Oh, think twice, it's just another day
For you, you and me in paradise
Just think about it

They bummed around the south side for hours. One large group of eight, with Phee and JC in the middle, walked from the Pizza Hut to a nearby park and from there to a mall and another hangout spot near downtown. At sunset, they bought hot dogs and sodas from the convenience store and headed back to toward the hotel where Phee worked, to catch the bus back uptown. The group waited to see them off, making sure she and JC got on the bus before heading back to their part of town.

JC was tired. No, exhausted. But full and relaxed and happy with how the day had turned out. He’d had fun for the first time in more than a year, and that felt good.

He had learned so much about Phee—or Nix as her friends called her. She liked Kung Fu movies. She loved pizza. She could drink any guy under the table but hadn’t had much to drink since Davey died. She was fiercely loyal and passionate about people. She saw people that needed help and sacrificed things she needed to make sure they were taken care of. She blushed, often, as the guys told story after story of how she helped Cass feed her kids or paid the fee for Jamal to take the test for his GED so he could get a job.

JC was impressed with her. But scared of her, too.

He thought back to his experience with Colin in the bathroom, about Phee taking on people as projects. He didn’t see himself as a project. He didn’t want to be “taken on”. He wasn’t sure how to make that plain without hurting her feelings. And he definitely didn’t want anything to do with replacing Davey.

JC was deep in thought as the bus rocked and rumbled across town. She let him have the window seat and he fell asleep with his forehead against the cool plastic. He felt like he’d just closed his eyes for a few minutes when he was being shaken awake.

“C’mon. This is my stop.”

He jerked awake and grabbed his backpack and followed her off of the bus. The night air was chilly and a light wind was blowing, making it even colder. He hoped that Phee wouldn’t let him leave that night. He had no idea where he would sleep if she did.

She dug through her bag and pulled out a cigarette and lit it, sucking down a lungful of nicotine and blowing it out in front of them. “That went well. My friends seemed to like you.”

“Yeah. They’re cool guys. They like you, too.”

She smiled up at him. “Yeah. I inherited them from Davey. They were his crew for a long time.”

“They all seem older than you. By a lot.”

“They are. Davey was four years older than me. I met him when I was sixteen. He was twenty. My parents fucking freaked.”

“I know why, and you do, too. You know exactly what a twenty year old wants with a sixteen year old.”

“It wasn’t even like that, at first. We just hung out. I loved that he read. He was smart. Philosophical. Nothing like the dumbasses I went to school with. I was already way more mature than boys my age.”

“Most girls are more mature than boys their age.”

“Yeah, well. I skipped a grade, graduated at seventeen. I was supposed to go to a fancy college.”

She herded him around a corner to State Street. “They were going to force me. I heard my parents planning it. They were going to just shove me in the car and drive me to some school and leave me there and said eventually I’d get over it. I left that night. Found Davey, he invited me to bum around with him. Been together ever since.”

“So you’re young.”

“Turning twenty-five, soon.” JC was surprised. She seemed older than that. “Why, how old are you?”

He laughed, not really wanting to reveal his age. “Older than that.”

“Duh. How much older? Five years? Seriously.”

“Try almost ten.”

“Shut up. You’re over thirty?”

Phee flicked the ash off of the end of her cigarette and ground it out in the sidewalk, then pulled out her key and unlocked the door. It was dark and chilly inside, so she flipped on a light and headed straight for the temperature control. The heater hissed as it came on. She shed her coat and flopped down onto the mattress.

JC lingered near the door, still in his coat and still wearing his backpack.  

“So are you leaving?”

He shrugged, not really answering but not moving to leave. Phee snorted a laugh.

“Take that shit off. Make yourself at home. And dig through that box over there.” She gestured in the direction of the box that he’d slid back under the table earlier. “Take anything you think will fit. It’s not doing anything but gathering dust.”

He obeyed, happily unzipping his coat and dumping his backpack near the door. He kneeled in front of the box again and began digging through it, mindful that he couldn’t take everything, but anything that could keep him warm in frigid weather, he should take advantage of. He picked out all of the long sleeved shirts and good pairs of jeans, also a cap and a scarf. It was black with glitter sparkles and fringe on the ends. It was a bit mangy, but made of wool and it would match the coat and hat.

