Chapter 14 Jack

“What happened?”

“Nothing, yet.”

John stirred next to me and I knew I was being watched. I took a few breaths and waited for the words, nervous and flighty as birds, to assemble themselves in my head.

"I had this one friend," I started, quietly, "In the - the war. We were talking one time, you know, about home, and he told me about how his dad was an admissions officer at a university over in California. He said when he went home he was going to school."

"And where the hell are you going to get the money to go to school?" He didn't sound mad, as I thought he would. A little bit tired, maybe.

"Well there's the GI Bill. You heard of that?"

"It's vaguely familiar." He looked down.

"Yeah, I get a month of school per month of duty. All expenses paid."

"What are you going to be?"

"It doesn't matter. Anything's better than working the rest of my life in a...an underground sex club."

"It's not a-- okay, yes it is."

"Anything's better." For a few minutes, there was silence, and then John clapped his hands to his knees and stood up.

"Well, you ought to get packing then, right?" I stood up too and looked at him. His face was turned away.

"Not that much to pack."

"No."

"John. You could come too, you know. More for a guy like you to do in California than there is here." He scratched at the back of his head, still not facing me.

"A guy like me?"

I felt my face heating up. "Sorry. I mean--"

There was a quiet laugh. "I know what you mean." Then, "How do you plan on getting there?"

"Um."

"Jeez. Now I have to go or else you're going to wind up dead in a ditch somewhere." He turned around, hands on his hips, one corner of his mouth creeping intoxicatingly upwards.

"How so?" I quacked, finding it hard to believe that he was actually agreeing.

"Because you," he jabbed me in the chest with a finger, "are too damn proper to know how to hitchhike."

"I could take a bus..."

But it was already settled.

---

Unfortunately, quitting wasn't as easy as we thought it would be. Charlie, for one, didn't want to let his Gemini go. Apparently John was pretty much the main attraction in the club, which was something I had guessed before, but John was surprised to learn. Charlie yelled, whined and haggled, and even offered to raise both our pay in desperation. I didn't bother arguing, knowing that I really wasn't that valuable.

John's reaction to the whole situation was interesting, to say the least. First, he stalked into Charlie's office with me in tow, and dramatically announced that he was quitting. Then, as Charlie turned up his oily charm, his bravado began to wear off and his no's became less confident by the minute. By the time Charlie began talking about pay, John had turned pale. Finally, I motioned to Charlie to wait a minute and hauled him off into the back alley.

"Jesus," he breathed, sliding down the brick wall and landing on his haunches. "This isn't the walk in the park I imagined it to be." I watched him carefully.

"Look, you don't have to go just because of me." He rubbed a hand across his face and looked at me sideways.

"I want to go. I know I want to get out of here. You were right -- about how you're not doing anything with your life. It's not like I am, either. It's just..."

"It's just that you've got a place here and you're afraid if you leave it, you won't find another one."

"Yeah, I guess. Jeez, you should be a psychologist."

I laughed.

"Well, I can't be one if I stay rotting around here, can I?" He looked up, probably startled to hear me laughing.

"No, you can't," he answered, softly.

There was a "Help Wanted" sign in the window the next morning.

---

John was promptly kicked out on his ass, so he gathered his measly belongings and moved in with me.

"Hey, stranger," he greeted me, shouldering the door open, a knapsack swung over one shoulder and a cardboard box held in front of him. I relieved him of the box, eyebrows raising as I felt how heavy it was.

"I'm stronger than I look," he said, winking. I rolled my eyes and he smirked. He dropped his things in the tiny room I had used as a bedroom and joined me on the couch, staring out the window.

"So..."

"So." Gemini stretched, his thighs opening slightly and a leg pushing snug up against mine.

"Did I just move in with you?" he wondered aloud, winding an arm around my shoulders and laying his head on my shoulder. A piece of hair tickled my neck and I shivered involuntarily. "Does this mean we're getting married?" "If by getting married you mean dragging our asses half way across the country, then yes, we are getting married." He chuckled, a slow, deep sound that he had somehow managed to infuse with his accent.

"We're embarking on a quest to a land far away, heading for an uncertain future. I think I like the sound of that." I turned my head and looked down my nose at the top of his head. He turned, chin propped up on my shoulder, looking up at me though his dark eyelashes. I felt a hand creep up my neck. "Don't you?"

I breathed out and he closed his eyes against the brush of air.

"Yeah. I do."

---

"Not much of a nest egg, is it?" John drawled, staring at the pathetic bundle of ones and fives laying on the counter.

"I thought you said you were going to add some," I muttered, looking around the room to see what I could sell.

"I thought I could," he answered, shrugging, "but you have to remember, I didn't make that much to begin with. He took a lot out of my paycheck for the 'lodging.'" I snorted, thinking of the dressing room complete with old couch that Charlie considered lodging. "And I never got around to investing."

He reached in his pocket and added twenty bucks to the pile. I stared at him. He shrugged.

"Guy has to eat." Growling under my breath, I recounted the money and wrote the sum down in the notepad.

"Alright. I figure this should get us to South Dakota in terms of bus fare, motel stays and food. Wyoming if we starve a little bit." John chuckled heartily.

"You don't know what you're talking about. First of all, we're hitching, so forget about that bus fare shit. Second of all, I don't know what kind of food you're used to eating, but what I've got in mind ain't gonna cost us anything." He frowned and scratched his ear. "Too bad it's not summer. We could sleep outside, or find sheds." He thought about it. "Well, we still could, I guess, once we get a little further south. And it depends on if we're in the city, because it's usually warmer in--"

I just shrugged and took notes.

"Maybe I should say goodbye to them," I said, the uncertainty welling up again. John, carrying his bag in one hand and like a child, holding on to me with the other, shook his head.

"You're both better off this way. They won't know you made tracks and you won't have to face them."

"But shouldn't they know where I went? I mean, they don't know if I'm alive or dead right now."

"Jack. You are twenty-one years old. You used to kill people for a living. I think they should expect you to be able to take care of yourself." I kicked at a lump of snow at my feet and watched sullenly as a car raced across the road. We were at the edge of town and I was indecisive.

"Maybe I could send a letter." John scrunched his nose against his thick bright scarf and freed both his hands. He rubbed them together and then stuck them under his armpits. It didn't take a lot of effort to figure out that he wasn't used to this kind of weather.

"Do that. Now please, can we get ourselves a nice warm car?"

I pushed myself off the wall and picked up his knapsack. He gave me a grateful look, not budging his hands from their warm places. I looked back to the city one more time, and then turned resolutely away from it.

"Alright. Now show me how you do this hitchhiking thing." Gemini grinned.

He was right. We were home free.

We are born innocent.

Believe me Adia,

We are still innocent

It's easy, we all falter.

Does it matter?