Page 20 of Only You

Washington, D.C.

The sound of the marketplace filled his ears as he wandered through the streets looking for his mother.

She had been gone for two days, an absence that was odd for her.

She was supposed to come back with food, but night came and went.

He went to her employer’s house the day before, sneaking through the back when he heard the mistress of the house shouting about his mother being missing.

He snatched a piece of fruit from the kitchen before silently slipping out.

He continued to wait until his stomach was too empty to bear, hoping that maybe someone in the market would know where she went.

Answers came with pitiful or scathing looks, but the answers were all the same: no one knew where his mother went.

Hours from that moment, he would wander the streets.

A baker closing shop would have some sympathy for him and give him some bread.

Upon trying to take him home, he would tell her his mother was gone.

While the baker was kind, she knew she wouldn’t have enough money to care for him.

She would do what she thought was best and tell a passing group of soldiers about her predicament.

Among them would be General Roulet, someone who took one look at him and noticed that despite being tired, poor and clearly orphaned, the boy wasn’t defeated.

Jones’s eyes blinked open to a dark room.

His gaze roamed the ceiling for a moment as he realised he was awake and felt surprisingly rested.

He reached over to his bedside table to his charging phone.

Squinting at the screen, he read that it was only 2:37 a.m. He groaned, putting his face in his pillow.

This is what happens when you go to bed early after staying up for an all-night session.

He usually would’ve stayed in New York, but the studio session had been so difficult and the artist so indecisive that the last thing Jones wanted to do was be anywhere where Jair could call him to come back in at the last minute.

So, he drank a cup of pure black coffee with two extra shots of espresso and headed out on the four-hour drive.

He managed to stay awake long enough to eat and watch a film to unwind before crashing.

Unfortunately, that left him wide awake at the worst time.

He rubbed his forehead in frustration as his stomach grumbled.

There was no way he was getting back to sleep starving.

He threw off his covers with force to look for a hoodie, happy he wore sweats as pyjamas.

The idea of cooking was thrown out quickly at the thought of having to wash dishes after.

So, he went to one of the few places nearby open late.

Twenty minutes later, Jones hummed happily as he sipped McDonald’s Sprite in the parking lot.

The radio filled the inside of his car and he bopped his head along to the music as he looked around.

There weren’t any shady characters he could see, so he eased up a little, letting himself turn the music a little louder before biting into his burger.

He swore at that moment a burger and fries had never tasted better.

Just when he started to relax, singing along to the song playing, he heard a thump.

Adrenaline flooded his system, and he turned his music off, praying that it wouldn’t be trouble.

He heard someone cursing quietly but he couldn’t quite see them, so he got out the car.

God was generous because instead of someone looking for a bone to pick, it was the familiar brown eyes of Dani, who was rubbing her arm.

‘Dani.’

‘Jones… um, sorry,’ she said quickly. ‘I accidentally ran into your mirror.’ He looked behind him and sure enough, his driver side mirror was bent inward.

‘Hey,’ he said bemused. ‘You good?’

‘Yeah, it was nothing. Just stings a little.’ She grimaced.

‘Do you—?’

‘No.’ She rotated her arm. Beyond a small wince, she seemed fine. ‘Not good as new but probably won’t bruise.’

‘That’s good,’ he said, not sure how else to respond. The silence stretched between them, the awkwardness giving him a chance to catch his bearings enough to remember his manners.

‘We should probably ask “how are you?”’ he suggested.

‘That’s a good point,’ she agreed. ‘How are you?’

‘I’m good and you?’

‘Hungry and exhausted from Rachmaninoff,’ she said, making him laugh a little. ‘This may sound a little out of the blue, all things considered, but… if you’re going to be hanging out for a bit, do you mind if I get my food and eat with you?’

Jones blinked in surprise but didn’t hesitate to say, ‘Nah, go ahead.’

‘Okay! Okay… um, I’ll be right back.’

Jones watched Dani jog to the door, her hands clutched tightly around her keys, pepper spray keychain swinging with each step.

Smart , he thought. Although it would be smarter if he didn’t leave her alone…

He grabbed his keys and locked his door before following her.

Dani looked up as he waited by the door, tapping on his phone like he was busy.