Phee smiled as he folded it in half and then in half again and placed it inside the larger backpack. “Aw, I remember that scarf.”

He paused, his eyes flicking up toward hers. She wasn’t going to cry, again, was she?

“We were at Goodwill, just trying to stretch some money and get some warm stuff. The scarf was draped around a mannequin. He loved it on sight. It didn’t have a price tag on it, so he just wrapped it around his neck, tucked the ends into his jacket and kept shopping. We bought a bunch of stuff, and we were on the bus, on the way back to this spot where we were squatting, and he unzipped his coat and I started laughing. He looked down and turned pasty white. He didn’t steal that often but if he did, he stole food, not clothes. He was mortified. I thought it was funny. He wore it every single day.”

She went silent then. JC didn’t push, but he did quietly put the clothes away and push the box back under the desk. Then he crawled the few feet across the room to the mattress and sat next to her, his back against the wall.

“So, what do you? At your job?”

“Whatever they tell me to,” she said, with a wry half grin. “I work in what they call Hospitality Services. I do everything from work the front desk to clean rooms to walk dogs to deliver laundry and fold towels. Like I said, whatever they want me to do.”

“Cool. You like it?”

She bobbed her head from side to side, lips pursed in thought. Finally, she said, “It’s a job. It pays enough to keep me fed and clothed and in this glorious living space.” She arched her hand across the room and laughed. “I guess it’s okay. It’s better than pan handling. I hate begging. And I hate my friends having to beg.”

“Yeah. Seems degrading. Even more degrading, I mean.”

“Ever tried it?”

He shook his head.

“It sucks.” She sighed and rolled her eyes up to him. “Do you miss working?”

He pondered her question for a few minutes. Technically he still worked. Sometimes he’d wash dishes at a shelter for meals and a bed for a few days. And once every few weeks he got picked for a day job, shoveling out a barn or picking up construction debris. He took work when it came and wasn’t picky as long as it paid cash.

“I miss having money. I miss not having to worry about what I’m eating or how to get somewhere. I miss not worrying about getting sick and not having healthcare. I miss having fun like we did today.”

“You miss the benefits of affluence, then.”

“Not necessarily affluence. Even when I was on my own, I wasn’t living the rich life. I was still just barely making it.”

He sighed, suddenly tired. His reality hit and it hurt. He’d felt so normal all day, but talking about how he’d ended up homeless reminded him that he wasn’t.

“That’s how I ended up out there. Did you know just about every working person is one lost paycheck away from being homeless? Luck of the draw, it happened to me.”

“What happened to you?”  Phee turned so she was facing him, her shoulder against the wall. Her hair fell alongside her face and in the dim light of the lamp behind him she looked kind of pretty.

Fuck no, dude. Remember your little confrontation in the bathroom. Don’t even think about it.

“Uhm... okay. So you know how stocks go up and down, right? Long-term playing the stock market is leaving your investments where they sit for a long time, like years. What I did was more day-to-day. If say, paper plates are up today, sell. If they’re down today, buy. Tomorrow if they go up again, sell. And you basically net out your profit by buying low and selling high. I managed portfolios and advised people based on the price of a stock.”

She nodded, paying rapt attention.

“For awhile, it was cool. I was doing great. I made some money, so I decided to get my friends and family into it. I make a commission off of their profit, so the more they make, the more I make. Anyway, I got us into the bottom floor of this boom of a stock. Small but promising tech company on the edge of a merger with another larger company. It was only going to go up, and if you sell before it peaks, you can make some serious cash. So, I talked everyone into buying in and we waited for the deal to happen.”

JC paused, not so much for dramatic effect, but because this part was hard to admit. He still hadn’t really come to grips with the magnitude of his failure. He hadn’t even really told the complete story to anyone before and hadn’t intended to, but something about her made him feel safe. She made him feel like he could open up and shrug a little of the weight off of his shoulders.

“Of course, the deal falls through. Then, the company fails. I thought I was doing something good for everyone. It wasn’t good for anybody. My girlfriend dumped me because she and her parents lost about ten grand. My friends lost quite a bit of money, too. I got fired because all my clients were leaving. The ones that weren’t my friends were filing complaints, threatening lawsuits.”

