Summer, 1928
Ian
It was so damn late.
Tiredness ached all over Ian as he sluggishly forced himself to take another step across the sidewalk. He tugged at the worn chain of his pocket watch to pull it out, sparing it a quick glance.
3:56 AM.
Lord, how the hell do people do this?
Nightlife was something Ian had never really had a keen interest in. The only real experience he’d ever had with it was hearing his father talk about it during early mornings, the few hours a day he wasn’t either working or sleeping.
It’d been so long, Ian struggled to remember why his dad had even said he’d taken a night job. Though, in fairness, the time passed had made it hard to remember much of anything his dad had talked to him about.
Faint memories flew around his subconscious like faded photographs, and even when he was able to reach out and grab one, most of the time it was far too worn to make anything out.
Thinking back on those memories only seemed to make the dull sleepiness in Ian even stronger. As he lagged behind where he should’ve been, the need for rest pulled at him more and more, until his brain gave in for a moment.
For half a second, he fell, tripping over himself as he closed his eyes.
They shot back open upon realizing that he was, in fact, falling. A sudden surge of energy came over Ian, just as he moved his hands to awkwardly catch his fall. They planted on the concrete beneath him just in time, and he clenched his teeth as the rough ground scraped against his hands. He stayed prone there for a moment, a small jolt of adrenaline making him breathe a little harder than usual.
The air was sticky with humidity, and with each breath it felt thicker and heavier in Ian’s lungs. He pushed himself up onto his knees, cringing in pain as he pressed his palms against the concrete. He instinctively clenched his hands as they radiated pain, the pressure making the cuts hurt a little less as he stood back up.
It was as if the mere act of standing back up had sapped all the energy back out of Ian at once, and as he got back on his feet, he was again greeted by the cold ache of drowsiness. So he couldn’t really help it when his brain looped around to the same thought that’d permeated throughout his mind since he’d woken up that night,
It’s SO goddamn late!
Ian shifted back to the same pattern of forcing himself to take one step, then another, ideally until he managed to make it to the interview that’d been the whole damn reason he’d gotten up this late anyways.
He opened his hands and held the palms out towards himself as he walked, wincing as the open air hit the scratches. Crisscrossing red lines were scored all across both of his hands, some of the cuts deep enough for a small amount of blood to be drawn out.
Ian frowned at that, the fact that he was bleeding from his hands bothering him more than the pain from the wound itself.
Of course it had to bleed. And just before the interview, too …
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He slowly slid a hand into his right pocket, trying his best not to get any blood on the jacket of the freshly washed suit.
It’d been a miracle Ian’d remembered to get it washed in the first place. All his habits had sort of deteriorated since he’d been kicked out of the foster home earlier that year.
The day he turned eighteen they’d made him go. He was given a day to pack his things, not that there was much to pack in the first place, and then, that was it. Birthday morning, he was out on the street, and that night he was sleeping on a bench.
Ian had made it though. He was still alive. He’d found a shoddy job at a drug store, made twenty cents an hour stocking shelves and cleaning whatever his supervisor ordered him to. He’d gotten a hovel of his own, a single, dank little room that reeked of mildew and cigarette smoke. The bed was hard and stiff, but it beat a bench.
And for a few months, life was fine. But then, as it usually seemed to for Ian, it all came crashing down.
He was fired from his job, as the bouts of sleeplessness he got from his rock-hard mattress had made him a less-than-efficient worker as of late. He’d tried to find another job, but Aceton was a busy town, all of them were either already taken, or had someone lined up to take it.
Ian first saw the advertisement for this job on a newspaper page someone had lost on the ground. “NIGHTLIFE BELLHOP NEEDED, HOUSING PROVIDED.” it’d read. He’d dialed the number on a payphone, scheduled an interview, and the rest was history.
So, a month behind on rent, here he was. Walking down the sidewalk at nearly four in the morning.
He took a white handkerchief out from his pocket, if you could even call it that. It was only a couple inches wide in length and height, so it looked more like a napkin than anything when he pulled it out.
The stinging from Ian’s cuts hitting the cool air was only amplified as he wiped at his hands with the glorified rag, and it seemed to only make them bleed even more. By the time he finished wiping off his right hand, the cloth was thoroughly wet with blood.
Ian held it in front of him, looking at it with a frown as he rotated it, looking for any part of the tiny handkerchief that wasn’t covered in the stuff.
Shit. This isn’t gonna work.
There was a restroom center nearby, if Ian remembered correctly. It was out of the way, but coming into an interview with blood on your hands was probably a worse look than being a minute or two late.
Restroom it is then.
Ian turned, just barely picking up his pace. The idea of being late to the interview seemed to provide him just enough motivation to boost his speed ever so slightly.
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Bloody water collected at the bottom of the sink Ian had planted himself in front of, leaving behind light red marks as it drained down into the pipes below.
Although the pain in his hands had dulled, it came back as a sharp burn as warm water flowed into them. Both his palms had become bright red and irritated, only worsened as he scrubbed at both hands with the paltry remains of the sink’s soap bar.
Dried blood came off of his hands in small flakes, falling into the sink and collecting against the drain’s grate, just enough for a small pool of the bloody water to begin forming.
Ian looked back at his hands, both of which seemed to be clear of the blood for now. He turned the sink off with a hand, patting the other against his leg to clear some of the water off of it.
A mirror hung in the dimly lit room, cracks on each of its corners splaying out into thin, black lines that sliced through one’s reflection. Ian caught his face in the damaged mirror while turning his head, and kept its gaze, taking a moment to look at himself.
Large bags hung under both of his eyes, dark enough to serve a jarring look against his pale skin. His hair was unkempt, a mess of short, dark brown strands haphazardly strewn around one another. And lord, his shirt was wrinkled too, he hadn’t even noticed!
Plain, messy, and more tired than he could put into words. Probably wasn’t the best look in terms of a job interview.
And the roughed up hands aren’t going to help all too much, are they?
He pulled out the old pocket watch for a moment.
4:04 AM.
Six minutes until he had to be at the interview site.
Ian knew that it should matter to him, that more likely than not he’d be late. But it didn’t, and for the life of him he didn’t know why. It was as if someone had ripped out whatever part of him was meant to feel, and he was left with only passive indifference.
It felt like that indifference was all he could muster up these days.
He looked back at himself in the mirror.
It didn’t look like him. Not the person he thought he knew. The eyes were too cold, the gaze too blank, as if he was staring right through himself.
Was I always like this?
Maybe he never knew himself.
A rattle made Ian turn his head, just as an older man opened the door to the restroom. As he walked in, he greeted Ian, who was currently hunched over the sink, with an awkward pause and a brief, confused look, before quietly making his way to a stall and closing it.
As the stall door rattled, Ian looked at himself for another moment.
I should probably get going.
He went back upright, wiping what remained of the water on his hands against the dark suit pants he had on, and made his way to the door, a sharp pain still throbbing in each palm.