Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ My (More Than) Acquaintance with a Rentboy ❯ They're not my friends ( Chapter 1 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: NeonNano 
An introduction to the characters, the city, and the plot. David meets the rent-boy
Miscellaneous: Original Stories Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Angst / Romance | Type: Shounen-ai | Uploaded On: 02.06.2007 | Updated On: 10.16.2008 | Pages: 2 | Words: 3.7K | Visits: 550 | Status: Completed
An introduction to the characters, the city, and the plot. David meets the rent-boy
Miscellaneous: Original Stories Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Angst / Romance | Type: Shounen-ai | Uploaded On: 02.06.2007 | Updated On: 10.16.2008 | Pages: 2 | Words: 3.7K | Visits: 550 | Status: Completed
you know what it feels like to miss 100 hours of sleep?
Don't be surprised, but it doesn't feel like anything. It's just a curtain of numbness between yourself and the world. The hours bleed together and then the time doesn't matter anymore; that starts on about the third day. Everything after that is zombie-mode, and it isn't clear whether the street you're walking is a dream, a memory, or in real-time.
That zombie is me: David. And this city was what bit and infected me.
At first, I didn't want to change. I didn't want to stay awake and I definitely didn't want to meet that kid.
I wanted the sleep that my body wouldn't let me have.
This city is the large mechanic heart of the state. The oiled cogs rotate, changing the traffic lights, and the people are the clockwork to pump the business in and out. This city is so large and distracted that most don't turn their heads to notice the cancer.This cold mechanical heart has it's arteries, one of which runs through this infected area. The artery is Jenson Blvd, and the infected area is what you would call the rundown section, the slum, the ghetto. My 'home'. Where one of two art schools is inconveniently located.
But unlike my classmates, I don't ask 'Why should I be here?'. Sure, I'm just a poor art student from the 'burbs. But I chose the path of the starving artist and I'll probably be that way for the rest of my life. As the hours waste away, I'm only getting more creative.
These were my days of delirium. The time period in which everything would have been different if I wasn't in a delirium. I wasn't only losing sleep, but also my waking life. You could call it a "sleep disorder", but I'm more partial to calling it an "awake disorder". This is how I found my cure.
xxxxx
There is a café on Jenson Blvd that used to be a popular place. This café didn't even have a proper name, but it had a patio that was between two merging streets, which appealed to those who decided to drop by for a coffee. Watching the slow moving traffic from a distance with a warm cup in hands was a relaxing pastime and lured businessmen, shoppers, and youth alike out of the veins of the city. It was a small building, but the patio more than made up for it, and it had all the typical characteristics of a café; it was familiar and friendly. I had been coming here since I had found it the first week of moving in, about two years ago. I'd come almost everyday, and pay my 2.50 for a coffee and toast.
Due to irregular sleeping hours, I took night classes at the nearby art school until midnight and then worked the graveyard shift at Kinko's near the café until 4:00am. It wasn't nearly as godawful as it sounds; in fact, I didn't mind the job or the hours. I had saved many a business person in the dead of night by running them off copies of a report that would be in front of their boss in 5 hours. But I probably didn't mind so much because I was in Zombie-mode. I was just trying to get the buzzing noise out of my ears.
It's not wise to drink caffeine in my situation, and I probably shouldn't get my fix of it everyday, but I do it anyways. Because the cafe's coffee is especially delicious and it's the only thing I feel like I can really taste anymore. Although my cute little sitcom cafe doesn't get customers like it used to. Over the last couple of years the atmosphere has changed for the worst. The city's cancer. The old bookstore owner moved to the north side of the city, replacing the space with an adult entertainment store. The Asian food mart was now a liquor store, with casual break-ins. The potted plants in various locations were neglected and left to die, morphing into new ashtrays for the public smokers. In general, the place had a growing air of smoke and pollution about it. My poor little café had probably never struggled more to survive in it's entire existence than it was then. Even on the verge of shutting down, I was still a loyal customer, ready for my AM coffee.
