From My Enemy To My Love (boyxboy) ✔

Chapter 68

A/N:  Trigger warning - towards the end of this chapter there is talk of sexual abuse.  It doesn't go into detail, but I wanted to warn people anyway.

Since this chapter also talks about $ I just want to remind you that this is US $.

Vincent Kinsington

It was my day off. I was in an area of the city I didn't usually go to. I was on my way to the thrift store to see if I could find a suitable couch for our little living room. I really wanted to purchase a brand new comfortable leather couch, but there was no way we could afford that at the moment. Chet had volunteered to go with me, but he had skipped out on a few soccer practices and I didn't want him to skip out on anymore even if it was unofficial. I had checked with the thrift store before I came to this particular one to make sure they would deliver the furniture if I found something I liked.

I got to the store and went inside. I looked around a little stumped. I had never been in a thrift store before. It was wide. There were several people inside, families, women, men all looking at the various items. From the front of the store I could see a large sign towards the back that said furniture. I walked to the back. I came to the dressers first. I was curious, but we didn't need dressers so I moved on. I came to chairs. We had one chair that went with Chet's desk. It might be good if I got a second chair. I ran my hand along the back of one. But we only had so much money and we didn't necessarily need a nice chair so I moved on. There was a small wooden table that we might be able to use as a dining table. But after I looked at the price, I decided to move on. I came to a small folding table and a set of four folding chairs. For all of them, it was only $10. That was in our budget.

"May I help you?" an employee said to me as she walked up.

"I want to purchase these," I said indicating the table and chairs. "I also need a couch though. I called and someone said you delivered. Is that right?"

"Yes," she said. "Why don't you look at the couches," she pointed to where they were, "and I'll mark these as sold so no one else purchases them while you're looking."

"Thank you," I said.

I walked over to the couches. I dismissed the fabric ones first in case they had a leather one. There were a few leather ones. One was a cream color that had some small dark stains. It was worn. I passed that and went to a brown leather one. It seemed in better shape, but when I sat on it to test it out, the cushion was angled weird so it felt like I was constantly falling forward.

There was a tan leather loveseat. It looked clean and I didn't see any stains. It was faded, but I could live with faded. I sat on it. It was comfortable enough. I could picture me and Chet cuddling on it in the living room watching t.v. that we had yet to get. I lifted the cushions and inspected it for any odd stains or signs of bugs. I specifically looked up signs for bed bugs before I came. I didn't see any worrying signs.

"This one just came in," the same employee said to me. "It's going to go fast. If you want it, I suggest you get it now."

"Can I lift up the end a little so I can look at the legs?"

"Sure," she said. She stood by patiently as I lifted one end and looked underneath then I went and lifted the other end. It looked good. I wanted it. But then I looked at the price tag. $100 was a great price for a leather loveseat, but it was more than we had budgeted for. I had $75 cash on me. $35 of it was mine and $40 was Chet's because we were going to split the cost of the couch. I did have a credit card from when Chet's mom helped me set up a bank account. It didn't have a high credit line and I didn't want to use it much. I didn't want to use it all if possible, but this might be one of those times.