words replayed themselves. And then you meet someone like David. He’s not part of your story, but he means something . He lay the pills on the counter ready for his tea and mumbled, “How the fuck could someone like David mean anything?”
Jamie had touched a nerve and John knew it.
Between accounts and customers John managed to shrug off the mood Jamie had put him in with his story and was chatting happily to a young female customer when David entered the store. He faltered slightly in his sentence at their brief eye contact. David gave a small smile and nodded hello. John nodded back, but David had already looked away. John felt a twinge of guilt and wasn’t sure if it was sparked by his previous dismissal of David’s importance or the fact he’d fucked Jamie.
He returned his attention to the woman and handed her the brown paper bag containing her child’s picture book.
“Was that David?” Jamie asked as he all but danced past John and headed to the back of the store. John glowered at the young man’s retreating back and muttered, “You fucking know it was, so why ask?” Suddenly he felt sick to his stomach, sure that Jamie had rushed to tell David the events of the night before. So what. He scowled and turned to the inventory book. I seriously have to get some fucking computers in this place….
The numbers had only just started to swim into focus when John heard Jamie’s laugh and he slammed the accounts book shut. Stalking through the store toward the secondhand section, John growled at Jamie, “Are you doing any work today?”
But as usual Jamie took John’s mood in stride and grinned. “Oh come on, John. It’s a half-day today and we’re closing soon. I was just telling Dave that we’re moving you into Mum’s place this afternoon and that you couldn’t put up with the ‘little old lady’ furniture.”
John relaxed a little; his evening with Jamie had not been the topic of conversation. “Give me a break, Jamie. You moved out,” he said, making sure to keep his gaze away from David.
Jamie laughed, slid his arm in David’s, and asked, “Come on, Dave. Wanna give us a hand moving John’s stuff upstairs? I’ll make him buy us dinner.”
David looked briefly at John, not sure how the suggestion would go down with the dour man now watching them, but when Jamie gave his arm a tug he shrugged and said, “Yeah… okay.”
Moving a selection of John’s possessions took most of the afternoon. Although Maggie had left the apartment fully furnished, John decided to put her furniture into storage and move in some of his own. The bulk of his belongings remained uptown in his real apartment; that way when the year was over he could simply settle back into his old life.
By early evening only a few boxes of clothes and peripheral items remained in their neatly printed cardboard boxes stacked near their final destinations. Looking at their progress John had to admit that although he’d initially been reluctant to let David help he’d worked hard and done the majority of the manual work. Jamie seemed to start a lot of jobs, but always found something else more interesting to do and spent most of his time looking through the boxes providing a running commentary rather than actually unpacking them. Finally John called a halt and sent Jamie for beer and takeout.
With nothing left to do, David stood uncomfortably near a stack of collapsed and folded packing boxes waiting to see what John wanted him to do.
When John turned away from the door he instantly saw David’s discomfort and gave him an equally nervous smile. “Jamie won’t be long. How about you give me a hand and we clear away some of these boxes to give us room to eat?”
David didn’t answer as he began moving the cardboard.
Little more than an hour later, the three men had managed to empty all the takeout cartons and the debris was now strewn on John’s coffee table.
“Man, I’m stuffed,” Jamie groaned,