by Ellen Mint
She was acting. He could see it now, Janeth widening her eyes beyond anything normal, her hands helplessly clutched to her breast. She had to appear completely terrified of the scary boyfriend. Sorry, the scary brown boyfriend who’d come to tell her off. Nothing could be her fault as long as he was angry. Hot- blooded Latino and all.
Worst of all, Marty was steam-piping angry, but all he wanted to do was crawl into a small box and wail. And the whole time, the restaurant glared at him. Made him into the bad guy. As if he hadn’t invested his life, his future, his everything into the woman who’d used him for likes.
The suits were closing in. Waiters held their trays like shields, the hosts speaking hurriedly into phones. He had to leave or risk a night in jail for Janeth. She wasn’t worth it. She wasn’t worth anything to him.
“You have no idea what you’ve lost,” he said. Aiden tried to grab his arm again, but Marty shook it off. “Fuck you, fuck both of you. I hope all your precious followers learn what really happened between you and your unicorn boyfriend.”
There was the first sign of real distress. Janeth’s mouth fell open and she hunched over her phone. If the fan had sent the video to him, then others knew. And, judging by the pinch in her forehead and furious typing, they were spreading it.
His heart was crushed, his head bowed, but Marty walked out of the restaurant and her life on his own two feet.
* * * *
Get here, ASAP!
Brandy prayed she’d typed that right, as her phone was trapped behind her back. The tell-tale glare of the manager burned through her and she stood up straight. But that wasn’t enough as Mr. Fensin circled her, knowing she must be up to no good. Brandy released her phone onto the chair behind her and stepped forward.
The bell jangled, raising her hopes, but it was only a customer. That at least distracted Mr. Fensin, who greeted the lady with a gruff, “Welcome to the store.”
A regular, the woman glanced warily at Brandy, who shrugged but tried to act peak professional. Come on, Marty. Where are you?
“Where is he?” Fensin growled, both claws and teeth out and eyeing up a pink slip. He stared daggers at the front door, then spun to Brandy.
“He, he’s out to lunch.”
“It’s two-thirty.”
“A late lunch. We were swamped earlier and Marty didn’t have time.” God, she was a terrible liar. She could feel her face cracking with each glare from their overlord. If Marty had given a hint of what had sent him running, she could’ve made up a better story for the boss. Oh, he’s out tracking down some inventory or chasing a shoplifter. Anything better than ‘he suddenly had to eat at two in the afternoon or pass out.’
“How long’s he been out?” Fensin huffed.
“Not very,” Brandy pipped up instantly. Come on, make it sound realistic. “Ten minutes, maybe?”
Her boss snorted. “Thought you only had five.”
Real capitalist Scrooge she worked for. The only reason the job was livable was thanks to him never being around, and the fact that she had savings to survive on. Otherwise it’d probably be nothing but cat food dinners.
Mr. Fensin turned away from glaring out of the window as if he hated every person on the planet. “You aren’t protecting him, are you?”
“What? Why would I do that?”
He answered with a snort. “Like I don’t know what kids get up to on their ‘smoke breaks’.”
Brandy bristled at not only the idea of her being a kid, but that he’d ever allot them smoke breaks. She tried to ignore the other sticky innuendo hanging in the air. ‘I don’t see Marty that way.’ ‘He’s just a friend.’ ‘We would never…’ God, every one sounded like a pathetic lie.
But they weren’t. He’d never so much as kissed her. He clearly thought they were only friends. And she…well, she was an idiot. That was all.
Fensin loomed closer, his caterpillar eyebrows arching until his pupils contracted to pinpricks. It sent Brandy shrinking, her natural instincts to run and hide from any confrontation kicking in.
“What’d you want?”
Oh, thank God! Brandy glanced up and her praise to whichever saint was in charge of texts faded. It looked like someone had run over Marty in the parking lot. His head lolled at the base of his neck as if he couldn’t lift it. That always vibrant smile was a dry frown, his skin crackling like a Victorian with consumption. As he risked a single look at Brandy, she saw not only heartbreak but endless betrayal lurking in his eyes.
