Time was not one of his best friends. He knew time was running out for him. He knew it was only a matter of time until he would have to marry Calisto, if only to make her a happy girl. If only to make his mother a happy woman.
Everyone else's happiness mattered, and he didn't know why. He was quite sure that he could not feel happiness, and so he made it his business to make everyone else happy.
"Can I take your drink order, sir?"
He looked up to see a girl of medium height and long auburn hair pulled back into a ponytail holding a pad of paper, her pen poised to write down his order.
"I . . . um . . . I'll just have a Coke, please," he said, caught off-guard by her sharp green eyes.
"That all?" she asked, writing it down.
"Yeah, that's all," he said quietly.
"I'll have that right out for ya," she replied, winking at him.
He caught her eyes straying over his body before she turned around and walked away.
He sighed.
'Here we go again.'
He turned his eyes back up to Nenette and smiled softly, knowing he'd made her happy the night before and probably would again before he left today. Nenette's happiness mattered.
The waitress returned a few seconds later, holding his Coke. She set it down in front of him, making sure he got a full shot of her cleavage as she bent over.
"I'm Tiffany," she said huskily, keeping her chest at his face level. "I have a break in a half hour. Why don't you meet me out back?"
He sighed and forced a smile onto his face. "I'll be there."
A half an hour later, he saw her slip out the back door with a seductive look in his direction and a beckoning finger. He sighed and looked up at Nenette.
He held up a dollar and put it in her g-string as she danced his way. He turned and headed towards the door after Tiffany, knowing yet again what he was getting himself into.
Tiffany had a nice car. God knows where she got it with the job she had. The backseat was quite roomy. He spent the time staring at the top of the car, contemplating the type of fabric that was used to cover it.
It seemed like the moment he walked back into the club was the moment Nenette found him and took his arm. And one more trip to the dressing room it was.
He really didn't want to go see Calisto.
She smiled. "Oh, Justin." She took his hand and pulled him into the house, running her other hand up his arm seductively. "What movie did you bring?" she whispered in his ear, brushing her lips against his earlobe.
"Cruel Intentions," he replied, handing her the cassette.
She smiled. "I love this movie."
"I know."
Calisto bounced over to the VCR and Justin sat down on the denim couch, sighing lightly. He had hoped the movie would steer them clear of any sexual encounters that night, but then realized he must be stupid. Movies INVITED sex. She popped the tape in and turned off the lights, coming up behind him and putting her arms over his chest, kissing his head softly.
He smiled and put his hands over hers as she moved her lips down to his neck, allowing her tongue to wander out and run along his skin lightly. She walked around the couch, her hand sliding over his shoulder. She stepped in front of him and he forced himself to look up at her, a small smile resting on his lips. She climbed onto him and straddled him, leaning forward to press her lips against his.
Her hands traced down his chest and she reached for his belt. He broke the kiss and pulled her hands away from his groin area as he felt her start to rub lightly.
"Calisto . . . could we just . . . not tonight?" he asked, hoping she would just watch the movie and be happy.
"Oh . . . do you not want to?"
"It's just . . . I just want to spend time with you we don't have to . . . do that every time we're together."
She just sat there for a moment. "Seriously?"
"Seriously. Not all guys want sex 24/7." It was true, he didn't want it.
A smile spread across her face. "Well, newsflash to me! Man, I thought you guys always wanted it."
Justin shrugged as she climbed off of him. "Some guys do. I don't. I can live without it. I'd much rather just spend time with you watching a movie or talking or something." He was hoping he could learn to love her. If only they really talked.
She smiled and snuggled up to him. "The movie sounds good," she whispered, landing a quick kiss on his cheek.
Of course.
His hands shoved in his pockets and his eyes aimed at the sidewalk, he walked briskly, just needing to be out. In a few minutes time, he had reached his home and stopped at the beginning of the driveway, looking up to his house's white massiveness with an almost complete look of disgust. He didn't want to be there.
He kept walking, his eyes not leaving the pavement. He found himself in a little shopping and eatery district a few blocks from his house and he sighed, thinking that maybe he should eat. He hadn't done that in quite a long time and he could only imagine what he must look like. He hadn't seen a mirror in weeks.