Although it was only soon after that I started noticing how bad it had really gotten. It is not terribly unusual to have prostitutes in the city, but when they are in my plane of vision, it feels like an alarm goes off in my head. A wall goes up around me in which I try to ignore their existence, but the aura of revulsion seeps out of them like radio waves. Walking disease. They are becoming more frequent and I watch them pace around the brick-walled bar across the street until light breaks, when they start to dissipate. The floor above the bar was a "massage parlor", but you didn't have to be a detective to know that it was a cheap brothel.
Ignore. Ignore. No one wants to start trouble so we ignore.
A few times the hookers with their fluorescent lips even had the nerve to come up to the railing next to my table and offer their services to me, at which point I try my nicest to point them in the other direction. I don't want to talk to them. I don't want to see them or hear them. It's not until an hour after I arrive that the sun begins to rise and the fog lifts a little. At this time the streets become quiet and the only rustling would be a paper in the grey wind or a bird pecking around my table.
But there is a person amongst them who I did not expect to see. A boy, maybe still in his teens, leaned against the brick wall with them. He was skinny, but average height for his age. The dark brown hair was overgrown and reached past the length of his eyes like he had just rolled out of his (or someone else's) bed. I could not see his face from my distance, but I could tell he had a cigarette which he often balanced on his lips, staining his clothes with it's scent. Everything about him was juvenile, from the Chuck Taylor sneakers to the fingerless gloves he used to brush hair from his face. Most likely a runaway. At his age I was probably sketching on school desks and getting love-letters from my then-girlfriend. And look at him now, a youth conversing with a transvestite outside of a foul bar off Jenson Blvd. The hookers that hovered nearby, who probably had ten years on his age, seemed to enjoy his company. They went about their business; People would walk into the parlor and come out about half an hour later. Cars came and went, stopping to make deals with the stiletto-heeled girls, then picking them up and leaving only to come back soon after. A few times I've seen the boy accept an invitation and ride away in a truck. My imagination is sometimes a cruel thing. I don't really want to think about what happens when those taillights fade around the corner, but I know that it's headed straight to the lot past the junkyard, where a quick job could be done away from the eyes of anyone other than a crackhead. I try to avert my eyes, but I can't. Usually, I would feel a sorrow in the pit of my stomach for these people. Maybe it's something I'd have to feel for them, since they can't feel it themselves. But as my sleep hours whittle away, so does my empathy. Goodbye sleep. Hello Apathy. After all, they are the ones risking themselves that way. It's disgusting.
I threw on my coat and scarf after work, heading into the early morning dark towards my daily destination of coffee bean sweetness, when I see the usual pack of rent girls(with, in this case, a rent boy) on the sidewalk ahead of me. The sun is starting to creep up, but the cold was still stifling( I remember this well, as I was briskly awake after a heavenly 3 hour sleep). The pack was huddled close, keeping warm and throwing a large shadow into the street, courtesy of the orange streetlamp above them. The empty streets magnified their catty voices, and one girl's laugh reminded me of a hyena. They usually were farther ahead so I didn't have to bother with confrontation, but not today apparently. I crossed my arms across my chest, hugging the coat to my body, and faced the floor as I headed toward them, to my café. My warm paradise across the stream of piranhas. I lengthen my stride as I walk through their cloud of cigarette smoke and I feel their eyes turn to my bowed head. I start making like I'm in one hell of a hurry, like I don't even see their smeared neon makeup. Their conversation quiets and they move out of my way as I pass. "Hey baby..." one of them cooed. I kept walking and focused my eyes on anything but them and the distorted shadows they gave off. I caught a few amused smiles in my peripheral as I left the atmosphere.
The usual middle-aged waitress could be seen waiting for me from the lit windows of the café, so I increased my speed, leaving staring eyes and a trail of breath behind me. Upon reaching the door, the waitress, Bethany, opened it for me and let me shake off the cold before inquiring. "Are those hookers bothering you David? They've been hustling everyone who walks by and I really can't stand looking at them anymore." she complained. Bethany is a graying woman with a friendly personality and desperation for communication. She likes to pretend I'm her son sometimes and just chit-chats to me on the patio when the weather is warmer or just if something's on her mind. She likes my quiet nature and is content with me listening to her since no one else would after the kids moved out of her house. I like her because she doesn't mind the fact that I'm not a very good conversationalist, or the fact that I occupy patio space for hours at a time without ordering anything more than coffee and sometimes toast.
