Jon & Nate (tentative title)
Oct. 22nd, 2013 11:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
novapsyche"And just what do you think you're doing?"
Jonathan turned around, a puzzled look on his thin face. "I'm gathering my tools so I can go fix that tire. Unless you want to do it?"
Nate grimaced and turned his face up and away. "Whatever, man. Just don't touch my stuff."
Jonathan continued on into the utility room, muttering to himself. Good God, they’d been living in the same apartment house for two years. One would think that Nate would know by now that Jon would take care of Nate's things, or at least ignore them. He'd never break anything, whether out of spite or accident. Jon felt the rise of bile but took the time to swallow.
Walking into the tiny 4x6' room cluttered with cleaning supplies and other various implements, Jon wondered why he felt the responsibility to change the tire fell to him. He wasn't the one who left nails in the driveway. What the hell had Nate been doing in the first place? Why were nails in the lane? Nate never did give him a straight answer. Seriously, was he building a go-kart or something? Making a make-shift basketball hoop with a wooden crate? Creating an IUD? Whatever it was, he sure should have cleaned up after himself, instead of doling out half-hearted apologies when Jon arrived home from work, reverse, into the driveway, into a blown tire. What kind of jackass does that?
A sigh escaped Jon's lips. The tire would get repaired. Then he and Nate would pretend as though it never happened. This was the pattern that repeated itself throughout their relationship, the same goddamn pattern, like a fractal. But what could be done at this point? He and Nate had been friends for all but eight of each of their lives. Jon had better friends, but none that had lasted as long. In the realm of friendships, longevity held its own glamor.
In twenty minutes, the rim clenched a fresh tire. Jon stepped back and admired his work.
"Dude, you through? I need to run to the drugstore."
Jon spun in his spot. "Seriously, man? Just take the damned bus. It comes every hour." Still, he tossed Nate his keys. "When are you getting your piece fixed? It's been sittin' out back for months now."
Nate shrugged. "When the money comes through."
Jon watched as his Tempo buzzed away with its dislodged muffler. How long had it truly been? Eight, ten months? He scratched the back of his bald head and flattened his lips against his teeth. Way too long. If the shoe had been on the other foot, what would Nate have done? Bitched, probably, just as Jon had just done, but more often and with more venom.
Two hours later, Nate returned.
"Where the hell have you been, dude?" Jon had taken it upon himself to pour four generous shots of Hennessy in the meantime, which were extraordinarily smooth going down but hit an empty stomach.
"Oh! Well, I was downtown, and there was this one chick . . . ." Jon didn't need to hear anything more, as he'd be hearing the same spiel he had been for the last two years. This one was a brunette, short and slight. "I thought you liked girls who were more top-heavy," Jon retorted. Nate rolled his eyes, then went to the cupboard to retrieve his own shot glass.
* * *
Nathaniel surprised Jon the next day, showing up after work hours (Nate didn't work, but Jon did) with a dinner companion. "Hey," he said. "You remember me telling you about Gloria." The diminutive female held out her hand. Jon noticed that her nail polish was flaking and irregular, but he was polite all the same.
"Yeah," Nate continued. "We were talkin' on the phone and it just seemed like a good time to catch a bite to eat together." He turned back to Gloria and tried his best at a surreptitious grin. Jon shook his head--just once--ultimately being more secretive than Nate could ever wish to be. Nate, for his part, gamboled into the kitchen and began defrosting some chicken in the microwave. Dinner, apparently, was at least a couple hours off.
Resigned to his fate, Jon sat down on the couch, catercorner to the loveseat where Gloria now parked herself. She was quite small, at most five feet tall if not standing on tiptoe. Her skin, taut and tanned, still bore signs of wear and weather--she must go to tanning booths year-round, Jon figured. Her nose was outsized for the rest of her face, but other than that she was entirely eyecatching. Pert breasts, nice hips, a dress that hugged all the best curves: he could see why Nate was so interested. At the same time, his eyes kept returning to her disheveled nails. Her hair, too, fell too flat against her shoulders and seemed to poke out at strange angles.