He decided to find someplace to eat and stepped onto the street to cross. He began to look both ways before he heard a woman's voice yell, "Cole!" and his eyes darted across the street from him where a little boy was beginning to run right in front of a white Corolla.
Justin's eyes bulged and he didn't hesitate even a fraction of a second before he ran across the street, not paying attention to the cars and swept the little boy up, holding him safely to his chest as he stepped away from the car screeching on it's brakes.
"Hey!" the driver yelled out the window. "You ok?"
"Yeah, we're fine," Justin replied, stroking the little boy's head softly. "It's ok. Thanks."
The man nodded and drove away, rolling up his window.
"Hey, little man," Justin said, looking into the little boy's face. "What were you doing out in the middle of the street like that?"
"Balloons!" the little boy replied, pointing across the street at a bunch of brightly colored helium balloons floating near the entrance of a store.
Justin smiled. "You like balloons, huh?"
"Yep, I'm gonna be a clown!" he told Justin proudly, smiling a mile wide.
"A clown? Really?"
"Oh my God, Cole, what were you thinking?!"
Justin turned his eyes to a frantic-looking woman running up to him faster than a six-year-old after an ice cream truck.
"What were you doing?"
"Balloons!" he replied happily, pointing to the balloons.
She stopped in front of the two. "Balloons??? You were . . ."
"Whoa, hold on. It's ok. He's all right," Justin said quietly.
She turned fiery cerulean blue eyes up to his, a shocked expression resting on her features as if she had just realized he was standing there, holding her son. She looked to be young, maybe late teens or early twenties. She had light auburn hair, which was pulled back in a long ponytail at the moment, displaying her five earrings, two in each ear plus a cartilage ring in her left. His eyes stopped on the loop in her left eyebrow, sliding down her face slowly to rest on her pink lips.
"Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "Thank you so mu . . ." She stopped, looking at the two innocent faces in front of her. One belonged to the sandy blonde-haired, blue-eyed features of her son, and the other to this tall, masculine curly-haired, blue-eyed man.
Justin's arms were wrapped around the boy's body protectively and their cheeks brushed together as they both looked at her, their matching blue eyes wide.
"I just . . ." she tried again.
Justin's lips started to curl into a soft smile and he waited for her to figure out what she wanted to say.
She shook her head sharply, tearing her eyes away from his. "I'm sorry," she said, reaching for her son. "He should know better than to run off like that. Thank you." She lifted him into her arms, kissing his cheek lightly.
"Is he yours?" Justin asked quietly, his hands dropping to his sides.
She turned her eyes back to look at him, a hint of hurt flashing through them. "Yes. Yes, he's mine."
"How old is he?"
She fought back a smile. "He's three."
"And his name's Cole?"
She nodded.
"And you wanna be a clown, right, little man?" Justin asked, smiling at Cole.
The little boy nodded enthusiastically. "With big feet and a red nose!" he yelled, his arms flying into the air.
Justin laughed. The first real laugh he'd let out in a long time.
"Can I take you to breakfast?" he asked, directing the question to the boy's mother.
She hesitated. "I don't . . ."
"Please?" he interrupted. "My name's Justin." He held his hand out to her.
Again, she hesitated, then smiled and shifted Cole against her hip and stuck her hand out to shake his gently. "Storm," she replied.
"Go to breakfast with me, Storm?" he requested, giving her the best sad face he possibly could. "I mean, it's the least you can do . . ." He nodded towards Cole.
"Mama, let's go! B-fast! B-fast!"
Storm laughed, looking at her son. She looked back to Justin.
"Please?"
"Pwease?!"
She nodded. "Yeah, ok, breakfast."
Justin smiled. "Good."
Storm cleared her throat and smoothed her shirt softly. Cole was too busy plucking the little marshmallows out of his Lucky Charms to pay any attention to what the "adults" were saying.
"I was raped three years ago," she said simply. "Cole came out of that."
Justin was stunned and ceased to move for a moment.
"Mommy! More marshmallows!" Cole yelled, banging his spoon on the bowl impatiently.
