Chapter four:

 

 

It’s still dark when I wake up.

My alarm beeps approximately five seconds after I open my eyes, and I smile in satisfaction that I beat the clock again.

The building is quiet, barring the crying. There’s always crying coming from somewhere in this place. No matter the time.

It’s almost sad how people’s misery can become an afterthought. It slips into the background once you’re desensitized to it. The crying is like the ticking of the clock. Constant.

Tears that go on and on, never stopping. It’s the soundtrack of my life.

I shower and dry and then I get dressed, and when I check my sneakers they’re dry too, and that makes me smile. I run my hands through my black hair to try and tease it into some kind of order. I brush my teeth with my blue toothbrush, spitting the minty foam into the sink. I like clean teeth and fresh breath. Personal hygiene is important, because honestly, there’s no excuse for smelling like crap. Anyone can afford a fifty-cent bar of soap. Even me.

I think I must be okay, looks-wise. I remember my mom telling me that I was a handsome boy. And I’ve seen the way women look at me, and the disappointment in their eyes when I’m not interested. They think I’m a fag for not wanting to fuck them, which is both insulting and obnoxious.

Why does a man have to be gay if he doesn’t want to sleep with a woman? Perhaps they’re just not his type. Perhaps he has a girlfriend and is actually a good guy for not wanting to bang everything that moves. Or perhaps he’s saving himself for that special woman.

I grab my jacket as I leave my apartment. It’s supposed to rain again today.

The building is no longer quiet, but alive with noise once more, the crying a constant drone in the background instead of the main event.

Televisions blare from behind passing doors.

Screaming babies.

Yelling husbands.

Shouting wives.

Music pounds through walls.

When will they ever shut up?

Outside is no better as a car honks its horn, a dog chases a cat, and a pimp slaps his ho. It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.

I check my watch and see I’m early, and I feel good because I beat clock for the second time today. There’s no point rushing for a bus that won’t be there, but I don’t want to be late for a bus that will no doubt be, so I hurry on regardless.

I leave my street and head uptown. The air is clear today, the damp still clinging to everything like mildew and cobwebs. But it’s nice. Refreshing, almost. As I move to a better part of town, the storefronts look less imposing. The graffiti is less graphic, less crude. Almost classy—for graffiti, anyway. The people are better dressed. Or at least wearing more clothing than a ten-dollar hooker.

The smell of croissants cooking in a bakery across the street makes me smile, memories of my mom’s cooking so many years ago coming to the surface. I head to the bakery across the street. I fumble in my pockets for the change I know is there and I go inside, holding the door for an elderly lady on her way out.

She says thanks, and I want to hug her for having some fucking manners. This is what it means to live somewhere nicer. People hold doors, and people say thank you. They smile. And they shake hands, and I say, ‘no problem, lady.’

I order a croissant, and my mouth is salivating at the smell of the warm pastry. I can’t believe that I’ve never been here before, and I already can’t wait to come here again tomorrow.

The woman behind the counter doesn’t smile at me. Not even when I smile at her. I say thank you but she still stays dumb. That annoys me, and I wonder what I’ve done to deserve her scorn. And then I get it: I’m not good enough for her, for her neighborhood, for a croissant. So I slam my change down on the counter and don’t put it in her hand nicely like a good boy should, and it rolls all over the counter noisily.

She’s still picking up my coins while I wait impatiently for my croissant, when another man comes in. He says good morning and he orders some ridiculous coffee with a long list of things he wants added to it—a dash of this, a splash of that, half-fat, mocha, choca, latte with a splash of caramel and vanilla and a dusting of chocolate powder. It’s the most obnoxious fucking coffee in the world. I want to tell him so, but I don’t.

The woman finishes picking up my change and she smiles at this other guy, in his smartly pressed suit and slicked-back hair, and his shoes so shiny I could see my face in them if I wanted. She smiles at him and she holds out my croissant to me with barely a passing glance, and I get even more annoyed.

What does he have that I don’t?

I snatch my croissant from her and the guy gives me an unimpressed look, and I want to tell him to go fuck himself, but I don’t. Instead I leave and I slam the door as hard as I can on my way out and I vow never to go back there, because she’s a stuck-up bitch who needs to learn some manners. And her customers need to mind their own damn business.

I walk to work eating my croissant, because I can’t afford the bus now. And the croissant doesn’t even taste that great, so that bakery can go fuck itself too. I eat it all though, even though it annoys me when the crumbs flake onto my clean sweater.

I’m almost at work, and I’m early, and it’s all going good again. I stand at the sidewalk and I wait for the light to change so I can cross, because I don’t believe in jaywalking. I like to follow the rules. When the light changes I walk, and I get to the other side and everything is still good.

I turn and go around the corner and into work, the smell of the slaughterhouse hitting my senses full force.

This place is clean, but even the scent of disinfectant can’t cover up the smell of death that surrounds this place. It stirs memories that are best left forgotten.

“Morning, Ethan,” my boss, Charlie, says.

“Morning, Charlie,” I reply and smile.

Charlie’s a good guy. Three kids and an ex-wife. He drinks too much. Smokes even more. And says he’s going to die before he’s sixty. I find that strange though. The guy’s adamant that he’s going to die early, yet he doesn’t look after himself. He’s overweight too. Loves to gamble on anything he can—horses, dogs, chickens or cards, he doesn’t care.

Sometimes he’s late paying us because he’s spent our wages already.

I can tell he feels bad when that happens.

He’s sick, I want to say when people get angry with him. He can’t help it. But people are cruel and hard and mean, and they don’t care that he’s sick. They only care that he didn’t pay them on time.

I don’t like my job. Not even a little bit. But I turn up day after day and I earn my money. I’m never late, I’m always early, and I even stay after hours if I’m needed. And that’s more often than not. Though not too late, because my parole officer would get pissy about that.

I think that’s why Charlie likes me.

I’m his constant in an inconsistent world. I’m his sure thing. His winning horse, so to speak; unlike all of his other gambles, I seem to have paid off for him.

“You’re early,” he says to me with a mouth full of cigarette smoke.

“You shouldn’t be smoking in here, Charlie,” I reply.

He looks down at his cigarette and then back up to me as if he didn’t even know he was smoking. “Sorry,” he says, and wanders outside to put it out.

I sometimes wonder who is the boss here, him or me.