"Gloria," he said. "I guess I watched too much All in the Family--I expect all Glorias to be blondes!" Gloria sat with a downturned smile and merely replied, "Hmm." Maybe she was too young to catch the reference? Jon stood up suddenly. "Can I get you something to drink?"
"Oh, sure," she said, visibly brightening. "Whatcha got?"
Jon headed over to the liquor cabinet, such as it was. "Umm . . . ." He rummaged for about five seconds. "At the moment, all we have is rum and gin. Longthroat over here finished all of the Hennessy."
"I'll take gin and juice, if you have it."
Juice in a bachelor's apartment? Jon thought to himself. Luckily enough, there was still some OJ way in the back of the icebox, just a tad beyond its sell-by date. The glass tinkled as he swirled a spoon throughout. He handed Gloria the oversized drink ("That's more of a double," he warned her) and returned to the microfiber couch. As he sat, he inadvertently wondered if her skin had the same velvety feel.
"Thanks," she said, sipping and, after a moment of evaluation, nodding. "So, how long have you two known each other?"
Nate laughed at the same time the microwave timer sang aloud. He called out, "Longer than you’ve been alive, baby."
Jon gave him a sidelong glance. "Since grade school," he said. "Too long to even remember that far back." Yet he pursed his brow. "How long has it been? Third grade, right?"
Nate, chopping celery and garlic for his chicken bake surprise, yelled back, "Somewhere around there." Jon had no idea why Nate was raising his voice--the kitchen was one room away with an open alcove. Both he and Gloria could see and hear Nate just fine. Jon turned to Gloria and stage-whispered, "I rescued him from two fifth graders. I was tall for my age. Don't tell him I said so."
The brunette giggled. "Regular knight in shining armor, huh?" she whispered back. Then she winked. Caught off-guard, Jon rose and announced his need to use the lavatory.
* * *
Dinner packed away in the trio of stomachs, multiple drinks downed as well, the three relaxed while watching a rerun of The Walking Dead. "I tried out for that show," Gloria offered. "Back when I was outside of Hollywood. Just as an extra, you know? Acting is tough. Even when you're just trying to be a zombie, acting is tough!" She picked up her glass and swirled around the ice-melted concoction. Nate suggested she have another, but she declined. She still had to drive home, after all.
"Well, you could always stay here," Nate said, almost nonchalantly.
Gloria demurred. "I appreciate it, but I do have to work in the morning." Jon looked at the time: 9:35 p.m. He'd have to retire soon himself. "What do you do?" he asked, continuing with the polite small talk that normally he despised.
"She's a regular whiz at numbers," Nate said, grinning.
"Yeah, I'm an accountant." She shrugged, making her hair stand even more at odd angles to itself. "Nothing exciting."
"But does it pay the bills?" Jon asked, knowing the answer. They both began laughing, Nate sitting alongside as though humor were a foreign language. Jon was about to change the subject--he didn't mean to make his buddy uncomfortable by highlighting his lack of employment--but then Gloria asked the same question in return.
"I'm in construction," he said.
"Like, really in construction? Or, 'in construction' like those mafia guys?" Gloria smiled.
"No, really, on the up and up."
"Yeah," Nate broke in. "He sets up those orange cones and everything. Sometimes he even gets to direct traffic!" Jon chuckled but gave Nate a deep, long look.
"Well, it was nice to meet you, Gloria. I'll leave you in the capable hands of my good friend here," Jon said, gathering himself and heading toward the hallway.
"Nice to meet you, too!" she said, her voice the timbre of windchimes. "See you next time, hopefully."
"Good dinner, dude," Jon said on his way out. "You should cook more often." Nate chucked a throw pillow at him as he darted out of the way and down the hall.
* * *
Jonathan was just about to let his hand slip down the waist of his dream-girlfriend when a knock roused him from his slumber. Cursing under his breath, he stomped to his door and swung it wide. "What the fuck, dude!" he exclaimed. Then his eyesight focused and saw that the figure before him was not the 5' 11" frame to which he was accustomed. "Gloria?"
"Sorry," she choked. "I thought this was the bathroom."