Storm smiled sadly and opened another little box of Lucky Charms, sorting the marshmallows from the other stuff and put a handful of them into his bowl.
"Yay!" Cole exclaimed, his blue eyes brightening as they fell upon the jackpot he had just received.
Storm turned her attention back to the other blue-eyed creature in front of her who had snapped out of his shock and had taken another sip of his orange juice.
"Raped? Do you want to talk about it?"
She shook her head, sighing and wiping marshmallow residue on her jeans. "Some other time," she said.
"So you're implying there will be another time?" he asked quietly, allowing a smile to surge across his face.
She looked at him, not able to contain the smile radiating from her own lips and laughed softly. "Well, I don't know. Maybe."
"Maybe means yes." Justin knew how to turn up his charm when he spotted a prospective conquest. He was attracted to Storm, but wanted nothing from her other than maybe a couple of hours in bed, if that much time. He had never slept with a woman who had given birth before. He decided it should be a new experience.
She shook her head, a smile invading her lips. She was obviously flattered. "Maybe means maybe."
"As you wish," he whispered.
Sometimes Justin was in the mood to have sex with someone. Granted, it was a rare occasion, but when he spotted something new, he was one to go after it. If only to have something new go on in his life other than the usual humdrum waitress, stripper, cheerleader, or slut on the street. He'd had plenty of those. He didn't want those. And so he was turning to this woman.
Storm.
Such a sinister name, yet he knew she couldn't be. From the moment he'd seen her, he knew this was one of the people he actually would take the slightest amount of pleasure in getting into bed. This one he would have to do himself. She wouldn't pull him out back and rip his clothes off in the alleyway, he'd have to do the work. That meant full-blast charm, a rose, a date or two and candles. He knew the equation quite well. And he could tell she was looking for someone, as well. He could tell a lot about her, but he didn't like to think on that.
Storm shouldn’t be hard to entice into his bed, but he was quite sure she wouldn't be lying there that afternoon. This was going to take a little while. And he needed something to occupy some of his time.
He knew he would tire of her after a short time. Most likely by the end of the week he'd be ready to toss her out and he would go pick up Jackie and they'd talk about it. Then he'd go see his therapist and she'd tell him it was repressed anger or some kind of bullshit, then fuck his brains out.
Of course, he'd never tell Calisto. He was beyond sure she couldn't help him anyway. She wouldn't help him. She didn't care enough.
"So when am I going to see you again?" Justin asked after the waitress came by and took away their plates, giving Justin that look he attracted way too often. The "I'd bang you in five seconds" look. He shrugged it off and concentrated on the auburn-haired woman in front of him.
She shrugged. "That's up to you."
"How's tonight sound?"
She laughed. "I work tonight."
"Where do you work? I'll come see you."
"You just don't give up, do you?"
Justin shook his head, sitting back in his seat. "No, I don't. Not when I spot the woman of my dreams on the street corner." He almost winced. He knew he was being sleazy, but he didn't care. He needed this to move along quickly.
"I work at a club,” she said, ignoring his last statement. “'Stretch Island'. Do you know it?"
Justin nodded. "I know it. What time do you start?"
"Eight."
"Then I'll see you at eight."
She smiled. "I'd imagine you will."
With that, Justin rose and left the table after a smile and brush of his fist under Cole's chin, making him laugh and wave in parting.
He took a deep breath of fresh air as he left the restaurant, stretching slightly. He checked his watch. He was about to be late for his appointment with Jasmine. He sighed. How soon was it till eight?
"Why?"
Jasmine was attempting her bullshit act of caring what it was he was saying as he lay there on the sofa, counting the tiles in the ceiling.
"Because I want to fuck her. And even if I didn't, you would still say that's what I wanted with her, so there you have it."
Jasmine nodded, jotting something down onto her paper. She did that less and less frequently lately. "You're making progress."
Justin fought not to scowl. He swung his legs over the side of the couch, wanting this meeting to be over. He threw a seductive look onto his face.
"Is it time for the physical therapy?" he asked, cursing inwardly.
She began to unbutton her blouse. "It's getting to that time."
It always was.
Next Chapter
The Justin Files Chapter Directory
Jones' Main Page
Home
Email the Author: Jones