We stood outside by the front door taking in the events of the morning. "Crap", Trevor exclaims, "I cant believe I just did that". I look at him and say, "I tried to stop you, but you seemed set on quitting". "No, its fine! This was the right decision to make. Bros before jobs, Trevor states. I chuckle and tell him, "one, that's not the actual saying and two, you shouldn't live by such a notion". Afterwards I walk off. "Where are you heading to now", Trevor asks me. "To get a much deserved drink", I tell him. "Dude! its not even 10am", he points out to me. "Well dude! We ain't doing anything productive at the moment. So you coming or not", I ask him.
Trevor puts his box underneath his arm and follows behind.
We get to a bar close to the bank and start drinking our sorrows away, like two drunk pirates who've lost a massive booty. "So what are you going to do now", Trevor asks me with his face bright cherry red from taking too many drinks. "I don't know man. Heck, I didn't even know what I was freaking doing before I was fired", I tell Trevor. I take a little sip of my beer from it's bottle, letting the bitter taste settle in my mouth for a couple seconds.
"I lie. I've been basically running on the idea that I'm doing this to keep food on the table and clothes on our backs. Like right now, our landlord has been making threats about evicting us from our apartment if we end up making another late payment end of this month. So I was also working to keep a roof over our heads", I cry to Trevor. "But doesn't your lady work as an attorney", Trevor asks me.
"An attorney in training. Basically, an apprentice. So she really doesn't get paid that much to take care of the both of us. We were really hoping on this promotion to help us out in the long run", I tell Trevor.
"Damn", Trevor exclaims. "Well there's the second option she can take", he suggests. I look at him and ask, "what option". "You know, the heir to a massive fortune option", he reminds me. "No, no, no, thats not an option", I yell to him. "Why is that", he asks me in a confused voice.
"If April takes that option, it will show her dad that she's failed at this attorney venture shes been trying to achieve. Her dad wasn't too comfortable with his only daughter going the route of trying to work for a firm, rather than taking up the massive fortune of his estate and never working a day in her life", I tell him.
"What's wrong with that. Everyone would kill for that. I'd kill someone twice for that", Trevor expresses himself with a drunk tone. "Not April. She's not one to take having things handed down to her. She'd rather work for her fortune and know that she did it on her own. And I can't make her turn on her dream, not even now in our little pickle", I tell Trevor.
"Well damn! Maybe you could ask your dad for a little something to keep you guys going for a while", Trevor suggests. I begin to laugh uncontrollably. "Yeah, and you think my she devil mother would let me see a cent of that money", I ask Trevor while wiping tears off my face. "Which mother by the way", Trevor asks me with an eyebrow raised. "My stepmother dummy! There's only one she devil mother and she's never liked my ass from the day I walked into her house", I tell Trevor.
"White people problems", Trevor exclaims while rolling his eyes, soon after taking a sip of his beer. "Yeah, not my white people problems, but their problems. I ain't light enough to qualify", I tell Trevor. "Yeah! Hey do you ever think your dad thinks about your real mom whenever Mrs Baston is nagging about some shit he didn't do? You know they say once you go black you never go...", Trevor tries to make the statement. I give him a sharp look to remind him that I don't like that statement. "Sorry", he says.
"But I've got to ask. Why would the most wealthiest man with a gorgeous wife people would kill for, and a Darling son, end up having an affair with one of his personal accountants. Was the loving at home not good enough", Trevor asks me.
"Spend a day with my stepmom and you'll understand why", I tell Trevor. "I just wish the result of that affair didn't lead me being the literal black sheep of my white family. Can you believe that for the longest time, all my stepmom's friends thought I was one of the helps son. And that the Bastons were generously bringing me up because I allegedly came from a broken home. Like dude, there's not even one family picture at the house that I feature in", I tell Trevor while slapping my forehead.
"Well you are the bastard son, so what can you expect from a well established lady like Mrs Baston. She can't have her peers knowing that her husband couldn't keep it at home and in his pants. And ended up making a baby with his favourite black accountant. Not a good image for a woman like her", Trevor states.
"If it was up to her, I would have disappeared a long time ago, but my dad had something different in mind. Which was making her raise her husband's bastard son", I state. "How I wished I could have stayed with my real mom, instead of that she devil. But I never really had that choice. Especially after the she devil herself paid off my mom to disappear. No wait, threatened her", I think out loud.
"But hey, you managed to find your real mom in the long run", Trevor says in the hopes of cheering me up. "Yeah but after how long", I ask him with a sigh. "So many years lost", I think to myself.
"Enough of me complaining about my crappy upbringing. It didn't help me back then, and it wont help me now. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a wife I need to face later on today", I announce to Trevor while getting up. "Yeah, I got a crappy call to make to my parents anyways", Trevor states with a sorrowful tone.
I pat him on his back and tell him, "good luck with that. And please get home in one piece. You know how you get when you have too many drinks in you". I walk out of the bar and head back to my apartment.
I do my best to duck away from my landlord who preys on the reception floor, like a wild animal let loose of it's chains. I managed to avoid the beast for now and got to my apartment. I didn't feel like eating anything when I got in, despite drinking on an empty stomach. I took a seat by the kitchen table and immediately went head first onto the hard wood, passed out.
I'm pretty sure I was knocked out for most of the day, because I was woken up by April coming into the apartment. "Oh! You're home early today", April exclaims. She walks up to me with the bag of groceries and lays a soft kiss on my cheek.
