CHAPTER SEVEN
Jarrod's apartment had only a few furniture pieces. Just the necessities. Jarrod woke, working his way up through layers of sleep until he was lying awake in the darkened room. There was a bit of light working its way around the aluminum foil taped to his bedroom window, so it was still daytime and he hadn’t overslept. Four o’clock, his alarm said, and Jarrod rolled out of bed. He needed food, and to check the messages on his phone.
His back didn’t ache when he bent down to take eggs out of his tiny fridge, so he knew it would be a good day. There was a message from his agent on his phone, telling him he had an audition for a part in a TV cop show, a message from his mom, asking him to call her, and a call from Clay, one of the working boys he knew, suggesting they meet for coffee.
He rang his agent back, then called the production company to set up a film test for the next day. He rang his mom and chatted for a few minutes, glad he had something he could tell her about. And he rang Clay and met him before work for a quick coffee.
Clay was pretty, in a washed-out Californian surfer dude kind of way, with bleached blonde hair and freckles and a tan, and men liked him a lot. Hell, Jarrod liked him a lot, there wasn’t anyone else he’d rather do a double session with. Jarrod bent forward and kissed Clay’s cheek and slid into the booth opposite him in the café.
Jarrod ordered an espresso and smiled across at Clay. He was like Jarrod, neither of them used coke, or anything else hard, and they were both trying to break into acting. They both had dreams.
“I’ve got an audition tomorrow,” Jarrod said.
“Excellent,” Clay said. “What’s it for?”
“One of the cops shows that’s filmed here. What about you? Have you had any callbacks?”
Clay nodded. “Yeah, for a music video. They’re shooting next week, all week, up the coast somewhere. It’ll be a full week’s pay.”
Jarrod squeezed Clay’s hand. “This might be it, for both of us.”
Clay squeezed Jarrod’s hand back. “If it is, for both of us, I don’t want to lose touch with you.”
“You’ve got my number, you won’t,” Jarrod said.
Clay kept hold of Jarrod’s hand. “I want us to be lovers,” he said. “If we get out. And even if we don’t. I care about you, Jarrod.”
Jarrod shook his head. “Keith,” he said, using Clay’s real name. “You know that will not happen.”
“Why not? We like each other, we could make each other feel great.”
Jarrod extricated his hand from Clay’s grip. “No. It will not happen while I’m working in the industry. I don’t sleep with anyone, you know that. And if I break into acting, get work, then I want a real relationship, I want someone to love me.”
Clay was silent and Jarrod smiled at him. At least he was honest enough not to claim he loved Jarrod.
“Besides,” Jarrod said. “We both know neither of us will get the career break we want, and I’ll go back to London when my visa runs out, and this time will be what I had to do to make my dreams come true.”
“Do you think’s what’ll happen?” Clay asked.
Jarrod said nothing.
Then, with tears in his eyes, he mustered, "I know I'm not going to get the break I long for. I'm just another English guy in the US, working as a hooker to pay the rent. But part of me still hasn't given up hope, and that was why I'm still here. As soon as I accept that there was no chance, I’d use the money that I had saved, and go back to London and get on with my life."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
When Selene let Jarrod into the brothel, he went upstairs to tap on the office door. When Autumn looked up, he said, “I don’t want to do doubles with Clay anymore. Could you change my file to say this?”
“Sure, honey,” Autumn said, and Jarrod stood there while she pulled up his entry on the database and tapped on the keyboard of her computer. “Anything else you want to change?” she asked him, looking up, and he shook his head.
“No, the rest is still fine,” he said.