"Your cup's ready for you, but maybe you should warm up a bit before going out to the patio. I don't know why you go out there in such chili weather anyways. Winter is right around the corner. Is that the scarf I knit for you last Christmas? Oh hon, I'm glad you like it. Maybe I should make you a hat this year huh? Would a beanie be okay? You're not the type to have a weird shaped head right?" Bethany handed me my coffee as I moved in the direction of the patio door. "Thanks Bethany." I said, as I handed her the pay. “I’ll paint a picture for you by Christmas"
"Oh would you? I always see you sketching and I'd love to have something to hang on the wall around here instead of these god-awful things. “She said, gesturing to a blown picture of the cityscape, which can be found on pretty much every phone book and postcard in the vicinity.
"Of course."
The morning air breathed on me again as I opened the door to the patio and took a small sip from the mug before seating myself in the usual spot. God, there's something about the coffee there that just tastes different. It's not some fancy taste, or the generic horrible kind, but it sure hits the spot. The cold was crisp to my face, and the wind was picking up, but once the sun would rises, the warmth would start soaking into my skin. On sleepless days, I'm content with staring off into space, but that day I was feeling good off 6 hours of sleep, so I opened my school bag. Taking out my sketch book, I open to a page I had started the day before. The steam from the coffee curled to the sky and there was an unusual quiet on Jenson Blvd. I looked over towards the bar, and as soon as I did so, all of the rent girls snap their head in another direction...Where they staring at me?
I noticed they were talking lower than usual and sneak peeks in my direction when they thought I wasn't looking. I wasn't sure what this was about, but it didn't seem good, so I placed my pencil down and continued staring in their direction. The rent boy, leaning against the brick wall, seemed harassed. He was a noticeable blot of ink with the countless amounts of faded and torn papers behind him.The girls were pulling on his jacket sleeve and laughing. They began holding up numbers on their fingers, and without properly seeing his face, I could tell he's starting to grin.
They're talking about me... I didn't know what they were planning, so I picked up my pencil and start aimlessly shading the woman in my sketch. It didn't need shading in that area, but I thought I might as well darken it and pretend I didn't notice their scheming. At this point I'm irritated already. I can admit that I'm pretty low-key and quiet, but still easy as hell to irritate. As expected, a figure started walking towards my direction. There are no cars in the street, so walking to the café patio left long stripes of shadow uninterrupted at the feet of my visitor.
I wasn't surprised to see that they had sent him over here. For what reason, I wasn't sure yet, but I was readying myself to give a witty retort to whatever it was that he (-they-) wanted. I had never seen his face clearly before, but now that I was, I was slightly taken aback. He had a pretty-boy face with an edgy smile on his lips, accompanied by a cigarette. He had dark around his eyes, either from lack of sleep, or maybe just dark lashes, but they inspected me from above like a predator. If he were a tomboyish girl, I would have thought he was cute, but considering he was a guy...how lame is that?
"Hey, do you have a spare cig? Mine's almost out." His voice was slightly raspy, probably from a cough. If I had to describe it, it was a fresh voice; an artsy voice. I didn't say anything back at first. He must think I'm an idiot if he asked such a question. It was fairly obvious that his friends had spare cigarettes. This was the only initiative he could come up with to start a conversation? Well, smoking was an oral fixation that I was never too fond of.
"No, uh, I don't smoke. " I returned my eyes back to the sketch that I was shading too much.
He leaned his backside against the railing of the patio, adjusting his scarf. I wanted to say something smart and all, but that type of thing never seems to come at the right time.
"So what's your name? " he asked me. It didn't sound like a question.
"David."
"David? That's cool. I'm Roz."
"Is that your real name?"