"How was work", she asks me while putting down the groceries on the kitchen table. "Uneventful", I tell her. "Really! Was it a slow day today", she asks me. "You could say that, cause that's really what you'd expect from a day of a man who's just been fired", I tell her and soon after throw my head back onto the hard wood. "Wait what", April exclaims in complete shock. She walks up to me and kneels beside me with her hand rubbing my back for comfort. "Why would they even do such a thing to a loyal employee", she asks me.
I look into her eyes and tell her, "it's simple. They can't be known as the company that hired a bastard son of a well-off family. So how about that". "That's ridiculous", April says in a fit of anger, "we could take them to court for this". "Don't waste your time April, I don't even want to fight those money grabbing pigs. It ain't worth getting dirty for", I tell her. April walks to the kitchen counter and hangs her head over it with her hands resting on the counter. I'm sorry Jahmal. I shouldn't have hyped up your day just for it to end up like this", she apologises to me.
"You don't have to be sorry for anything. Matter of fact, I should be the one who's sorry around here. I know this isn't the life you had dreamt of living", I tell April. She immediately turns around and walks up to me to grab my face. "Don't you ever say that love. The life I dreamt of, turned out way better in reality. And quite honestly, if it wasn't for you I would have ended up being one unhappy woman married to some snort nosed guy and feeling miserable everyday about my inherited wealth. But instead I'm here with you, living the life I've always wanted, pursuing a career of my choice. Plus my parents love you to bits, so thats got to be a bonus", April tells me all of this while looking me deep in my eyes.
"Yeah well, I don't think your parents will love to bits their unemployed son at the moment", I tell her. April lifts me up to make some space for her to sit on my lap. As she wraps her arms around my neck she tells me that, "hey! Everyone goes through their hiccups in life, but we always pull through. I chuckle and tell her, "my very birth feels like the biggest hiccup ever, and I'm still trying to pull through that till now. And it didn't help that I was the shadow in my stepbrother's bright life, and basically a nerd/geek all through my schooling life. And my dearest brother Ethan didn't spare any expense of reminding me about that and my obvious bastard origin". I look at April and notice that she's pondering hard on something.
"What's on your mind love", I ask her. She looks at me with a very straight face, and exclaims, "wait I'm coming". She runs off into the bedroom, and from the sounds I can hear, she's probably digging through some old boxes.
She walks back into the kitchen with something clearly in her hand. "Do you know what this is", she asks me while displaying the dusty case that has my old reading glasses in it. "That would be the person I tried so much to leave in the past", I tell her. "No J! This is the man I fell in love with because he had all these big dreams that not only involved me, but also his gang of techno nerds", she reminds me. I cringe a little, because I never thought I would hear that terrible title we gave our gang. "What's your point Buttermilk", I ask her.
She pulls out a little notebook from behind her back and shows me it. It had my name written on it with the bold title saying J's Dream book. I couldn't believe that thing still existed, I thought I had got rid of that silly old thing. "I'm sure in this whole book you dreamt up something that you probably could work on right now and make it possible", April states. "Really April", I ask her while reading through my old notebook, "is building a time machine or finding a cure to all diseases something I should be putting all my focus on. And instead looking for a new job".
"Come on! What happened to the J who had all these crazy ideas and bright eyes for everyone of them", she asks me. He grew up", I reply to her. "Yeah, but these ideas never grew out of you", she tells me. "Yeah well my stepbrother and stepmom made sure that was certain", I remind her. "Ugh! Come on baby, you've always been making decisions based on your brother and mother's ideas of what they thought was suited for you. Wasn't it your she devil mom who told you that you were better off being a thug or club bouncer", April reminds me. "You've always been living in their shadows as the family black sheep, but it's time for this sheep to shine", Aprils says while making herself comfortable on my lap once again.
She grabs the glasses out of their case and puts them on my face, setting them in place. "I want this J back, the dreamer. My sexy techno nerd. And I'm sure in this entire book of dreams, there's got to be at least one thing you can work on and actually achieve it", April tells me while looking at the book I had chucked onto the table.
"Fine. I'll look through it tonight and maybe I'll find something worth my time", I assure April. I notice her giving me another kind of look, one that I know and look forward to every night. "I forgot how good looking you looked in these old things", April states while fiddling with my glasses. "It's actually turning me on", she says with a seductive voice. "What doesn't turn you on Miss", I respond in a sarcastic tone. April smacks me at the back of my head and tells me, "I'm trying to make you feel happy here. Don't spoil the mood".
I rub the back of my head and respond with, "one, ouch that hurt. Two, I'm sorry it won't happen again. And thirdly, I'm not about to have sex while wearing these old things". I take off the glasses and analyze them while telling April, "I'm pretty sure I need to renew these old TV screens". "Yeah you do that", April demands me. "Well I guess this is goodbye to contact lenses", I state. "Goodbye contact lenses and hello sexy", April exclaims.
LATER...
After April and I have amazing sex, I sit up on my side of the bed looking through my notebook as April is sound asleep. I couldn't help but chuckle at every turn of a page. Some of the ideas were just too ridiculous even for me. Build an under water city. Clearly played too much Bioshock as a kid. Become the president of four countries, invent a type of gum that always stays sweet, these were just some of the dreams I had to read through with a semi straight face.
I was about to call it quits and just throw away this book of utter ridiculousness, but the last turn of a page caught my attention.
"Thats it", I exclaimed, almost waking up April.