Over the Rainbow

Chapter 1: Where are you?

It had been a late night at the office. The new project was taking more out of Jared than he'd likely admit. He still enjoyed the coding, but it could get monotonous. His team was responsible for the background designs and once the imagery was complete, it all boiled down to pulling varying perspectives to accommodate character movement and views.

That's when it got boring. But it paid the bills.

At 8:30 it was already fully dark. The flashing signs and street lights offered up enough light to navigate the pot-hole ridden sidewalk, but other walkers were just dark, unidentifiable shadows. They passed Jared by, unnoticed. As he dodged them, carefully avoiding the holes and frost-heaves of the concrete walk, he pulled his phone out of his back pocket.

He swiped the screen, killing the vibrations as well as picking up the call. The image on the screen told him it was Crystal calling, probably wondering why he was so late... yet again.

"Hey Hon. What's up?"

"Where the hell are you?" She kind of sounded pissed, maybe just a little annoyed. "I was expecting you two hours ago."

Jared cringed. He should have called to tell her he would be late, but somehow, he just never managed to get around to it. This, understandably, never made Crystal happy.

"Sorry Babe, I was in the zone." Another cringe. Did he really just call her Babe? "Sorry, but you know how I get."

"Yeah, I know." He could almost see her, hand on hip, shaking her head in disgust. "Too bad I'm not as important as your precious games."

Jared had to listen carefully in order to decide whether or not she was actually upset with him. He closed his eyes and replayed her voice in his head. No, he thought, She's ok. It'll be fine.

He opened his eyes just in time to stop short of walking straight into some guy standing still on the sidewalk, staring straight at him.

"You wanna watch where you're goin' there Sport!" The tone was vaguely threatening, and the young man's size reinforced the threat.

Jared sidestepped and looked into his eyes (he had to crane his neck to look up that high).

"You got it, Captain. I'll keep my eyes open from now on," he said hurriedly as he continued down the sidewalk. But the captain wasn't quite through.

"See that you do, asshole!" The tone was a bit less threatening, but maybe only because Jared was getting further away. Further away was exactly what he needed right now. All the way back to his apartment, actually. He needed to get home quickly in order to keep Crystal from getting too wound up.

This was the third time in as many days that he was heading home after 8:00. It might have been alright if he'd called to let her know, but somehow, he just never could break away from work long enough to make the call.

That's okay, he thought. She never stays mad too long. And anyway, this project is nearly done. Things will settle back to normal.

"Dinner's cold," Crystal announced as he entered the apartment. "Don't worry though, I'll warm it up for you."

"Thanks Hon." She actually didn't seem upset at all. Good news for Jared. They got through dinner peacefully, although quietly.

The rest of the evening consisted of streaming reruns of old sitcoms. Crystal laughed loudly at the hijinks while Jared glanced at the tv and typed diligently on his laptop. The workday never actually ended for him.

Later, in bed, the couple snuggled closely against the cold darkness of the night. The routine was welcome, comforting.

***