Thomas and Niko in the City of Trees

Chapter 6 - Part 2

I'll tell you what, the next day, I've got all the time in the world to think about things, sweating all day in that coffee shack. It's called "Spill the Beans" if you can even believe that horseshit. Jesus Christ. To make matters worse, it kept raining most of the night. Now it's sunny again and humid as hell. Marlon texts to tell me he'll have the window unit in tomorrow. I'm not sure I'll make it.

The rush is mostly over by ten, and it will only come back a little after lunch, so I'm standing there thinking about what we talked about the night before. I guess Thomas's main worry is that something will happen again. It seems sort of unlikely to me. He has a lot of self-control, at least for most things, and so do I. I'm looking at pictures of him on my phone. I do that a lot. He's one of the most photogenic people I know. There's one from when he was swimming with his cousins last summer. He has his shirt off. I just stare at it for a while. I don't know what to do. I decide it would be a good idea right about now to stop looking at those pictures.

Outside of the shack, it's just full-on summer. The puddles have mostly evaporated away. I'm situated in a part of town where a lot of refugees have moved in over the years. You get to see all kinds of people going in and out of the Winco, just getting their groceries. Even though I complain about this job a lot, it's not like it's the worst way to spend the day.

I get off work at four and go straight to Thomas's place. Alfred is sitting on the couch in the living room. I can tell by the way he's looking at me that things are already much better. The way that kid was talking the night before...all I can says is I'm just happy he doesn't have to worry anymore. I go into Thomas's room. He's at his desk reading about some band on Wikipedia. I lie down on his bed. It's really pretty crazy how normal everything feels again.

"How did finals go?" I say.

"Don't ask me," he says. "I don't fucking know."

"You think you did okay, though?"

He turns his chair around. "I think I did all right. Probably would've been a lot better with your help, but I didn't fuck them up too bad."

I don't know why I feel so relieved. They're not my grades. I'm such a dumbass sometimes. "Can you believe it's all over?" I say.

"Not really," he says. "Doesn't feel the way I thought I would."

"I know."

"I don't miss it yet," he says. "Not at all."

"You thought you were going to miss that shithole already?"

He grins. "No. I guess I'm just surprised. Feels almost like I never will." He's just sitting there shaking his head. "Feels kind of far away now."

"I know," I say. "The great world is unfurling before us." I have a habit of just throwing out shit that sounds like something I would read in one of Ms. Nolan's books. Sometimes it's a direct quote, but usually it's just a string of bullshit like that. Thomas used to think it was annoying, but he's been getting a little more artsy these days, and I think he's starting to like it.

"Fuck yeah, man," he says.

He puts on music and we chat about nothing while we wait for rush hour to pass. He's always got some new shit playing. I've learned to be careful when I ask what's on. I swear, this time all I ask is what language they're singing in—that's it. And you know what he does? He spends the next twenty minutes lecturing me on how this entire country is fucked because nobody listens to the voice of Hamed Sinno.

Eventually, we get in his car and drive around town. The air-conditioning still isn't fixed, but that's fine because I'd almost always rather have the windows down. Later on in June or July it'll start getting up around a hundred degrees some days. Even then, I'll be happy to just sweat it out with the windows down.