Through the slanted light of the streetlights streaming in from downturned blinds, Jon tried to expand and clarify his field of vision. He swiveled his head to peer at his alarm clock. 3:20 a.m. What was this chick still doing here? He then turned back and let the light land on the woman's face and skin. Her hair was even wilder than it was before, radiating almost straight out from her scalp. She still wore her dress, but it was wrinkled and not nearly as flattering as it had been.
Jon continued to just look at her, while she screwed her head from side to side. "Um, the bathroom is that way," Jon said, pointing. That was when Gloria began to sob. Her weeping was silent, mainly just shoulders hunching up and down. Inexplicably, Jon admired that of her.
"Is something the matter?" he asked. Apparently that was an invitation, as Gloria let herself into his room and closed the door. "You need me to call you a cab?"
"No . . . ." she said, her voice catching as it trailed. Jon flicked on the overhead light and the brunette sat down at the edge of his unkempt bed. He saw that her lipstick, which had hitherto been applied with stricture and care, now lay smeared from corner to corner. She shivered as though in freezing temps.
Jon stood akimbo, raised his hands, then put them back on his hips. "Um . . . ."
"I think something happened," Gloria said, her mahogany eyes looking up into the emerald of Jon's own. Well, obviously something happened, Jon thought. He stood still, though, and remained in polite silence.
"Will you take me to the hospital?" she asked. The question alarmed Jon. Why wasn't she asking this of Nate? Besides the fact that he didn't have a car. Jon rolled his eyes at his own thought, then focused again on the crumpled woman on his bed. "What's wrong?" he asked. As she looked at him in silence, he suddenly understood. Of course. Silence was the best method of relaying such information.
"Are you sure you don't want me to call you a cab?" he asked again. He thought about his burgundy Tempo in the driveway, perfectly ready to convey its passengers anywhere they wanted to go.
"No, no," she said, rising, trying to find her feet in her heels. "I'm sorry to have disturbed you. Can you help me find my purse?"
The two went out into the living room, where the purse lay nearly scattered on the loveseat, opened as though someone attempted to retrieve something in haste. Gloria gathered her belongings. "Thank you," she breathed. She opened the door after finding her keys, then turned around to embrace Jon. "Thank you," she said again, then left. Jon shut the door, then heard the clunk of a car door closing. An engine fired and held, growing dimmer and dimmer from the Doppler effect.
* * *
Home from work, Jon unlocked the front door and found Nate on the couch, the remainder of Captain Morgan before him. He wasn't even bothering to use a shot glass. Jon scowled as he clopped closed the door. "Hey," Nate mumbled, staring intently at the television. Jon didn't reply, simply sat down and looked at his friend for several minutes. He looked the same. Same straggly blond hair, same five-o'clock shadow, same devil-may-care attitude.
"So what happened with Gloria?" Jon asked once a commercial came on.
Nate chortled in a tone Jon had never heard before. "That crazy bitch," he said. "She found my Xanax and went to town. I'm surprised she wasn't here when I got up."
"Yeah?" Jon asked, almost out of obligation.
"Oh man," Nate said. "She was ready to go, you know, but she just couldn't handle her liquor! Well, her liquor and pills," he paused, tightening his brow. He brightened again, though, stating, "It was a great night. You didn't hear anything?"
"Guess I was too tired from work."
"Heh. Yeah. Well, let me just say that we had a good time."
Jon thought back to the blear of lipstick. "I'm sure you did."
"You know me, not one to kiss and tell!" Nate said, suppressing a laugh.
"You gonna see her again?"
"Doubt it, dude. You know how chicks are."
Jon turned his gaze from Nate to the television, to the door, and back to Nate again. "I guess I do," he said.
He walked to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator and viewed the remnants of the previous night's dinner. He considered, then went into the crisper and got out a medley of vegetables. No one else in the apartment ate veggies, just him. He recalled his life from a year prior, when he lived alone and had no extra expenses, no one to gripe to but also no one to complain about, either. He fantasized about that time, when the refrigerator was nearly filled top to bottom with vegetables. It had been pure.
