“I get paid on Friday,” he said, scrubbing a hand down his face.
“That’s great. But today is today.”
Beckett swallowed, avoiding his landlord’s disapproving stare. “I know. I just had an unexpected bill last month and it’s been hard to catch up.”
“That restaurant doesn’t pay you enough,” Robert said, shoving his hands into his pockets. The motion appeared resigned, and Beckett finally let out his breath, knowing he’d been given a reprieve.
“It’s a minimum wage job,” he agreed, “but the tips are good. I just need the right shifts.”
And he hadn’t been getting the right shifts. All he needed was one good brunch run on the weekend and Beckett would be golden. Working at La Creperie wasn’t his idea of a good time, and it surely wasn’t a life goal. He hated kissing ass and smiling for money, but the restaurant had a rich clientele who loved their breakfast booze. Brunch shifts were a surefire way to come home with way more money than he deserved.
“What happened to the Beckett who moved in here two years ago?” Robert asked, and Beckett winced. He’d been trying his best to forget that version of himself ever existed. Two years ago, Beckett had been an optimistic idealist with dreams of opening his own restaurant and paying people much more than minimum wage to wait tables for him. But money was a shit thing, wasn’t it?
“Myers Bluff shattered those dreams, Rob.” He gave a self-deprecating laugh.
“Don’t let this town beat you down, Beckett,” Rob said, taking a step back into the hallway.
“I’ll have rent on Friday,” he said again. “Friday night. After I get paid.”
Robert exhaled loudly and nodded. “I’ll see you Saturday morning.”
“Thanks, Rob.”
Beckett closed his front door and locked it, groaning as the deadbolt latched into place. Had he really lived in this place for two years? He flattened his back against the door and surveyed his surroundings. It wasn’t like Robert presided over a hovel, but the building was definitely due for some updating and repairs. Thankfully, the state of affairs was what kept the rent down, which Beckett appreciated. He didn’t complain when things broke because he knew well enough to predict that with upgrades came rent increases.
He’d done his best to make the place home, though, including thrifting a ridiculously ornate velvet and dark wood couch from the Goodwill right after he moved in. The lush green velvet was the most dramatic pop of color in the otherwise bland living room, accented by a shelf of healthy plants and succulents in the far corner. He had a decent television, a battered entertainment center that he’d painted gold because…why not? Beside his TV sat his portable record player, and on the ground were two milk crates packed with old vinyls.
His bedroom was much the same—a generic bed frame he’d thrifted a couple weeks after the couch and a queen mattress that had seen better days. He had plain white twinkle lights strung up in the bedroom, from his dresser to the window and back. He’d wrapped the cord in gauze, and if the overhead light was off, the room had a deliciously soft and dreamy vibe that he absolutely loved. A pile of books stood beside his night stand, and a dresser on the far wall overflowed with clothes.
Beckett did love clothes. It was where he spent most of his money, and he’d never apologize for that.
Beckett grabbed some clean briefs from the top drawer of his dresser and turned off the lights, padding back down the hallway to his extremely cramped and unsalvageable bathroom. He’d decorated with colored towels, but there wasn’t much else to be done in the small and stark space. He stripped naked and shoved his dirty clothes into a hamper behind the door, then turned on the taps and waited for the water to get warm. It ran hot fast, and he climbed in, pulling the curtain closed behind him.
He wasn’t eager to work a lunch shift on a Wednesday, but that was what the luck of the draw had earned him. He’d really pissed off his boss with the whole wisdom tooth fiasco, and he hadn’t seen a weekend shift since. He’d been trying to go above and beyond, not whining about the shit shifts and the shit work, hoping he could get back in her good graces, but so far, no luck.
Hence the barely visible bank balance and the pending celery and radish diet he was about to start. But Beckett didn’t want to complain because, for as bad as all of it was, it was still better than living in Arizona. Still better than living with his older sister and her family. It was still better than all the could have beens in his life.
“Suck it up, buttercup,” he said to himself, rinsing his hair and turning off the shower. He dressed quickly for work in black pants and a black dress shirt. Beckett shook the water out of his hair, letting the brown curls fall where they wanted. He grabbed his sneakers out of his closet and finished getting ready, then locked up and headed to work.
He didn’t necessarily live close to the restaurant, but he could walk there in about an hour. He’d planned ahead and made the decision to save the gas, counting his monthly budget back to himself as he walked the four miles to work.
Beckett’s life hadn’t always been like this…this borderline slum apartment and negative calorie vegetable diet he now found to be his temporary norm. He grew up in Ohio, properly middle class with married parents and an annoying sister, seven years older than him. By the time Beckett started high school, Jessica was about to graduate college with an engagement ring bigger than any Beckett had ever seen on her finger. Her high school sweetheart had proposed the day they graduated high school, but promised to wait until they’d finished college to set a date.
The whole thing seemed ridiculous to Beckett, who at fourteen knew he never wanted to get married, but wasn’t quite sure why. Still, he went through the motions of celebration with his family. The following summer turned everyone’s lives upside down and Beckett spent a good amount of his brain power trying to not think about that time in his life. His sister did her best to never let him forget, but…
He’d turned to alcohol at an early age, trying to drown out the nightmares that haunted him, and his reliance on booze as a crutch only served to make his sister hate him more than she already did. By the time he turned seventeen, Beckett knew he was gay, or at least bisexual. He definitely favored men, but sometimes there would be a woman… and that was the mood he’d been in when he met Samantha on the first day of his senior year.
She was a transfer from California. Samantha was blonde and beautiful and so filled with spite for every single thing that existed in Ohio, Beckett included. Her apathy made him hard. Two weeks into September, she shoved him against a tree and kissed him… and Beckett turned to putty in her hands. After that kiss, Samantha was mean to everyone but him, and he loved the sense of superiority that gave him.
He continued to be the only person she kissed until he wasn’t.
Samantha broke his heart a month before graduation, when he caught her against the same tree with her arms around the captain of the cheerleading squad. It seemed so off base, but also so appropriate, that Beckett could hardly begrudge her for it. He cursed her name under his breath, deleted her phone number, and went home to rub frozen spoons against his neck to make her love bites disappear.
That weekend, at a graduation party, he had sex with a boy for the first time and it wasn’t better than sex with Samantha, but it was different, and he liked it for different reasons. He didn’t think he would ever want to “pick a side” so he mentally checked a box in his brain, reaffirmed his lack of interest in getting married, and waited for graduation.
It took him six years, two girlfriends, one boyfriend, and a hundred notches on his bed post to get through college. School was hard for him, it always had been, but his sister had insisted. She’d sworn it was important and, even if he didn’t agree, she assured him she knew best. Jessica wanted him to learn from her mistakes, to not repeat them. She didn’t give him much choice.Jessica and her husband had moved to Arizona and she dragged Beckett out there for college as soon as he was out of high school, promising him the change in scenery would do him good.
One year after that, with a Bachelor’s degree under his belt and a bottle of Jack sitting heavy in his stomach, the two of them had the biggest fight they’d ever had. Beckett woke the next morning with a migraine the size of Mt. Everest and a plane ticket to California on top of an empty suitcase. His sister’s message was received loud and clear. He packed his things, caught a flight to Myers Bluff, and never looked back.
