Get out

Reflection

Brett had tried his best, he really had. He wanted to take care of Eddy, he wanted him to be happy staying with him, to thrive. Of course it wasn't possible to make a tiger feel content in a cage, though, no matter how nice the meat you fed it was. A tiger belongs in the jungle, with the other tigers, not trapped in a zoo with a zookeeper. It didn't matter how much the zookeeper loved the tiger: A cage was still a cage.

This particular tiger had escaped once before, though. Left after a fight without a warning, disappeared overnight while Brett slept. If there was one day in his life Brett had thought about in the past eight years, one day he had analyzed over and over trying to understand what he did wrong, it was the day Eddy left him.

___

"Bye, babe, I'll see you tomorrow," Brett told his girlfriend, kissing her goodbye as she headed off for work at the bar. He couldn't help but smirk as he watched her slightly awkward walk as she headed down the stairs and disappeared out of sight. It had been a fun, loud night. He loved the confidence boost he got from hearing her cry out in pleasure and moan his name. He'd have to apologize to Eddy for probably keeping him up half the night again. Though, he had to admit, he hoped he had. He wanted Eddy to know what he was missing out on. He wanted it to be Eddy.

He kept up his smug face as he moved into their tiny kitchen where he knew Eddy was having dinner and grabbed himself one of the leftover cans of soda he had nicked from the supermarket down the street for their pizza night last Saturday. Money was tight, and he wanted to surprise Eddy with something nice for a change.

"Brett, I need to talk to you about something," Eddy said, looking up from the sad vegetables and cheap rice they had for dinner the last few days after the pizza ran out. They were scraping by, but they needed to do another job for someone soon if they didn't want money to run out completely.

Brett sat down across from Eddy and opened the soda can.
"What's up?" he asked before throwing back a gulp. He'd let Eddy have the rest of the food and he'd manage on the soda for tonight. If all else failed, if he could find no jobs for them, he could always go grab a piece of fruit off the market stalls tomorrow. "Something wrong?"

Eddy shifted slightly and put down the chopsticks he had reused from the takeout they had shared last week.

"Listen, okay? I can't do this anymore with all the stealing and the... the shootings and all that. We gotta find something proper to do," he said, meeting Brett's eyes. Brett just shrugged at him.

"What would we even do, Eddy? Some minimum wage job that won't even pay the rent of his crappy apartment?" Brett sighed, shaking his head. They had a very similar conversation last week, but nothing came of it. They had chosen this, and Brett didn't understand why Eddy was doubting it now. Eddy pushed his plate of food away.
"You don't understand, Brett. It's dangerous and immoral, and I don't want us doing it anymore," Eddy said, sounding almost annoyed now which put Brett on his defenses. He was the guy with the plans, after all.
"Look, Eddy, I know money is a bit tight right now, but..."
"It's not about the money, I just don't want to put you in danger anymore, Brett. I..."
"I'm only ever in danger because you never practice shooting and miss important targets," Brett said, rolling his eyes. "Don't be silly, Eddy, we're good at this. I know the vegetables suck, but you know there's always more jobs nearing the weekend. And the corner guy said he'll pay us nicely for doing a trade for him on Tuesday. It's just a small setback."

"You're not even listening, Brett. Fucking listen to me for once! I don't want to do this anymore! I don't want to be a criminal! I don't want to..."

"Just stop, Eddy. You know realistically that's not an option!" Brett interrupted him, raising his voice now. He was listening! What on Earth was Eddy on about? "What are you gonna do, then? With no education? Please, tell me what's in that life for us. Busking day in and day out when you can just swap a small bag of pills for a wad of cash in less than half the time?"

Eddy stood up quickly, placing another plate over the rest of his food before chucking it in the fridge.
"I don't know what else we'd do, do I? I just don't want to do this anymore. Brett, I want both of us to fucking live! I don't know if you've noticed, but this is dangerous! Neither of us know how to shoot properly, and still we go seek out people who don't give a shit if we live or die! Just to earn some cash! I thought you valued our lives higher than that, Brett, I really did" he said, slamming the fridge door shut. "I'm done, Brett. I'm not doing this anymore!"

"Please, Eddy, if you have better suggestions, feel free!" Brett answered, sharper than probably was necessary. Eddy was probably just tired.

Eddy just shook his head at him and headed for the living room. Brett stood up to follow him, knocking over his soda can. He didn't even look at it. "Where are you going?"

"I'm going to bed! Go call your girlfriend if you're so lonely, I'm sure she'll come keep your dick busy so you can use your brain for something that's not trying to look badass for once. Guess what, Brett? Almost getting killed every week to barely survive off fucking dry vegetables isn't badass! We're not even earning enough to survive, so even if the bullets won't kill us, starvation fucking will!"

Brett stood speechless as Eddy stomped off to his bedroom and slammed the door, making the glasses in their cupboard clink against each other. He had never seen Eddy that agitated before.

He was sure Eddy would come around, though. Absolutely sure. The next morning he'd come out of his room for their soggy cereal breakfast and they'd get on with life and laugh together again like they always did when they fought like that.

Boy, how wrong he was.

...

The house was very quiet the next morning, and it didn't take Brett long to discover that Eddy had left while he slept. That wasn't completely unusual either, really. He thought he would show up during the day, though, or maybe even that evening.
It wasn't until he had to go back to bed in the same silence he had woken up to despite several unanswered phone calls he began worrying.

The following day, Brett took a walk around the neighbourhood to look for him, but of course couldn't find him. His girlfriend wanted him to go home to fuck and do the stuff they usually did, but for the first time in a very long time they didn't feel like fucking. This of course pissed her off which in turn pissed him off which led to another fight. They didn't talk anymore after that, really.

That night, as Brett stared up at the ceiling of the living room after having slowly collapsed onto the floor for reasons he hadn't consciously processed yet, the realization that Eddy probably wasn't coming back slowly crept up on him. Maybe if he had found something better for them to eat that night? Maybe if he had tried harder to find something for them to do? It felt like an elephant was taking its time sitting down on his chest, squeezing his heart and making it impossible to breathe.

He really was on his own now, wasn't he?

______

Brett shook his head to snap out of the memory as he stacked what he figured would be the last stack of breakfast pancakes he would cook for Eddy. It was time to let the tiger go home. It was time for Eddy to go home to his boyfriend, where he could be happy.