Jon endeavored to save some cash so as to fix Nate's Mustang as soon as possible.
Jonathan turned around, a puzzled look on his thin face. "I'm gathering my tools so I can go fix that tire. Unless you want to do it?"
Nate grimaced and turned his face up and away. "Whatever, man. Just don't touch my stuff."
Jonathan continued on into the utility room, muttering to himself. Good God, they’d been living in the same apartment house for two years. One would think that Nate would know by now that Jon would take care of Nate's things, or at least ignore them. He'd never break anything, whether out of spite or accident. Jon felt the rise of bile but took the time to swallow.
Walking into the tiny 4x6' room cluttered with cleaning supplies and other various implements, Jon wondered why he felt the responsibility to change the tire fell to him. He wasn't the one who left nails in the driveway. What the hell had Nate been doing in the first place? Why were nails in the lane? Nate never did give him a straight answer. Seriously, was he building a go-kart or something? Making a make-shift basketball hoop with a wooden crate? Creating an IUD? Whatever it was, he sure should have cleaned up after himself, instead of doling out half-hearted apologies when Jon arrived home from work, reverse, into the driveway, into a blown tire. What kind of jackass does that?
A sigh escaped Jon's lips. The tire would get repaired. Then he and Nate would pretend as though it never happened. This was the pattern that repeated itself throughout their relationship, the same goddamn pattern, like a fractal. But what could be done at this point? He and Nate had been friends for all but eight of each of their lives. Jon had better friends, but none that had lasted as long. In the realm of friendships, longevity held its own glamor.
In twenty minutes, the rim clenched a fresh tire. Jon stepped back and admired his work.
"Dude, you through? I need to run to the drugstore."
Jon spun in his spot. "Seriously, man? Just take the damned bus. It comes every hour." Still, he tossed Nate his keys. "When are you getting your piece fixed? It's been sittin' out back for months now."
Nate shrugged. "When the money comes through."
Jon watched as his Tempo buzzed away with its dislodged muffler. How long had it truly been? Eight, ten months? He scratched the back of his bald head and flattened his lips against his teeth. Way too long. If the shoe had been on the other foot, what would Nate have done? Bitched, probably, just as Jon had just done, but more often and with more venom.
Two hours later, Nate returned.
"Where the hell have you been, dude?" Jon had taken it upon himself to pour four generous shots of Hennessy in the meantime, which were extraordinarily smooth going down but hit an empty stomach.
"Oh! Well, I was downtown, and there was this one chick . . . ." Jon didn't need to hear anything more, as he'd be hearing the same spiel he had been for the last two years. This one was a brunette, short and slight. "I thought you liked girls who were more top-heavy," Jon retorted. Nate rolled his eyes, then went to the cupboard to retrieve his own shot glass.
Nathaniel surprised Jon the next day, showing up after work hours (Nate didn't work, but Jon did) with a dinner companion. "Hey," he said. "You remember me telling you about Gloria." The diminutive female held out her hand. Jon noticed that her nail polish was flaking and irregular, but he was polite all the same.
"Yeah," Nate continued. "We were talkin' on the phone and it just seemed like a good time to catch a bite to eat together." He turned back to Gloria and tried his best at a surreptitious grin. Jon shook his head--just once--ultimately being more secretive than Nate could ever wish to be. Nate, for his part, gamboled into the kitchen and began defrosting some chicken in the microwave. Dinner, apparently, was at least a couple hours off.
Resigned to his fate, Jon sat down on the couch, catercorner to the loveseat where Gloria now parked herself. She was quite small, at most five feet tall if not standing on tiptoe. Her skin, taut and tanned, still bore signs of wear and weather--she must go to tanning booths year-round, Jon figured. Her nose was outsized for the rest of her face, but other than that she was entirely eyecatching. Pert breasts, nice hips, a dress that hugged all the best curves: he could see why Nate was so interested. At the same time, his eyes kept returning to her disheveled nails. Her hair, too, fell too flat against her shoulders and seemed to poke out at strange angles.
