The radiator hissed like a tired old man with secrets to leak. Kaine sat cross-legged on the splintered hardwood floor, back pressed to a wall stained faintly with nicotine shadows, eyes fixed on a ragged spiral notebook splayed open in his lap. The paper edges were curled like they’d been chewed by time. Ink bled into the lines from prior weeks, words that had already been said, verses already weaponized and flung into crowds that either devoured or fled from them.

The apartment was dim, windowlight filtered through greasy blinds he hadn’t bothered to adjust since spring. His breath misted faintly when he exhaled too hard; the heat never reached this part of the unit.

The room was stripped of intention, just an old mattress against one wall with cigarette burns in the fabric, a crate of vinyls by a milk-crate turntable, and a fold-up table weighed down with ashtrays, half-used candles, and a Mason jar full of broken pencils. A single lightbulb swung above, bare and too bright when it flickered into life. He didn’t bother turning it on. The gray daylight was enough.

On the floor before him, a list lay open, scrawled in Kaine’s tight, all-caps handwriting with loops like barbed wire. It wasn’t poetry, this was his war schedule, as he called it.

THURS – EASTSIDE CYPHER // BASEMENT CLUB SAT – CHICAGO INVITE / (TBC, CLUB REDLINE) MON – RADIO88.7 INTERVIEW – "NO CENSOR" TAPING WED – WRECKHOUSE SHOWCASE (NO DJ SETUP) FRI – LIVE TAPING @ HELL’S DOOR CHAPEL (FILMED)

He scratched at the stubble under his jaw with a thumbnail, slow and methodical, like he was trying to dig memory out of bone. The words blurred. He reread them anyway.

The Eastside Cypher, a concrete basement two blocks off Mack Avenue where the lights never worked and the mic was wired through a salvaged car battery. He hated that place. The walls sweated and the crowd always smelled like steel and sweat and paranoid impulse. But it was raw. It was perfect.

Chicago would be the only time he’d have to travel that week, club called Redline, supposedly haunted by a guy who’d passed onstage three years ago. Fitting, Kaine thought. He’d have to pull a set out his spine for that one, because he knew the Chicago crowd expected blood.

The Radio 88.7 interview, he grunted when he read that. Pirate station. Probably a trap. They always wanted some confession on tape they could play like he was a priest for the damned. He had nothing new to say. He never did. He only had older ways to scream the same rot.

Wreckhouse Showcase, no DJ setup. No backing tracks. Just raw vocals. He didn’t mind. Made the lies harder for the others. Made the silence between bars more lethal. He’d bring the burned-out Samson mic from his closet.

And then Friday. That place wasn’t a venue. That was an old church gutted into a venue by some crustpunk collective who thought naming it “Hell’s Door” gave them depth. But they were filming it, Kaine’s first live taping since ’95. The last one ended in a riot and a broken jaw for the camera guy. He'd have to wear the same hoodie he always wore, black, bleach-stained, sleeves too long, cuffs chewed from nervous habit. Anything else would feel like betrayal. Like pretending.

A wind outside howled between the buildings, brushing the rattling windowpane like it was testing it. A siren crooned low and slow down the boulevard, didn’t matter what kind. Could’ve been fire, could’ve been cops, could’ve been death on wheels.

His fingers twitched. He picked up a Sharpie and dragged a thick black line across the Saturday show, CHICAGO, then paused. Not cancelled. Just acknowledged.

Somewhere above, a neighbor yelled. Below, a dog barked. Kaine closed the notebook like sealing a tomb. His hand reached absently for the half-burned cigarette in the ashtray beside him, relighting it to life.

Smoke curled around his buzzed head, drifting into the chill like a ghost just released. He tilted his head back, tapping the wall behind him with rhythmic pressure, as if coaxing the words to fall back into his mouth.