Let's Get Lost

VII. Johnny

VII. Johnny

     IT WAS AROUND three in the morning when I woke up and I couldn't have felt sicker.  After talking on the phone with Ryan last night and leaving things the way I did, I had realized he was the only real family I had left.  He was the only person I was going to introduce to my children, if I had any, and be able to say to them, "This is your family, too."  I didn't want to lose my brother, but when he'd called, I couldn't answer the phone.  I wanted to, more than anything, but I couldn't bring myself to press the send key.  I didn't want to do any more damage to him than I'd already done. 

Sighing, I stood and walked to the bathroom to shower.  I was in a mood, but I didn't have any female friends, anymore, so I got myself off.  Afterwards, I stepped out of the shower and threw on a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt after pulling on a clean pair of boxers.  Then, I pulled on some socks and my DC shoes before grabbing the keys to my motorcycle and my room key, which I decided to hook on with my vehicle keys.  The nice thing about this motel was that the keys weren't cards; they were actual keys.  This place was nearly a hundred years old -- the motel, I mean.  It had been refurbished and I'd stayed here a few times before to get away, but I never really noticed the change over the years like I had just now. 

I quickly made my way out the door before locking it and rushing to my bike.  There was nothing more important to me than riding this motorcycle.  My dad and I had fixed it up when I was a boy; it's the only thing that lasted through the fire, since it was parked in the driveway.  Dad left it to me in his will and after he died, for awhile, I couldn't even look at it.  I had it in the garage so long, covered in a tarp, but I never forgot about it.  I'd only recently found the keys and decided it was time she saw the light of day. 

I sped off down the road and parked at a gas station, buying a pack of Marlboro black menthol.  Usually, I smoked regular menthol cigarettes, but today, I figured I'd try something new, since I was now officially out of the house.  After that, I made a run to the grocery store, bought some food for sandwiches and stole two bottles of Southern Comfort when the woman at the checkout wasn't watching.  I was only nineteen; you had to be twenty-one to purchase alcohol . . . but no one said you had to be a certain age to steal it. 

I got back to my bike and put the contents of my grocery shopping in the saddle bags, along with the bottles of alcohol.  I knew it was wrong, but I didn't care.  There was something about the liquid that drug me in; it was so tantalizing the way it washed over my tongue.  It wasn't just the taste, but rather the texture of it, as well, that I fell for so hard.

I ran the food and drinks back to my motel room and put them away in the cabinets and mini-fridge before I went out to look for an apartment.  Once I found one that seemed suitable, I put in a call to the landlord.  He said if I could put a security deposit of one hundred fifty dollars down on the apartment, plus the two hundred seventy-five dollars rent with it tonight, then it was mine.  I told him I could manage that and called a friend, who owed me a thousand dollars still from when I helped fix up his car. 

"Yeah," he said, not even minding that I was demanding the money.  I told him to keep it for me until absolutely necessary, and then I would call in for it.  "If you meet me around noon at our usual, then I can give it to you in cash.  I've got nothing else to do today, anyway." 

"Thanks, man," I muttered, quickly ending the call. 

I drove around aimlessly until eleven thirty.  At that point, I sent him a text and told him I was heading to where he was now and he responded back within thirty seconds, with a simple "OK" before I took off as fast as I could down the road.  It took me maybe five minutes to get there and when I did, I hopped off my bike and pulled my hood up.  The area I was in wasn't exactly Johnny-friendly; I had a lot of enemies.