"Gloria," he said. "I guess I watched too much All in the Family--I expect all Glorias to be blondes!" Gloria sat with a downturned smile and merely replied, "Hmm." Maybe she was too young to catch the reference? Jon stood up suddenly. "Can I get you something to drink?"
"Oh, sure," she said, visibly brightening. "Whatcha got?"
Jon headed over to the liquor cabinet, such as it was. "Umm . . . ." He rummaged for about five seconds. "At the moment, all we have is rum and gin. Longthroat over here finished all of the Hennessy."
"I'll take gin and juice, if you have it."
Juice in a bachelor's apartment? Jon thought to himself. Luckily enough, there was still some OJ way in the back of the icebox, just a tad beyond its sell-by date. The glass tinkled as he swirled a spoon throughout. He handed Gloria the oversized drink ("That's more of a double," he warned her) and returned to the microfiber couch. As he sat, he inadvertently wondered if her skin had the same velvety feel.
"Thanks," she said, sipping and, after a moment of evaluation, nodding. "So, how long have you two known each other?"
Nate laughed at the same time the microwave timer sang aloud. He called out, "Longer than you’ve been alive, baby."
Jon gave him a sidelong glance. "Since grade school," he said. "Too long to even remember that far back." Yet he pursed his brow. "How long has it been? Third grade, right?"
Nate, chopping celery and garlic for his chicken bake surprise, yelled back, "Somewhere around there." Jon had no idea why Nate was raising his voice--the kitchen was one room away with an open alcove. Both he and Gloria could see and hear Nate just fine. Jon turned to Gloria and stage-whispered, "I rescued him from two fifth graders. I was tall for my age. Don't tell him I said so."
The brunette giggled. "Regular knight in shining armor, huh?" she whispered back. Then she winked. Caught off-guard, Jon rose and announced his need to use the lavatory.
Dinner packed away in the trio of stomachs, multiple drinks downed as well, the three relaxed while watching a rerun of The Walking Dead. "I tried out for that show," Gloria offered. "Back when I was outside of Hollywood. Just as an extra, you know? Acting is tough. Even when you're just trying to be a zombie, acting is tough!" She picked up her glass and swirled around the ice-melted concoction. Nate suggested she have another, but she declined. She still had to drive home, after all.
"Well, you could always stay here," Nate said, almost nonchalantly.
Gloria demurred. "I appreciate it, but I do have to work in the morning." Jon looked at the time: 9:35 p.m. He'd have to retire soon himself. "What do you do?" he asked, continuing with the polite small talk that normally he despised.
"She's a regular whiz at numbers," Nate said, grinning.
"Yeah, I'm an accountant." She shrugged, making her hair stand even more at odd angles to itself. "Nothing exciting."
"But does it pay the bills?" Jon asked, knowing the answer. They both began laughing, Nate sitting alongside as though humor were a foreign language. Jon was about to change the subject--he didn't mean to make his buddy uncomfortable by highlighting his lack of employment--but then Gloria asked the same question in return.
"I'm in construction," he said.
"Like, really in construction? Or, 'in construction' like those mafia guys?" Gloria smiled.
"No, really, on the up and up."
"Yeah," Nate broke in. "He sets up those orange cones and everything. Sometimes he even gets to direct traffic!" Jon chuckled but gave Nate a deep, long look.
"Well, it was nice to meet you, Gloria. I'll leave you in the capable hands of my good friend here," Jon said, gathering himself and heading toward the hallway.
"Nice to meet you, too!" she said, her voice the timbre of windchimes. "See you next time, hopefully."
"Good dinner, dude," Jon said on his way out. "You should cook more often." Nate chucked a throw pillow at him as he darted out of the way and down the hall.
Jonathan was just about to let his hand slip down the waist of his dream-girlfriend when a knock roused him from his slumber. Cursing under his breath, he stomped to his door and swung it wide. "What the fuck, dude!" he exclaimed. Then his eyesight focused and saw that the figure before him was not the 5' 11" frame to which he was accustomed. "Gloria?"
"Sorry," she choked. "I thought this was the bathroom."
