Setting my laptop on my desk, I positioned the two black baseball-shaped speakers to the side and, with an automatic, rhythmic nod of my head, I let the tunes crank.
~Oh, yo, yo, there's a demon inside. Oh, yo, yo, just like Jekyll and Hyde! ~
With a pimp strut and an improvised dance step making me look, no doubt, like a complete moron, I went back to my unpacking. Nineteen years of life makes for a lot of clutter, but my mom had helped with winnowing out the trash from the junk, so I had only about a million boxes to unpack and not a million and one. Grabbing a stepladder, one of the five I own, I pulled it over to a likely blank wall and tacked my first poster up in my own apartment.
Oh, how sweet that sounds.
My. Own. Apartment
.
No more living in my parents' house. No more annoying little sisters bugging the crap out of me all the time. My music. My video games. My TV shows!
"Fuck you SpongeBob, in your square-pants ass."
Grabbing another poster, this one from the movie Pacific Rim, I pulled my stepladder over to another blank wall. Of course, I was at that critical point of reaching up to pin the top corner when the knock on the door came.
"Just a second," I muttered around a mouthful of push pins. Spitting them into my hand, I left them on the corner of my desk as I went to see who was disturbing the sanctity of my lair. Another stepladder climb and I looked out the peephole.
"Ah, dinner."
Getting down, I folded the ladder out the way and opened the door to the guy with my pizza feast. He was trying to juggle a red vinyl bag and a two-liter Cherry Dr. Pepper. I ignored the surprised looked on his face. I'm far too used to it after all these years. Digging my wallet out the back of my jeans, I grinned up at him.
"Double cheese, Death-by-Pepperoni, and an order of breadsticks with tons of garlic butter? Please tell me you have it all?"
"Yes, sir. And a Dr. Pepper." He gave me a nervous grin, nod, and smile as he pulled my food out the warming bag. "That will be $24.65."
I fished out a twenty and a ten. "Keep the change, my brother. Ah, thank you."
"No sir, thank you."
Shouldering the door closed, I carried my first meal in my new place to the kitchen table. I was about to dig in when I heard a knock, much louder than the first one. Looking back, I saw that my door had crept back open and a very familiar face was standing on the landing. I grinned at the sexy silhouette.
Big blue eyes peeking from behind blonde bangs looked into my apartment. "Hello? Oh hi, Gordon."
"Hey, Gracie! Come on in; food just got here."
She pointed over her shoulder. "I saw the delivery guy. Oh no. I can't stay, though it does smell good. No, sorry my mom asked me to drop off the finalized copy of the lease agreement. It is so cool to have someone I know from school renting here!'
I let my eyes roam her delightful figure. "I'm pretty hyped about it myself. You sure?" I pointed to the pizza. "I've got plenty. This is my moving-in meal."
"I can't stay ... okay, maybe a slice."
As she moved past me my eyes went naturally to Gracie's ass, given that it was perfectly on level with them. Not many blessings go with being born with achondroplasia, but awesome female derriere views is certainly one of the perks. And let me tell you, the young daughter of my new landlord had a monumentally spectacular example of a nice heart-shaped ass.
Bam!
"Ready for the prom?" I asked fishing myself out a breadstick that instantly dripped garlic butter down my wrist. "The guys in your class burning up your phone for a date yet?"
"No, can't say they are. With Myra Jenkins still up for grabs, I'm not trending yet." She gave a shrug. "I've got a few weeks. I did find my dress. Oh but it's gorgeous. I'll swing by and let you see it before I leave."
Because seeing her in her prom dress was the height of my existence? Twitter-headed twit.
With a mental shrug, I nom-nomed on bread. "Where are you running off to? Like I said, there is plenty."
"Oh, no this is good enough; trying to watch what I eat, I want my dress to fit me perfectly." She held out a large envelope, which I of course immediately got garlic butter on, not thinking. "That's your copy of the finals. Mom said to let you know that if you see anything wrong with it not to hesitate to give her a ring."
"Tell her I will." Hell, I might try to find something to wrong simply to do that. As nice as Gracie was on the eyes, her mother was a stone-cold smoking fox. "Thanks for dropping it by."
"No problem." She looked down at me. "Well, gotta run. Bye."
I followed her to the door simply to watch her walk away. And yeah I needed to lock it before I attracted any more pizza thieves. As I went back to my dinner I did stop to think about two things along the way. Why wouldn't she say where she was going? And just why a girl that ... rumor has it ... was as likely a candidate for having Lollypopguildophobia as there was, happy that I had moved in here? From the Braxton High rumor mill (that being my sister Marcy) Gracie Carmichaels was not the leader of my fan club. She had apparently said some "not kind" things and often used the "M" word when talking about me.
"Humm, but she ate my pizza. Maybe the worm has turned."
With a shrug, I pushed all that high-school drama behind me. I was graduated/paroled from all that crap, and this was my first night in my new place. No
I'm-Queen-of-the-Harvest-Ball
girl without two brain cells to rub together was going to get me off in a depression wallow.
Munching pizza, I went back to trying to figure out where to put my stuff. Rocking out to Marilyn Manson now, I placed my books on the wide, built-in shelf by the bedroom door. I did clean my hands before touching those. They might smell of garlic for a bit but they were not going to be greasy. Running a hand over the familiar titles, the spines showing the many nights rereading these I pulled back out my well-worn copy of
Luck in the Shadows
. The first book read in my new apartment.
"My ...new ... apartment."
Grinning, I went back to dancing for a moment before going to get more of my dinner.
Ah yes, this is the life.
~Hey you, what do you see? Something beautiful something free? ~
** ** ** ** ** ** **
I hate work.
It's like school, but without summer vacation to look forwards to. Eight hours had never felt so long. I was dragging when I left the photo studio at the mall.
And then I did two hours of my side job.
Tired of even thinking about taking pictures -- a state I would never have thought possible -- I put the black nylon case with my camera down and opened my laptop. There were hours of work still left to do to transition these raw street pictures I took into the masterpieces of urban art photography that could earn me better money than eight hours taking picture of drooling babies. Color shift, gradient changes, and a few other small Photoshop tweaks to hide flaws and make the focus pop out. Hours and hours of work for every photo. Staring at my screen saver, I sighed. If I ever had any hope of seeing a photo of mine in a gallery I had to do this, otherwise it was going to be a lifetime at