“Finally,” Fensin snapped between them, looming over the broken man. “Where were you?”
Brandy tried to get Marty’s attention and somehow tell him what to say, but he wouldn’t look up. “I was tracking down a special order,” Marty said smoothly.
“Hmph, she said lunch,” their boss spat and jabbed a shaky thumb at Brandy.
Marty didn’t flinch, didn’t falter. “I grabbed a sandwich along the way. Beef and cheddar if you’re curious. Off a cart down by—”
“I don’t give a shit,” Fensin interrupted, causing the one who worked retail to almost shush her boss for cursing. “I’ve gone over the books, proper this time.” He waggled a finger at them as if they were pulling some long con with the finances. “And it’s come to my attention that we don’t need two employees.”
“What?” Brandy gasped.
“You’ve got to be bleeping kidding me.” Marty muted his own curse and tipped his head back to the ceiling.
“So I’m cutting both your hours,” Fensin continued, snapping them away from the impossible choice of who should go. “You”—he jabbed a finger at Brandy—“work Monday, Tuesday, Saturday. And you”—now it was Marty’s turn—“take Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.”
“What about Sunday?” Marty responded in an instant, as if it was all a joke.
“I’ll flip a coin,” Fensin said, causing Marty to chuckle.
Didn’t he realize what that meant? Their hours were being cut in half. They wouldn’t be full time. There wouldn’t even be the hint of benefits…including health insurance. Fuck. When would it run out? Right away?
What would she do if she had to pay out of pocket for chemo?
Die. That was it. The choice was die slowly from the cancer or quicker from starvation and exposure.
Panic seized her arms. Brandy tried to wrap them around herself as she stared dumbstruck at the two men glaring at each other. How could she do this? Could she get another job and deal with cancer treatments? But that’d have to be part time too? No health insurance. No help.
She was alone and not even her friend holding her hand at a doctor’s appointment would fix it.
Through the terror swarming from her brain to her heart, she watched Marty switch his stance. It went from broken and fragile to sturdier, as if he was prepared to do something stupid.
“Since it’s Tuesday,” Fensin said, “you head home.” He prodded a fingertip into Marty’s shoulder. It barely moved him, Marty crossing his arms.
“So that’s it then? I just go home for the day and you cut my paycheck in half?”
“Yeah. It’s called being the boss, son. You’d do well to learn your place.”
Shit. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end. Fensin’s venomous response rang through the bookstore. Marty shook his head less like a man clearing his thoughts and more like a bull about to charge. She caught his fists clenching and unclenching.
No. She didn’t want this. Even if his quitting, or attacking their boss and being fired, might let her keep her job, it wasn’t right.
Marty’s gaze drifted from the sneering visage of their boss back to Brandy standing behind the counter begging for him to stop. To her relief, his fists unclenched and his hands fell limply to his sides.
“If that’s how it has to be,” Marty whispered, more to himself than their boss.
Fensin all but clapped over his victory. The smug bastard didn’t give a shit about this place the rest of the time, but now he was high king of the shop. Browbeat
en, Marty slipped to the counter beside her. He picked up his bag, the one holding the small box Brandy was doing her best to not think about.
As he drew close, she held on to his shoulder. “What happened?”
He blinked rapidly and swung to her as if he was surprised she was standing in his corner. A warm hand caressed hers. “I broke it.”
Broke what?
She couldn’t ask as he’d already moved to the door, away from her. Just before he shoved the glass open, Marty turned to her and in a bittersweet voice said, “Bye, Brandy.”
As the door swung shut, his form slipping away into the steaming heat of July, it struck her. She wasn’t just losing her health insurance, her stability, her livable paycheck. She’d never get to work with her best friend ever again.
Damn it.
Chapter Nineteen
Darkness. Cruel, oblivious, unforgiving darkness leeched from every pore of his body. The light extinguished when his heart crumbled to dust, only a shadow remaining between his lungs. It was the darkness that sustained him, kept his body alive and clinging to this now heartless earth.