Through the slanted light of the streetlights streaming in from downturned blinds, Jon tried to expand and clarify his field of vision. He swiveled his head to peer at his alarm clock. 3:20 a.m. What was this chick still doing here? He then turned back and let the light land on the woman's face and skin. Her hair was even wilder than it was before, radiating almost straight out from her scalp. She still wore her dress, but it was wrinkled and not nearly as flattering as it had been.
Jon continued to just look at her, while she screwed her head from side to side. "Um, the bathroom is that way," Jon said, pointing. That was when Gloria began to sob. Her weeping was silent, mainly just shoulders hunching up and down. Inexplicably, Jon admired that of her.
"Is something the matter?" he asked. Apparently that was an invitation, as Gloria let herself into his room and closed the door. "You need me to call you a cab?"
"No . . . ." she said, her voice catching as it trailed. Jon flicked on the overhead light and the brunette sat down at the edge of his unkempt bed. He saw that her lipstick, which had hitherto been applied with stricture and care, now lay smeared from corner to corner. She shivered as though in freezing temps.
Jon stood akimbo, raised his hands, then put them back on his hips. "Um . . . ."
"I think something happened," Gloria said, her mahogany eyes looking up into the emerald of Jon's own. Well, obviously something happened, Jon thought. He stood still, though, and remained in polite silence.
"Will you take me to the hospital?" she asked. The question alarmed Jon. Why wasn't she asking this of Nate? Besides the fact that he didn't have a car. Jon rolled his eyes at his own thought, then focused again on the crumpled woman on his bed. "What's wrong?" he asked. As she looked at him in silence, he suddenly understood. Of course. Silence was the best method of relaying such information.
"Are you sure you don't want me to call you a cab?" he asked again. He thought about his burgundy Tempo in the driveway, perfectly ready to convey its passengers anywhere they wanted to go.
"No, no," she said, rising, trying to find her feet in her heels. "I'm sorry to have disturbed you. Can you help me find my purse?"
The two went out into the living room, where the purse lay nearly scattered on the loveseat, opened as though someone attempted to retrieve something in haste. Gloria gathered her belongings. "Thank you," she breathed. She opened the door after finding her keys, then turned around to embrace Jon. "Thank you," she said again, then left. Jon shut the door, then heard the clunk of a car door closing. An engine fired and held, growing dimmer and dimmer from the Doppler effect.
Home from work, Jon unlocked the front door and found Nate on the couch, the remainder of Captain Morgan before him. He wasn't even bothering to use a shot glass. Jon scowled as he clopped closed the door. "Hey," Nate mumbled, staring intently at the television. Jon didn't reply, simply sat down and looked at his friend for several minutes. He looked the same. Same straggly blond hair, same five-o'clock shadow, same devil-may-care attitude.
"So what happened with Gloria?" Jon asked once a commercial came on.
Nate chortled in a tone Jon had never heard before. "That crazy bitch," he said. "She found my Xanax and went to town. I'm surprised she wasn't here when I got up."
"Yeah?" Jon asked, almost out of obligation.
"Oh man," Nate said. "She was ready to go, you know, but she just couldn't handle her liquor! Well, her liquor and pills," he paused, tightening his brow. He brightened again, though, stating, "It was a great night. You didn't hear anything?"
"Guess I was too tired from work."
"Heh. Yeah. Well, let me just say that we had a good time."
Jon thought back to the blear of lipstick. "I'm sure you did."
"You know me, not one to kiss and tell!" Nate said, suppressing a laugh.
"You gonna see her again?"
"Doubt it, dude. You know how chicks are."
Jon turned his gaze from Nate to the television, to the door, and back to Nate again. "I guess I do," he said.
He walked to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator and viewed the remnants of the previous night's dinner. He considered, then went into the crisper and got out a medley of vegetables. No one else in the apartment ate veggies, just him. He recalled his life from a year prior, when he lived alone and had no extra expenses, no one to gripe to but also no one to complain about, either. He fantasized about that time, when the refrigerator was nearly filled top to bottom with vegetables. It had been pure.
Jon endeavored to save some cash so as to fix Nate's Mustang as soon as possible.