"What's that supposed to mean?" He asked it softly, without offense. Before I could fake an apology, he said, "Anyways, why do you sit here everyday by yourself?" He flicked his hair with those fingerless gloves in a pseudo-charming sort of way. He wasn't fooling me.
The sky was turning a lighter shade of blue and I sipped my coffee before answering, "Routine." and exhaled a large cloud of mist. “Can I ask-Roz, right?-why you approached me?" I was a little annoyed and decided to ask him directly. "What do you want?" was what I wanted to say, but l usually just keep the ruder comments to myself. Roz lowered his head to face his shoes with a smile growing. His hair followed his leaning and covered his eyes as he flicked his cigarette to the floor and replied, "You know those girls over there? They see you here almost everyday and you ignore them. They figured maybe I was more your type. Like I could convince you to get me as a customer."
I don't know what kind of face I made, but it was enough to make Roz burst out laughing when he turned his head to me. “Sorry!" he said immediately.
What the hell? Do I look gay? No, I'm pretty damn sure I'm straight and my past girlfriends would agree. And of course I ignore them. They're prostitutes. Besides, who the hell would want an STD anyways? This side of town really has gone down the gutter. The growing cancer.
I wanted to say these things, but I didn't. I had a bad tendency to run my mouth off so I tried since childhood to make it stay shut when it needed to. It didn't always work, unfortunately. I always try to avoid social confrontation, but it always seems to follow me. Roz was still chuckling by the time I replied with my face hidden in the coffee mug. "Well, I'm not interested. Now you know. "
In seeing my reaction he interrogated further, for his own amusement.
" So you like girls? I could pull off a girl, right?" He ran his hand through his hair in impression.
" There's something I don't understand here. And that's why the hell you guys are so damn persistent."
I'm just a one guy who happens to be here everyday. I've refused them a few times, so why am I still such a target? Is it so strange for a guy to have dignity, and not jump all over a woman when she's offered to me? I'm only average looking; maybe a past girlfriend or two would dote on me, so what the hell? Roz didn't seem the least bit put off by my attitude.
" Well," He elongated that word. " We see you here everyday, so we decided we'd make some innocent bets that's all"
There's nothing innocent about you.
" And you're losing money on this bet, right?" I asked.
" Not really. I'm just in for the fun of it. But I guess there's no persuading you, huh?" He slipped into the chair opposite me, adjusting his scarf, and rested his head on his hands. He sure had a lot of nerve. Staring at me with those damn bright eyes. But I decided to ignore him and continue my sketch.
"Hey." He said, trying get my attention. "Are you ignoring me?" I could hear the smile in his question and I refused to make eye contact. He didn't move however, and contented himself in watching me for a bit; which stretched into minutes, which stretched into moments.
After a while it was as if he wasn't even sitting there. He wasn't really that distracting at all so I didn't mind continuing with my work. Likewise, he didn't seem to mind that I was ignoring him. With the strokes of my pencil, his eyes followed calmly, and a stillness started to grow, but not in an uncomfortable way.
The mist was almost completely gone as we sat quietly with the chill subsiding around us, an almost pale glow resting on the buildings and patio. I was surprised Roz sat there for as long as he did. He gave the impression of a fearless attitude so I expected him to continue pestering me, but he seemed quite peaceful just overlooking my progress on the sketchpad. I wanted to say something, but I also didn't want to break the silence. Cars and taxis started to pass by more frequently as morning traffic began and this seemed to queue Roz as the time to leave. Without an expression, he stood up slowly and I watched him. He looked over to the bar, but all his companions had left, disappearing with the fog. With the soft light on him now, he looked almost eerie with is dark features.
" Maybe I'll see you later David. I'll tell them to leave you alone. " Roz said, as he lit a cigarette. Wait, did he have those cigarettes the whole time? He sighed, sounding irritated. His back was to me, so I couldn't tell if he really was.
" Going to look for your friends?" I tried not to say it in an unkind way.
