Page 80 of Jolar
I closed the car door, taking care to shut it as quietly as possible. Mrs. O’Hare of 4A had already complained to the landlord more than once about the noise of my car and the beams of my headlights allegedly waking her up when I came home from driving my night fares. She even claimed that I slammed my doors, which I assuredly did not.
I spotted movement as I reached the stairs to go up to our second floor apartment. I glanced over to see, sure enough, she was there peering out of her curtain, phone pressed to her ear. There was no way she’d been in bed asleep! She had to have been sitting up laying in wait. I sighed, hoping that I didn’t get another letter from the landlord. At this rate, we’d have to find a new place to move to and it would be difficult as while there were only two of us, my brother was only twelve.
It had taken me ages to find this studio apartment in my financial range and close enough to my university that I could save gas by walking. I only used the car for doing my Uber and Door Dash runs if I could help it. All the other landlords had insisted that my brother should have his own room and tried to rent me a two bedroom. Not even a one bedroom where I could still sleep in the living room, but a two. They had all been beyond my means.
Haru had left the outside light on for me again, and the light was also on over the stove so I could see to get in. I smiled, seeing he’d washed up from having had tonights bowl of ramen and from the look of things, he’d also empties out the trash. He was laying sprawled out diagonally on the double mattress I’d gotten us from Craig’s List. That and a set of plastic garden chairs with a matching table, in dark green and rescued from where they’d been left out by the curb by another tenant who’d moved out, were our only furnishings. Well, unless you counted my three year old laptop that we both used for school work and watching videos. He also had a tablet the school provided for schoolwork and which had most of his text books on it.
I rolled my neck, trying to relieve the tension in it and went into the kitchen to make myself a sandwich as I was starving.
Fuck. There’s only three slices of bread and he has a field trip tomorrow so needs a packed lunch.
I looked in the fridge. He hadn’t remembered to pack his lunch for the trip, so the three pieces were indeed the last of it. There was nothing for it, I couldn’t let him go without a reasonable looking lunch. The school would be all over my ass if I did, for good reason too. It was bad enough that he only got a good breakfast and lunch on days he had school as he ate fr free. Well, except on days like this. For some reason, the school did not provide free lunch students a free packed lunch for field trips. You’d think someone responsible for feeding the kids would realize that if families had to rely on the free meals, that they needed to have the meals for free. All the meals they have during school time, not just some of them, but no.
I closed the fridge and opened the cabinet that held our food. I smiled. Score! We had a can of tuna flakes left. I took it out, taking care to drain the tuna water into a plastic cup. I next opened the drawer where our scavenged packets of mayo and ketchup were. I pulled out a packet of mayo and squirted it onto a slice of bread, then used a knife to spread it more evenly. Next I sprinkled some of the drained tuna flakes onto the bread and topped that with a second piece of bread which I used a second packet of mayo on. I wrapped the sandwich up in some cling film and had a rummage to see what I could send him to go with it.
A can of fruit cocktail was still sat there, courtesy of the food bank. I opened another cupboard and pulled out an empty margarine tub that we used for food storage. I opened the can of fruit with our hand held can opener and scooped out about half the can, making sure he got the cherries, because those were the best bits, but only enough liquid to not let the fruit dry out. I put the lid on it then, wrapping the whole thing up in more cling film to be on the safe side. I didn’t want it to leak all over.
Chips and pretzels and shit like that were expensive, so I didn’t buy any of those things. Celery and carrots were cheap though, so we had some of those. I peeled a large carrot and cut it into sticks, adding a celery stick that I stuffed with a slice of orange value brand cheese food that I I cut into thirds which I lined up so that whole stalk was full. I cut that in half and wrapped it up in cling film with the carrot sticks.
That left me just having to figure out a drink for him. Soda was also expensive so I didn’t buy that, either. I had a box of powdered milk that I mixed up every night in a free protein drink shaker I’d gotten with a sample of protein shake one day at college from someone handing them out, but that was so he’d have cold milk to drink at home with his dinner. I decided to mix up the next day’s milk and pour it into a glass which I covered with more cling film. At this rate, I was going to kill the planet all by myself, but it was cheap and we were poor, so there it was.
I rinsed out the shaker. It was designed to be portable so you could take it to drink post work out, so it wouldn’t leak. I just needed to fill it. Milk was out, it would spoil unrefrigerated in the heat of late May. I checked the fruit cocktail tin. It was syrup, not juice, so out. I sighed, putting what I’d made so far into a small shopping bag from under the sink and stuffing it in the fridge. I picked up my keys from the counter and crept quietly to the door. I’d just have to walk to the gas station and hope they had a cheap packet of Kool Aid type stuff. The money I’d earned tonight would cover the electric bill and pay for enough gas to go out again tomorrow, hopefully, but that was it. I’d sent a check already for the electric bill so that money had to stay there so the check would clear.
