Once my bags were free of items to sell, I made my way back to the Cat's Fiddle.
“Lyle!” Jack was in the kitchen, helping himself to a bowl of tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. “Holy hell, dude, what happened to you?”
“Can I get two of those stews, Oscar?” I asked the man at the front counter.
“TWO STEWS, EARL.” Oscar turned his head toward the kitchen.
“STOP YELLING.”
Oscar turned back to me.
“300.”
I paid and sat down at the table across from Jack.
“So what happened?”
He put his sandwich down and folded his arms on top of the desk.
“Got attacked by a pack of rats.”
“Rats? Where?”
“That Scrapyard place you were talking about in your messages. Went there today.”
“Really? How is it?”
“Well, I think I almost died because of the rats, so I don’t really know.”
“Like, what kind of place is it?”
“Oh...just like it sounds. It’s a place full of scrap metal. Piles and piles of it.”
“Really? Where does it come from?”
I shrugged.
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“Going there tomorrow, do you want to come along?”
“If I have jobs around that way, sure.”
It wouldn’t hurt to have someone with me, right?
You’re going to work with Jack? Good.
Why was this, ‘ego,’ such a fan of Jack?
“Good. Aside from hunting, I can either go there or a place called, “The Coal Pits,” but the coal pits have a ‘warning,’ on them, so I wanted to go by the Scrapyard until that warning goes away.”
That was smart. Luckily for him, he doesn’t have a psychotic voice threatening his life to do the most dangerous stuff he could do.
We spent the time talking about a variety of things. Things that he liked, and things that I had liked when I was a kid. He was always a fan of fantasy of science fiction and wanted to be a writer when he was growing up, but his older brother convinced him that it wouldn’t pay, so, instead, he went on to study economics, and absolutely hated it and ended up dropping out. Because of that, his parents kicked him out of his house, and wouldn’t let him move back in unless he had a job, and could pay them a pretty sizable rent.
“I don’t get it.” He said with a heavy sigh, “My other brothers were allowed to live there for free as long as they like. I suppose my parents just didn’t like me….”
I didn’t know how to respond.
“Sorry for bringing the mood down.” He said with a sigh.
“You again? You going to be cross with me today as well?”
The old man brought my two bread bowls of stew to the table.
“No sir.”
“Hmph.” He set them both on the table and I dug in.
Once he was out of earshot, our conversation continued.
“I don’t have a good relationship with my family. Never have. My uncle got me onto meth when I was sixteen, and my relationship has been shit with them ever since.”
“Shit. Did they know about your uncle?”
“Course they did. Didn’t do anything to him. ‘Oh he’s just sick,’ my mother would make excuses for him. Funny, she never made those excuses with me.”
“Do you have any siblings?” Jack asked. Apparently, the smell of my food drove him to dig into it a little more.
“Two older brothers, and a younger sister.”
“How’s your relationship with them?”
“Not good.”
“Any nephews or nieces?”
“My oldest brother has two young girls, and my second older brother has a boy. My sister has a boyfriend, that I’m pretty sure is planning on marrying her.”
“What do they do for a living?”
“My oldest brother, George, works as a truck driver. He’s gone most of the year. Luke, is working toward his Masters in Chemistry, and Sarah is working toward a Finance degree. Though I think she’s like you.”
“What do you mean?”
“Ever since she was a kid she liked painting, but mom and dad kept trying to push her into things like sports, and whatnot. I think she took up finance to appease them, and nothing else.”
We spent another few moments eating before he stopped and asked.
“Are you close with your brothers and sister?”
I almost laughed at that.
“George about near killed me right before I came here. No. I hate them, and they hate me.”
He took another bite of his sandwich.
“Do you really hate them?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t care if I found out they were dead. In fact, I’d be happy.”
“See, what I don’t understand about that,” he took a bit out of his sandwich, “I have no clue what my brothers are up to.”
“So?”
“So, if it’s true that you hated them as much as you say, why do you know so much about the going-ons of their life?”
I set my spoon down on the plate, and an inexplicable feeling rose from deep within. Sorrow? No, there was too much heat thumping through my blood for sorrow. Rage? No, there was too much sadness wringing my heart for rage. It was somewhere in between the two.
“You…” I was too much of an inner wreck to eat another bite.
“Sorry…”
I set my spoon down and slid away from the table.
“It’s fine,” I muttered.
Deep down, I knew I was being childish.
“Are we still good for tomorrow?”
“Sure.”
“Okay. Six in the morning?”
“Sure.” I walked out of the kitchen up to the restroom, and stepped into the one-stall shower.
As the hot water poured down from the faucet, the heat inside of my blood faded, and all that was left was the sorrow.