" Huh? Oh, no. They're not my friends." With his hands shoved into his pockets he walked, in a rather melancholy sort of way, towards the end of Jenson Blvd and disappeared around the corner. There was a sorrow in the way he last spoke and for the first time in a long time, I was curious. Maybe Roz also went to school, worried about financial problems and brought this upon himself. No, people like that don't deserve my sympathy. Deciding that I shouldn't wonder about someone else's business, I swigged the last bit of coffee, packed up my bag and decided to go home and try hopelessly to sleep.
If Roz did want to see me again, maybe I wouldn't mind so much.
Don't be surprised, but it doesn't feel like anything. It's just a curtain of numbness between yourself and the world. The hours bleed together and then the time doesn't matter anymore; that starts on about the third day. Everything after that is zombie-mode, and it isn't clear whether the street you're walking is a dream, a memory, or in real-time.
That zombie is me: David. And this city was what bit and infected me.
At first, I didn't want to change. I didn't want to stay awake and I definitely didn't want to meet that kid.
I wanted the sleep that my body wouldn't let me have.
This city is the large mechanic heart of the state. The oiled cogs rotate, changing the traffic lights, and the people are the clockwork to pump the business in and out. This city is so large and distracted that most don't turn their heads to notice the cancer.This cold mechanical heart has it's arteries, one of which runs through this infected area. The artery is Jenson Blvd, and the infected area is what you would call the rundown section, the slum, the ghetto. My 'home'. Where one of two art schools is inconveniently located.
But unlike my classmates, I don't ask 'Why should I be here?'. Sure, I'm just a poor art student from the 'burbs. But I chose the path of the starving artist and I'll probably be that way for the rest of my life. As the hours waste away, I'm only getting more creative.
These were my days of delirium. The time period in which everything would have been different if I wasn't in a delirium. I wasn't only losing sleep, but also my waking life. You could call it a "sleep disorder", but I'm more partial to calling it an "awake disorder". This is how I found my cure.
xxxxx
There is a café on Jenson Blvd that used to be a popular place. This café didn't even have a proper name, but it had a patio that was between two merging streets, which appealed to those who decided to drop by for a coffee. Watching the slow moving traffic from a distance with a warm cup in hands was a relaxing pastime and lured businessmen, shoppers, and youth alike out of the veins of the city. It was a small building, but the patio more than made up for it, and it had all the typical characteristics of a café; it was familiar and friendly. I had been coming here since I had found it the first week of moving in, about two years ago. I'd come almost everyday, and pay my 2.50 for a coffee and toast.
Due to irregular sleeping hours, I took night classes at the nearby art school until midnight and then worked the graveyard shift at Kinko's near the café until 4:00am. It wasn't nearly as godawful as it sounds; in fact, I didn't mind the job or the hours. I had saved many a business person in the dead of night by running them off copies of a report that would be in front of their boss in 5 hours. But I probably didn't mind so much because I was in Zombie-mode. I was just trying to get the buzzing noise out of my ears.
It's not wise to drink caffeine in my situation, and I probably shouldn't get my fix of it everyday, but I do it anyways. Because the cafe's coffee is especially delicious and it's the only thing I feel like I can really taste anymore. Although my cute little sitcom cafe doesn't get customers like it used to. Over the last couple of years the atmosphere has changed for the worst. The city's cancer. The old bookstore owner moved to the north side of the city, replacing the space with an adult entertainment store. The Asian food mart was now a liquor store, with casual break-ins. The potted plants in various locations were neglected and left to die, morphing into new ashtrays for the public smokers. In general, the place had a growing air of smoke and pollution about it. My poor little café had probably never struggled more to survive in it's entire existence than it was then. Even on the verge of shutting down, I was still a loyal customer, ready for my AM coffee.
Although it was only soon after that I started noticing how bad it had really gotten. It is not terribly unusual to have prostitutes in the city, but when they are in my plane of vision, it feels like an alarm goes off in my head. A wall goes up around me in which I try to ignore their existence, but the aura of revulsion seeps out of them like radio waves. Walking disease. They are becoming more frequent and I watch them pace around the brick-walled bar across the street until light breaks, when they start to dissipate. The floor above the bar was a "massage parlor", but you didn't have to be a detective to know that it was a cheap brothel.
