part they weren't willing to give while it was still attached. If it was just a one night stand or a fling the parts wouldn't come off unless the person held some sort of attachment to whomever it was taking it. If that was the case, Jevan was decently sure a one night stand would have walked off with a little bit of him at some point. Then again, he was sure if he would have been the sort of person to walk off with something he could have taken parts of some of the people he'd been with. He just didn't see the point.

Picking himself up from the bed, Jevan stumbled sleepily down the hall and out to the small kitchen where he reached for the pot with his left hand and missed several times before he chuckled to himself and picked it up with his right. Amazing how much one did with their hands they never realized until they found themselves missing one. He fumbled with the maker, got the coffee open and started it brewing.

Hm. Cooking might be more of a challenge. Good thing I can crack eggs one handed.

He started a skillet heating and dropped a few slices of bacon into the pan to cook. He'd make eggs with the grease left over from the bacon. Setting the butter out to soften, he put the bread in the toaster and had it ready to hit the button once the bacon was done so his eggs wouldn't get cold waiting on it. His brow furrowed as he contemplated how to butter his toast without use of his opposite arm. He'd figure it out. Jevan was a smart boy. He'd figured out how to walk without a foot and ankle before and he could figure out how to get around with out an arm. Thankfully no one had ever taken his heart. He'd heard about that happening but had never met anyone that had actually happened to. It was primarily a myth, he thought, for people who wanted someone to feel sorry for them. `If you leave, you'll take my heart', they would say and convince someone to stay with them. Jevan thought that was a rather silly reason to stay with someone because you didn't have to take a part of someone when you left. Just tell them you didn't want to be with them anymore, leaving their part behind and walk away. He didn't understand why more people didn't think like that. He did. Then again, if everyone thought like he did, he wouldn't be missing an arm and he was sure they would both be more happy. Jevan would have an arm and Zuka wouldn't have to carry it around with him everywhere he went. The world would have a lot less baggage.

On the opposite hand, it also wouldn't make it as easy to spot trouble. Someone moving who had bags and bags of parts wasn't someone you wanted to get close to. Anyone who moved into your place with bags and bags of parts might be a sign you needed to put the brakes on and get away. Going over to somebody's place that had a lot of storage containers might be a good indicator to get away. Then again, falling for someone never made sense.

The bacon was done and Jevan pulled it out to soak on some paper towels to remove the grease and cracked the eggs into the remaining before pressing down the button for the toaster. Thankfully the body adjusted to the missing parts with a little time and practice. He'd have to work out a little bit with his remaining arm. It was already getting fussy from having to overwork itself for daily tasks. He'd been missing parts before and he'd always gotten on with life after it happened, no matter how difficult.

There were people who didn't fare as well, sadly, and ended up in rehabilitation of some sort or in the hospital. He'd seen people literally give away parts for their significant other to take with them when they'd left. He'd known people who seemed to be trying to put together an entirely new being from the parts they'd collected and carried about with them. Jevan couldn't imagine having that many parts to carry around with him and stash in a closet or foot locker or something. He couldn't understand why someone wouldn't just donate them to a parts collection at some point or something, not that there was such a thing. People generally found someone to get with who had parts and see if they'd give it to them or took the part from someone else, which seemed rather spiteful and vindictive, but he'd known people before who had done that very thing. They would get close to someone, get them to trust them, wheedle their way in and all the while doing it just to replace something they were missing. Or, in the case of some people, to get something they thought they were missing. That was just the way things were. People were always misunderstanding and making things worse than they should have been or could have been. Making a mountain out of a molehill as his mother would always say.

He needed to call his mother. Since his father died, she hadn't ever bothered to replace her missing half. The silly thing was his father wouldn't have minded if she would have taken the parts of him she needed. He supposed it worked differently when someone was dead. It had served the purpose, however, that once he'd found someone he was comfortable enough with to propose marriage he would take half of them and half of him and they could rebuild each other with one another's parts so when one of them died, the parts would already be missing. If such a thing were possible he would.

He had been given pieces of others before, one from a girl he'd never even had a relationship with who just wanted him to have something of hers so she would be remembered. He'd thought it odd until she committed suicide roughly a month later. She'd given several small parts of herself away so there wouldn't be much to bury. That was one of the parts he hadn't given away. He kept her finger in a small box on the mantle since she only wanted to be remembered. It was the least he could do for her. He had pieces of other lovers who had sworn he had to take parts of them with him when he left and despite his attempts to leave them behind, always found them packed in luggage when he'd gone. After they started to be distant from his mind, however, he'd always sent them back without a return address so they could be whole again or replace a part they'd gotten elsewhere if they so chose. Either way, Jevan didn't need it anymore, not that he ever really had, and it was theirs to begin with. Sending it back just made sense, not that he'd ever known of anyone else who would send back parts except the first boy Jevan had ever loved. He hadn't minded when his lover had taken part of him when he left and made do with crutches to get around and learned to write left handed. When the parts had come back to him almost two years later, it brought a smile to his face that he was still remembered. Maybe that was why he had always sent parts back again.

He'd have to seriously think about a donation site, however, for the parts that came back return to sender. Maybe that's something he should start; parts collection so people who were missing parts could come and replace the missing part from people who liked being wounded and if they weren't going to use them, they should go to someone who would. It just seemed senseless to take parts with you in the first place, but when his love had done it…

Realizing he was running himself in circles, Jevan picked up the now prepared breakfast and set it at one of the tall stools of the breakfast bar and dug in. Work was going to be interesting today to say the least.