What was he but a lost shadow with the other half of his soul wrenched from his body? Doomed to wander the city streets, seen by nobody and touched by none. Not until the cloud of darkness beating inside of his concave chest gave its last, pathetic thump.
Another knock on his door caused Marty to roll over. Rather than bother rising from his couch to answer it, he hit Repeat on his phone. The loudest, sharpest music he could find blared from the speakers directly into his ears. Girls used breakup songs and ice cream. He had heavy metal and a sea of flaming-hot Cheetos. The end was the same though.
“Martin!” the would-be reaper at his door called. “Open up.”
“Go away,” he shouted back to his brother, and began the laborious task of rolling over to stare at the back of the couch. There were a lot more red handprints all over the navy upholstery than he remembered. Not that it mattered. Nothing did, or ever would.
He was worse than cursed—he was unloved. A pointless wretch of flesh and bone, knitted together by a callow God and set adrift in—
Eldon burst through the door. The sound of the real world shattering his cocoon caused Marty to sit up. His brother stood on the threshold, scanning the mountain of takeaway boxes and bags of trash Marty hadn’t found the energy to toss.
“Did you break my door?” he shouted, a brief burst of anger shaking away the doldrums of heartache.
“You gave me a key,” Eldon responded, dangling the single key on a cheap ring that he’d marked with Marty’s name. Of course he’d label it.
With the mystery solved, and no threat of possible eviction, Marty flopped back to the couch and his groove. He’d been working on it for a week—morning, noon and night, only leaving for bathroom visits or when he’d stumble into work, glower at anyone even venturing near the romance section and return to the groove.
“You cannot keep doing this,” Eldon buzzed above him like the obstinate horsefly he always was.
Marty waved a hand at his brother and cuddled closer to the cushion. “Leave me alone. I’m dying.”
“You’re not dying.”
“My heart was ripped out of my chest. Not many people can survive that,” he harrumphed before digging deeper into his couch. Why did he ever give his brother a key? Their mom had probably made him.
Eldon, in true robot form, sighed. “Can you not turn the melodrama down? And that racket? How have the neighbors not complained?”
“They have. Often.” Marty fished for his phone, which had slipped under the couch, and increased the volume.
“No.” Eldon bent down and stole the phone. In an instant, the screeching of a banshee upon the lovelorn’s door died. “This won’t stand.”
“I didn’t ask you,” Marty said, spinning around and facing his brother. His incredibly tall brother. Eldon’s head cut off somewhere in the clouds, leaving Marty to stare at his tie. It was gray. ‘Boring, bland, wouldn’t know romance if it walked up and socked him in the heart’ Eldon Dashwood. But he was tall. And that was all that mattered.
“Go home, Eldon. Leave me to my misery.”
“For fuck’s sake, Martin. I’d expected better from you.”
It was less the admonishment and more the fact that his brother had cursed that caused Marty to focus on him. The suit was stiff, the buttons polished, the glasses cleaned, but wear showed on his brother. No one knew how to find it better than the brother that usually caused it, but it was there. Was he really worried about him?
Too bad.
“Sorry for not rising to your expectations of how to deal with having your entire life turn to complete shit overnight.”
“She is hardly…” Eldon began, leaning closer, when he paused. His bland face yanked away and he gasped. “When did you last shower?”
That required too much time away from his groove. Here was comfort. The couch would never abandon him. It needed him as much as he needed it.
With Eldon’s attempt at brotherly bonding over, Marty slumped back to his cushions. “Leave me to my grief already,” he ordered, flapping a hand at his brother. Marty dug his chin deeper into the couch, wondering if he could smother himself from grief. Not on purpose, more if his body would become so tired of this pointless existence that his lungs would just deflate like a balloon and refuse to work.
Martin Cruz Dashwood. Died twenty-five years young from a lack of love. He was too beautiful for this world.
He brushed his cheek over the cushion, prepared to chase sleep, when hands locked around his stomach. What the…?