Ignore. Ignore. No one wants to start trouble so we ignore.
A few times the hookers with their fluorescent lips even had the nerve to come up to the railing next to my table and offer their services to me, at which point I try my nicest to point them in the other direction. I don't want to talk to them. I don't want to see them or hear them. It's not until an hour after I arrive that the sun begins to rise and the fog lifts a little. At this time the streets become quiet and the only rustling would be a paper in the grey wind or a bird pecking around my table.
But there is a person amongst them who I did not expect to see. A boy, maybe still in his teens, leaned against the brick wall with them. He was skinny, but average height for his age. The dark brown hair was overgrown and reached past the length of his eyes like he had just rolled out of his (or someone else's) bed. I could not see his face from my distance, but I could tell he had a cigarette which he often balanced on his lips, staining his clothes with it's scent. Everything about him was juvenile, from the Chuck Taylor sneakers to the fingerless gloves he used to brush hair from his face. Most likely a runaway. At his age I was probably sketching on school desks and getting love-letters from my then-girlfriend. And look at him now, a youth conversing with a transvestite outside of a foul bar off Jenson Blvd. The hookers that hovered nearby, who probably had ten years on his age, seemed to enjoy his company. They went about their business; People would walk into the parlor and come out about half an hour later. Cars came and went, stopping to make deals with the stiletto-heeled girls, then picking them up and leaving only to come back soon after. A few times I've seen the boy accept an invitation and ride away in a truck. My imagination is sometimes a cruel thing. I don't really want to think about what happens when those taillights fade around the corner, but I know that it's headed straight to the lot past the junkyard, where a quick job could be done away from the eyes of anyone other than a crackhead. I try to avert my eyes, but I can't. Usually, I would feel a sorrow in the pit of my stomach for these people. Maybe it's something I'd have to feel for them, since they can't feel it themselves. But as my sleep hours whittle away, so does my empathy. Goodbye sleep. Hello Apathy. After all, they are the ones risking themselves that way. It's disgusting.
I threw on my coat and scarf after work, heading into the early morning dark towards my daily destination of coffee bean sweetness, when I see the usual pack of rent girls(with, in this case, a rent boy) on the sidewalk ahead of me. The sun is starting to creep up, but the cold was still stifling( I remember this well, as I was briskly awake after a heavenly 3 hour sleep). The pack was huddled close, keeping warm and throwing a large shadow into the street, courtesy of the orange streetlamp above them. The empty streets magnified their catty voices, and one girl's laugh reminded me of a hyena. They usually were farther ahead so I didn't have to bother with confrontation, but not today apparently. I crossed my arms across my chest, hugging the coat to my body, and faced the floor as I headed toward them, to my café. My warm paradise across the stream of piranhas. I lengthen my stride as I walk through their cloud of cigarette smoke and I feel their eyes turn to my bowed head. I start making like I'm in one hell of a hurry, like I don't even see their smeared neon makeup. Their conversation quiets and they move out of my way as I pass. "Hey baby..." one of them cooed. I kept walking and focused my eyes on anything but them and the distorted shadows they gave off. I caught a few amused smiles in my peripheral as I left the atmosphere.
The usual middle-aged waitress could be seen waiting for me from the lit windows of the café, so I increased my speed, leaving staring eyes and a trail of breath behind me. Upon reaching the door, the waitress, Bethany, opened it for me and let me shake off the cold before inquiring. "Are those hookers bothering you David? They've been hustling everyone who walks by and I really can't stand looking at them anymore." she complained. Bethany is a graying woman with a friendly personality and desperation for communication. She likes to pretend I'm her son sometimes and just chit-chats to me on the patio when the weather is warmer or just if something's on her mind. She likes my quiet nature and is content with me listening to her since no one else would after the kids moved out of her house. I like her because she doesn't mind the fact that I'm not a very good conversationalist, or the fact that I occupy patio space for hours at a time without ordering anything more than coffee and sometimes toast.
