In Between Days: Raising Jordan (boyxman)✅

Just Like Heaven

Jamie

My eyes lingered at the sliding doors even after Jordan was no longer there. The two of just spent over an hour together yet I couldn't wait to be with him again. He did things to me I never expected him to do.

"Are you sure it's okay if I stay?" I said. "I could leave, you know, see if Liz would let me stay with her." Liz lived in a small one bedroom apartment and more or less worked from home as a freelance writer. She also happened to be super OCD, so I doubted she'd be too thrilled with me disrupting both her work and living environment.

"You don't have to leave," Tim said. "Jordan's gotten used to you."

"Yes, I guess he has," I said, my insides burning thinking about him. Tim's eyes stayed on me for a few seconds, making me a little uneasy. Although he didn't outwardly say anything, I started to suspect that maybe Tim was on to us, that he slowly realized we were more than friends. Maybe he was even okay with it, forgetting about the initial warning he gave me about "getting any ideas about him." And then I thought that maybe Tim was too distracted by his father's presence in the house to care whether or not I was fucking his younger brother. Either way, I left it up to Jordan to have that "talk" with him. It wasn't my place. Even if Tim were to say anything to me, I'd refer him to Jordan.

"How'd you get him out, anyway?" Tim asked me.

"I told him to get out," I said.

"And he did? Just like that?" Tim said.

"Yes, just like that," I said.

"And what'd you do after?" Tim asked as if he were digging for information, perhaps to confirm his suspicions.

"We went for a walk," I said, hoping my face wasn't too red. "And then we talked."

Sighing loudly, Art stood up, obviously bored with this conversation. He also preferred to avoid any conversation pertaining to Jordan.

"I'm going to bed," he announced, walking toward the door. "Talked," he said with a laugh. "I bet you talked," he said, stepping into the house, not looking back at us.

Tim reached for the pitcher of sangria and poured himself a great big glass of it. "Fuck you, Art," he muttered to himself. He then poured me a glass even though I didn't ask for one.

"This fucking sucks," he said. "He always does this. He shows up unannounced only because this is his house. I wish he'd just sell it and let me buy it. He only has something to do with us when it's convenient for him. He fucking abandoned Jordan. He left me to raise him." I always knew when Tim was really angry when every other word out of his mouth was the f-word. "He's the one who fucking told me to go to court to get fucking guardianship of Jordan when our mother finally lost it. He didn't have the time, he said. He didn't have the time to raise his own son. I mean, I've always been on my own. I raised myself. He could have gotten a job here like me. That's what everyone expected me to do because I'm the mature, responsible one. He's a fucking pathetic excuse of a father, that's what he is. I fucking hate his fucking guts. Where was he all those times Jordan was suspended from school? All those times he cried because he didn't have any friends? I think you're his first friend that I know of. That fucker never saw how shitty he felt after each blow up incident and there were lots of them, believe me. Art didn't have to deal with any of it. He wasn't fucking there when Jordan said he hoped he'd go to sleep and never wake up. He didn't have to listen to any of that. Oh fuck...fuck him..."