I rummaged in my pockets, happy to find I had just over a dollar in change. I could maybe buy a can of peas or mixed vegetables to add to our ramen tomorrow night, if the drink wasn’t too expensive. My stomach rumbled and I turned around, grabbing the last piece of bread and adding a bit of the leftover tuna to one side before folding it over and taking a big bite, deciding to eat along the way. I needed to haul ass to get to the store and back so I could get some sleep. I had to see him off to school and get to my ten a.m. class.
Days like this, I missed Mom and Dad most of all.
I trudged down our dimly lit street, grateful that my curtain twitching neighbor seemed to have finally gone to bed for real. The hairy part of my journey was what came once I reached the corner. I had four lanes of traffic with a narrow median between then to cross to reach the gas station and convenience store. There wasn’t a pedestrian crossing, either. I had to wait for the right moment to dash across, which fortunately didn’t take long. It was late enough on a weekday night that there was hardly any traffic about.
The store had small packets of unsweetened drink mix and I swiped a couple of the free packets of sugar from by the coffee machine to sweeten it with. I found a dented can of peas marked half price, so grabbed it and made my way to the counter. I had a whole fourteen cents left over after I counted out my change to pay him. Then it was back home again, playing chicken with the semis and other late night travellers, and back up the stairs. I’d been wrong, though. The old busybody hadn’t gone to bed at all. She opened her door and called up to me, “You should be ashamed of yourself! Leaving that child all alone at night while you go gallivanting about!”
I held up my bag of shopping. “I had to go buy stuff for him to take to school tomorrow,” I said, then continued on. Once inside, I mixed up the drink mix, using only part of the packet since it wasn’t for a whole pitcher. I added the sugar packets first and warm water to make sure the sugar dissolved, then used a teaspoon to spoon out the fine purple drink powder. I kept adding tiny bits until it looked the right color, then gave the bottle a shake, had a small taste, then added a bit more. Then I put the bottle in to chill. Satisfied that he would be well enough provisioned for tomorrow. I’d have rest of the fruit cocktail for breakfast, maybe. I wasn’t worried about me so much. Haru was a growing kid and it was him that I was concerned about. I’d manage, I always did. It was only for a three more days, anyway. Then our SNAP would come in and I could go buy more food. Everything put away, I checked to make sure the door was locked, putting on the security chain since I’d forgotten, then stripped off and sprawled out next to him to sleep.
Morning came all too soon, the alarm on my phone bitching at us to get up so Haru could get to school.A bus came by later int he morning, but if he wanted breakfast, he had to get there early. There was no way I was going to let him walk along the busy roads by himself, even though his school was within walking distance.
No, I’d walk him to school, which gave us time to talk. It was actually one of the better parts of my day, hearing about the stuff he and his friends got up to at school.
“Harry invited me to his birthday party on Saturday,” Haru said.
That was only a few days away. Birthday parties meant presents and presents meant money. I wanted to tell him no, but he was looking at me with those puppy dog eyes and I simply couldn’t do it.
“Okay, but I need a phone number so I can call his mom to let her know you’ll be there for sure.”
“Yes!” he said, doing a fist pump.
I felt awful as in reality, was going to have to call this Harry kid’s mom and apologize for not being able to send Haru with a gift. It was humiliating. But I’d walk through fire for my little brother, so this wasn’t the first time since our parents died at the end of last summer that I’d had to do this. The moms were always very nice, knowing Haru and I were the ‘orphan boys’. One woman even bought a gift, wrapped it, and put Haru’s name on it to give to her kid. It had been a nice gesture and none of the other kids had ever known that Haru hadn’t been able to buy a present.
“Okay, here you are.” I handed him the plastic shopping bag with his packed lunch inside. “Have fun at the aquarium.”
“I will,” he promised. “Do you have to work again tonight?”
“I do,” I sighed. “I’m going to need new tires soon and the rent is going to be due soon.”
He grimaced. “Okay. I wish I could help.”
“You just keep studying hard, kiddo.” I ruffled his hair. It was getting shaggier than he liked it. I mentally a dded the price of a haircut to the list of things I needed to pay for. I watched as he went inside, then turned to walk to my college campus. The student union would be open and I could get some of my homework down. Sometimes I was lucky enough that a classmate would see me and buy me a cup of coffee even. That would be nice, I thought.