"Your cup's ready for you, but maybe you should warm up a bit before going out to the patio. I don't know why you go out there in such chili weather anyways. Winter is right around the corner. Is that the scarf I knit for you last Christmas? Oh hon, I'm glad you like it. Maybe I should make you a hat this year huh? Would a beanie be okay? You're not the type to have a weird shaped head right?" Bethany handed me my coffee as I moved in the direction of the patio door. "Thanks Bethany." I said, as I handed her the pay. “I’ll paint a picture for you by Christmas"
"Oh would you? I always see you sketching and I'd love to have something to hang on the wall around here instead of these god-awful things. “She said, gesturing to a blown picture of the cityscape, which can be found on pretty much every phone book and postcard in the vicinity.
"Of course."
The morning air breathed on me again as I opened the door to the patio and took a small sip from the mug before seating myself in the usual spot. God, there's something about the coffee there that just tastes different. It's not some fancy taste, or the generic horrible kind, but it sure hits the spot. The cold was crisp to my face, and the wind was picking up, but once the sun would rises, the warmth would start soaking into my skin. On sleepless days, I'm content with staring off into space, but that day I was feeling good off 6 hours of sleep, so I opened my school bag. Taking out my sketch book, I open to a page I had started the day before. The steam from the coffee curled to the sky and there was an unusual quiet on Jenson Blvd. I looked over towards the bar, and as soon as I did so, all of the rent girls snap their head in another direction...Where they staring at me?
I noticed they were talking lower than usual and sneak peeks in my direction when they thought I wasn't looking. I wasn't sure what this was about, but it didn't seem good, so I placed my pencil down and continued staring in their direction. The rent boy, leaning against the brick wall, seemed harassed. He was a noticeable blot of ink with the countless amounts of faded and torn papers behind him.The girls were pulling on his jacket sleeve and laughing. They began holding up numbers on their fingers, and without properly seeing his face, I could tell he's starting to grin.
They're talking about me... I didn't know what they were planning, so I picked up my pencil and start aimlessly shading the woman in my sketch. It didn't need shading in that area, but I thought I might as well darken it and pretend I didn't notice their scheming. At this point I'm irritated already. I can admit that I'm pretty low-key and quiet, but still easy as hell to irritate. As expected, a figure started walking towards my direction. There are no cars in the street, so walking to the café patio left long stripes of shadow uninterrupted at the feet of my visitor.
I wasn't surprised to see that they had sent him over here. For what reason, I wasn't sure yet, but I was readying myself to give a witty retort to whatever it was that he (-they-) wanted. I had never seen his face clearly before, but now that I was, I was slightly taken aback. He had a pretty-boy face with an edgy smile on his lips, accompanied by a cigarette. He had dark around his eyes, either from lack of sleep, or maybe just dark lashes, but they inspected me from above like a predator. If he were a tomboyish girl, I would have thought he was cute, but considering he was a guy...how lame is that?
"Hey, do you have a spare cig? Mine's almost out." His voice was slightly raspy, probably from a cough. If I had to describe it, it was a fresh voice; an artsy voice. I didn't say anything back at first. He must think I'm an idiot if he asked such a question. It was fairly obvious that his friends had spare cigarettes. This was the only initiative he could come up with to start a conversation? Well, smoking was an oral fixation that I was never too fond of.
"No, uh, I don't smoke. " I returned my eyes back to the sketch that I was shading too much.
He leaned his backside against the railing of the patio, adjusting his scarf. I wanted to say something smart and all, but that type of thing never seems to come at the right time.
"So what's your name? " he asked me. It didn't sound like a question.
"David."
"David? That's cool. I'm Roz."
"Is that your real name?"
"What's that supposed to mean?" He asked it softly, without offense. Before I could fake an apology, he said, "Anyways, why do you sit here everyday by yourself?" He flicked his hair with those fingerless gloves in a pseudo-charming sort of way. He wasn't fooling me.