Marty flailed his arms and legs, trying to kick away, but that diet of Cheetos and misery had left him weak. He couldn’t do anything but wretchedly wave his limbs as Eldon plucked him into the air.
“What are you doing? Put me down!”
Eldon’s bony fingers dug into Marty’s stained shirt as he marched his brother away from the living room and down the hall. “This isn’t funny, Eldon. We’re not kids anymore! You can’t do this!”
Still his brother wouldn’t say anything. No, the bastardo just carried Marty like he was a babysitter again, charged with getting his younger brother washed up before bed. What? Did Eldon think if he just locked him in there, he’d have to take a shower?
Well, too bad. The pain in his heart couldn’t be relieved by a single drenching of water or scrubbing of soap. It would never leave, no matter what his brother did.
Marty’s ass struck the bottom of the shower stall and he swung his head up in anger at the brother who’d put him there. Old, mildewy water seeped up his pajama pants. He’d have to change them or be faced with…
“Ah!” he cried as Eldon flipped on the damn tap. Cold water sprayed Marty’s head and chest, his skin erupting in goosebumps as he whipped soggy hair from his face. Before he could lash out in rage, Eldon had already walked away.
“We’ll talk when you’re done washing up,” he said, and slammed the bathroom door.
Marty slumped over, his back bent so the cold water could only hit what it’d already damaged. The shivers trembling up his body were the first thing he’d felt since that woman had broken his heart. Shattered it. Kicked the pieces into the waves. Then laughed at his crumpled form.
He should reach over and shut off the tap, but the longer Marty sat there, the warmer the water became. It didn’t feel so bad after all.
* * * *
He wasn’t better, even if he had scrubbed himself clean and put on a real shirt and pants. That, Marty intended to make abundantly clear as he strode back into his living room.
Funny, he’d expected to find that Eldon had vacuumed and cleaned his place. But no, there was his ‘I know a close Thai place’ mountain. And ‘it’s not alcoholism after a breakup’ beer can Stonehenge.
No, his brother was in the kitchen, hovering over the coffee pot, making…
“Tea?” Marty spat as he spotted the familiar string dangling from Eldon’s mug
—which he’d no doubt bleached before using. “You come into my place and make tea?”
“What of it?” his brother asked, taking a careful sip. Probably worried about catching the plague or something.
Marty hefted his massive plastic jug of coffee grounds, dug a spoon in and chewed down. The full-punch of bitter caffeine was worth it for the sour look he got from his brother. “Well,” he said, splattering some of the grounds. Wiping it off, he began again. “I’m here. Alive. Clean.”
“More or less,” Eldon said.
“Forgive me for not putting on tails and spats, your majesty,” he responded with a deep bow. “Unless you were going to clean up my place…” He watched Eldon’s full-body twitch, as if he lived in fear of the very idea. “…then I’d say you can leave.”
“Hardly. Martin, you’ve been locked away bemoaning your state as if you’ve suffered the gravest injustice in the world.”
“I. Was. Dumped!”
“And? You’re hardly the first person.”
“She…” She’d made a fool out of him. Used him, tricked him into her web of lies until he was punch-drunk happy to dance to her every whim. He wasn’t certain what he hated more—that she’d turned him into a chump in front of millions of strangers…or that he’d really fallen for her.
Marty stumbled into the chair, his chin nearly striking the table as it grew too heavy to lift. “I loved her.”
His brother sighed and placed the steaming mug of weak-ass tea beside Marty’s chin. “You barely knew her.”
“So what? Doesn’t change how I feel. Which you’d know if you weren’t nothing but a series of ones and zeros cooked up in a lab.”
“What?” Eldon blinked.
“Binary. You know, the numbers to make computer programs… I’m saying you’re a robot!” God. Wasn’t his brother supposed to be the smart one?
Eldon groaned and leaned against the table. He never sat when he visited Marty, always hovering around on his feet. Eldon Dashwood was important. He had very vital places to be. Wasting his time with that foolish younger brother was beneath him.