Shark of Spades

The Morning Life

I woke up early due to my internal clock, but I didn't mind much. Jack and I had pretty much made a deal (albeit unspoken) not to dig through  each other's stuff or get in each other's business, but I still felt  safer showering when he wasn't  awake. That's why, even though the cheap alarm clock sitting on the bedside table read 6:00, I got up, stretched, grabbed the only change of clothes I'd brought with me, and stepped into the bathroom, locking it behind me. I turned to look in the  mirror, slowly taking off my sunglasses and wincing when I saw the red  lines around my eyes. Probably why you're not supposed to sleep  with sunglasses on. To be fair, though, I had no choice but to sleep with all of my normal attire on, sunglasses and gloves included. If I changed into regular sleepwear, Jack would find out my secret  immediately, and though he'd hinted at it before, I could tell that he'd  been bluffing. I play cards, after all. Who was he trying to fool?

I  turned on the shower, undressed quickly in a methodical fashion, and  stepped into the still-lukewarm water, silently yelling at it to hurry and heat up. After five minutes, I stepped out, wrapping a towel around myself and vowing to get something better than the 25¢ shampoo and conditioner that  probably was more like 50% weed killer, 40% rat poison, and 10% cyanide, for the good (or lack thereof) it did.

I dried off as fast as possible and changed into the only clothes I'd brought with me from Chicago.

After I'd completed dried, changed, and had made sure there were no incriminating traces left behind that might somehow point to my gender, I  unlocked the door and laid back on the bed. From the time I'd left to now (approximately 11 minutes), Jack had migrated from the couch to the bed, so I took the couch in his place, suspicious. What does he know? Does he know?

Then I went back to sleep before I could doubt him further.

•§•

When  I woke up again, it was 8:00. Judging by the sound of opening and  closing cupboards coming from the kitchen area, I correctly assumed that Jack was already up and starting the traditional game of hide-and-go seek with our good old friends Mr. Breakfast.

Personally, I hate breakfast. I find it near impossible to choke down food at the start of the day when your stomach kindly lets you know that you have no way of holding anything down with that feeling of nausea deep in your gut. So...breakfast. We never agree on much of anything, Mr. Breakfast  and I.

Meanwhile, Jack, apparently a culinary master of sorts,  insisted that breakfast was the pivotal point of every day, the climax of our daily life, the most momentous decision a human being is given the opportunity to make.

So I ate breakfast. And by "ate," I mean to say that I forced myself to digest it.

As per usual, when I dragged myself into the kitchen (because albeit the early morning showers, I am far from embracing the rooster's call or getting in touch with my inner early bird), Jack had assembled something for me to eat.

I sat down in the chair, staring morosely at the toast spread with jam, arranged artfully in coordination with a side of  scrambled eggs, with a glass of orange juice to the left and a napkin (with a fork laid on top) tucked ever so slightly underneath the right side of the plate.

I sat there staring at the elegant ensemble until Jack sat down across from me with a matching plate. Then I met his  twinkling eyes with my doleful ones.

"You know, before we started rooming together, I managed to survive, every single day, and I never ate breakfast. Not once."

"And haven't you just become so much more downright charming since you started?" he asked, grinning and taking a drink of his orange juice (his  hand poised just so, supporting the glass) without breaking eye  contact.

I pointed at his beverage of choice. "See? Case and point.  How can you even drink that stuff this early? Do you realize how acidic that is? Why not just chug battery acid and call it an energy drink?"

"Breakfast," he began in the lecturing tone that he so very rarely used, unless it was dripping with patronization (as such now), "is the penultimate  precipice on which every organic life form hangs."

"Yeah, I'm hanging myself off of that cliff," I agreed before returning to the main issue  before Jack tried to tell me that breakfast was the cloud upon which we all must float to achieve eternal salvation in Heaven. "Look. All I'm saying is that I don't want to eat breakfast. Ever."

Jack's eyes bore down into mine intensely as he grinned menacingly. "Are you going to waste the good I set out on the table?"

"What are you, my mom?" I asked, but the weight of his gaze soon changed my mind. "Nope. Absolutely not. Never, that is."

So I took a bite out of the yellow brain matter and washed it down with  the orange battery acid, adding a forkful of dead bread (still bleeding)  and avoided eye contact with him for the rest of the me, although I felt that he never stopped staring at me.

Breakfast...as usual. Another reason why we're far from friends.

Once my plate was devoid of any food and my cup of drink, he stood up, taking my plate to the dishwasher. For just a second, I imagined him  putting on rubber gloves that came up to his elbows, fighting the wave of grime with a bottle of dish soap in one hand and a sponge in the  other. He turned around just as I broke out into a smirk.

"What?" he asked, confused but grinning slightly as though he'd missed out on the joke.

"Nothing." I dropped the smirk, trying to look intent on...something.

"Anyhow," he said, narrowing his eyes suspiciously, "get ready."

"Where are we going?"

"A place I know."