The sky was turning a lighter shade of blue and I sipped my coffee before answering, "Routine." and exhaled a large cloud of mist. “Can I ask-Roz, right?-why you approached me?" I was a little annoyed and decided to ask him directly. "What do you want?" was what I wanted to say, but l usually just keep the ruder comments to myself. Roz lowered his head to face his shoes with a smile growing. His hair followed his leaning and covered his eyes as he flicked his cigarette to the floor and replied, "You know those girls over there? They see you here almost everyday and you ignore them. They figured maybe I was more your type. Like I could convince you to get me as a customer."
I don't know what kind of face I made, but it was enough to make Roz burst out laughing when he turned his head to me. “Sorry!" he said immediately.
What the hell? Do I look gay? No, I'm pretty damn sure I'm straight and my past girlfriends would agree. And of course I ignore them. They're prostitutes. Besides, who the hell would want an STD anyways? This side of town really has gone down the gutter. The growing cancer.
I wanted to say these things, but I didn't. I had a bad tendency to run my mouth off so I tried since childhood to make it stay shut when it needed to. It didn't always work, unfortunately. I always try to avoid social confrontation, but it always seems to follow me. Roz was still chuckling by the time I replied with my face hidden in the coffee mug. "Well, I'm not interested. Now you know. "
In seeing my reaction he interrogated further, for his own amusement.
" So you like girls? I could pull off a girl, right?" He ran his hand through his hair in impression.
" There's something I don't understand here. And that's why the hell you guys are so damn persistent."
I'm just a one guy who happens to be here everyday. I've refused them a few times, so why am I still such a target? Is it so strange for a guy to have dignity, and not jump all over a woman when she's offered to me? I'm only average looking; maybe a past girlfriend or two would dote on me, so what the hell? Roz didn't seem the least bit put off by my attitude.
" Well," He elongated that word. " We see you here everyday, so we decided we'd make some innocent bets that's all"
There's nothing innocent about you.
" And you're losing money on this bet, right?" I asked.
" Not really. I'm just in for the fun of it. But I guess there's no persuading you, huh?" He slipped into the chair opposite me, adjusting his scarf, and rested his head on his hands. He sure had a lot of nerve. Staring at me with those damn bright eyes. But I decided to ignore him and continue my sketch.
"Hey." He said, trying get my attention. "Are you ignoring me?" I could hear the smile in his question and I refused to make eye contact. He didn't move however, and contented himself in watching me for a bit; which stretched into minutes, which stretched into moments.
After a while it was as if he wasn't even sitting there. He wasn't really that distracting at all so I didn't mind continuing with my work. Likewise, he didn't seem to mind that I was ignoring him. With the strokes of my pencil, his eyes followed calmly, and a stillness started to grow, but not in an uncomfortable way.
The mist was almost completely gone as we sat quietly with the chill subsiding around us, an almost pale glow resting on the buildings and patio. I was surprised Roz sat there for as long as he did. He gave the impression of a fearless attitude so I expected him to continue pestering me, but he seemed quite peaceful just overlooking my progress on the sketchpad. I wanted to say something, but I also didn't want to break the silence. Cars and taxis started to pass by more frequently as morning traffic began and this seemed to queue Roz as the time to leave. Without an expression, he stood up slowly and I watched him. He looked over to the bar, but all his companions had left, disappearing with the fog. With the soft light on him now, he looked almost eerie with is dark features.
" Maybe I'll see you later David. I'll tell them to leave you alone. " Roz said, as he lit a cigarette. Wait, did he have those cigarettes the whole time? He sighed, sounding irritated. His back was to me, so I couldn't tell if he really was.
" Going to look for your friends?" I tried not to say it in an unkind way.
" Huh? Oh, no. They're not my friends." With his hands shoved into his pockets he walked, in a rather melancholy sort of way, towards the end of Jenson Blvd and disappeared around the corner. There was a sorrow in the way he last spoke and for the first time in a long time, I was curious. Maybe Roz also went to school, worried about financial problems and brought this upon himself. No, people like that don't deserve my sympathy. Deciding that I shouldn't wonder about someone else's business, I swigged the last bit of coffee, packed up my bag and decided to go home and try hopelessly to sleep.
If Roz did want to see me again, maybe I wouldn't mind so much.