He didn’t look directly at her, but he swore he spotted a smile from the corner of his eye.

When Dani received her food, he stood and waited by the door.

She gave him a small, polite ‘thank you’ when he opened the door, leading her to his car.

He opened the passenger’s side and got his food off the seat while she sat on his trunk, facing the restaurant, a line starting to form in the drive-thru.

He was certain it was filled with students going just as crazy as Dani or those who finished second shift and were hungry, like him.

‘What did you get?’ she asked as he joined her. She reached into her bag, grabbing a handful of fries.

‘A quarter pounder.’ He took a bite, but the euphoria he found earlier was long gone. It was just cheap, greasy food again. Still, it quieted his stomach, so he wasn’t too bothered. ‘You?’

‘Just fries,’ she said. ‘It’s the best thing they got.’

‘Fair,’ he said, reaching for the last of his own.

They ate quietly for a while, looking at the line of cars going by.

The silence was surprisingly comfortable and Jones was able to disappear into his mind, reflecting on his dream.

It was rare that Damien thought about his childhood, his life becoming consumed by the military so early in life.

In fact, even reliving Damien’s life, his childhood memories only came after he met Sabine and his desire to have more to share with her.

It was laced with so much hope that he could replace those memories with a family of his own, one he would never abandon.

It was a blessing Damien didn’t know how it would end.

That seemed to be a burden unique to him and Dani.

The sound of slurping interrupted his thoughts. He looked over at Dani, who was staring at the half-moon above them with a straw in her mouth. She didn’t seem to even realise her drink was finished as she sucked on air, the obnoxious sound getting louder.

‘Okay, okay.’ He reached over to the cup to take it, but Dani started to dodge his hand as she realised what he was doing. ‘The drink is gone. Please, put it out of its misery.’

‘I don’t hear the ice complaining,’ she commented as she let the straw slip from between her lips. She set it down and he picked it up, shaking it.

‘That’s the complaining,’ he said.

She snatched it back from him, placing it as far from him as she could. They fell back into a lull before Jones broke the silence.

‘So, why are you practising so late?’ he asked her.

‘You’re asking me this now? At… 3:12?’ He shrugged, waiting for the answer. She crossed her arms and looked at him pointedly.

‘You first. You don’t seem like a night owl to me.’

‘I’m afraid you don’t have a choice as a musician.

Artists rule the night,’ he said. ‘My friend is a producer in New York. There’s a song he’s working on and he asked me to play bass with the singer’s band.

I’ve worked with her before but this time we were there all night.

We didn’t leave the studio until ten a.m.’

Dani winced. ‘Damn. You couldn’t just do the bassline and leave?’

‘The singer insisted on the entire band being there and getting it right live,’ he said, exhausted by the mere reminder of the session. ‘I have never seen someone so obsessively work on a song for ten hours straight.’

‘Wait, you didn’t start until midnight?’

‘The band started at nine, but the artist didn’t show up until midnight. They had a concert earlier.’

‘They had a concert and then ran over to the studio,’ Dani said in disbelief. ‘How? I’m tired after sitting and playing Beethoven for two hours, much less having to jump around a stage.’ Jones threw his hands up helplessly.

‘Either they ran on Red Bull and faith, or they had something extra to get them through. I was tempted to dip out every break, but I knew it would cause hell for my friend.’ He laughed a little at the image of Jair pounding at his door for leaving him with the insufferable pop star.

‘Do the artist often have “something extra”?’ Dani asked.

‘Eh, I’d say it’s fifty-fifty. Usually, it’s nothing more than weed but some get a lot more creative .’

‘How vague of you.’

‘It keeps me in the biz.’ He winked, making her giggle. ‘You’ll learn one day.’

‘I doubt I’ll be working in a studio a lot. Maybe for soundtracks or live recordings, but I think I’ll stay strictly in the performance realm for now.’

‘And you think they’re any more chill?’

He and Dani exchanged knowing looks both smirking. Jones didn’t spend a lot of time with the performance majors when he was at Howard, but he did know enough people to know where there were packed schedules, there were more than a few drugs to be found.

‘NowNow, back to you. What’s got you craving fries this early?’