He uncrossed his legs and drew his knees up to his chin, balancing an elbow on each knee. He stared at the wall, but wasn’t really looking at the wall. His mind was in the past, reliving the same nightmare over and over.

“My parents lost their house. They were hoping a little extra cash could catch them up, but it never came.  A couple of my buddies went into debt, thinking this stock was gonna boom.  I couldn’t get another job because the economy was so shitty and oh, I lost my last job because I put a lot of people in the poor house.

“I lost my place. Then I lost my car, which I was living in for awhile. And then I was couch-surfing for a little bit, working day labor but instead of saving the money, I was drinking. Doing pot, a little bit of harder stuff but pot was cheap. I was drunk and depressed every night. I was a loser and everybody hated me. I had nowhere to go.

“One night, I got so drunk. My buddy’s wife… I was so fucking sick and tired of her mouth.”  He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes. He wished he couldn’t remember, but behind his eyelids, the images were vivid.  It was like watching a movie.

“She said I was a fuckup. And that he should put me out on the street, just like… just like I did my parents. Like I did it on purpose. Like I put my parents into a one bedroom apartment on the shitty side of town on purpose.  She pissed me off, talking about my folks, so I picked up a six foot tall plant and threw it through the front window. Pot and all.”

“Seriously? You?”

His head bobbed forward, both in confirmation and embarrassment. “Seriously. Me. She called the police, I got hauled into jail and while I was there, she dropped off my stuff and said she never wanted to see my sack of shit face ever again. And you know what?”

He rolled his head toward her, pausing in his story. She hung on every word, her eyes open wide. “I have never seen her, ever again. I got out of jail and started walking.”

“Where’d you go, that first night?”

He shook his head. “I just walked. Tried to call a couple of friends but no one was around. I walked until I couldn’t walk anymore and found a spot, like behind a house in the woods or something and laid down. Slept like a baby, that first night. The next night I hitched back to town, hit a shelter. I think I thought it would be easy. Fun. Like an adventure. I just wanted to disappear.”

“I could never get used to the shelter. It never felt comfortable to me.”

“Exactly. A crash course in what it’s really like to not have a dollar to your name, no one rooting for you and no place to go.”

“But you made it through,” she said with a smile, landing a light punch on his arm.

He smiled in return. “If you want to get all inspirational about it. I’m making it. And I’m thankful that someone wanted to help me. On a night like tonight, I’d be freezing my balls off.”

“And instead you’re talking them off.” She giggled and rolled herself to the edge of the mattress. “I work at 7o’clock tomorrow, so I’m going to start winding down. Don’t feel obligated to go to sleep or anything, though.”

He got up and grabbed his backpack and pulled out the book he took from her stack earlier. “I’ll get up with you and head out. Back to work, I hope.”

She disappeared into the bathroom, and in a few minutes, he heard the hot water squealing through the pipes. Then just as suddenly, the squealing stopped and minutes later, she emerged from the steamy room, wrapped in a towel and glistening. Her long dark hair hung straight down her back and since she was only covered with a towel, he got a good look at her. A real good look.

No. Dude, you wanna die?

“I saved you some hot water. And considering how your eyes fell out of your head this morning when I took my pants off, you should go take your shower now, because I’m about to get naked.”

He smirked and lowered the book but didn’t move. She huffed, rolling her eyes.

“Seriously. Get out!”

He laughed a deep, chesty guffaw that he hadn’t heard from himself in a long time, and heaved himself up from the mattress. She’d left a towel for him and a fresh bar of soap from the hotel. He picked it up and smiled at it. I’ve got you covered. She must have a stash somewhere, he decided.

He showered with the fresh smelling soap, dried himself with the towel she’d left and donned the sweats and t-shirt he’d worn the night before. A shower and a warm place to sleep two nights in a row were unheard of for him.

Don’t get used to this. You’ll start using her and you can’t do that.

She was in the bed, unfortunately—or fortunately, he could see it both ways— dressed in a t-shirt and sweats like him. All she had on the mattress was a sleeping bag and a few thin blankets. She needed all of the layers she could find. He slid into bed next to her, careful not to take up too much room. Not that it mattered, because she scooted up against his back as soon as he rolled over.

*****

JC walked Phee to the bus stop the next morning and sat with her until the bus came. She looked cute in her polyester slacks and white shirt and jacket with the emblem on the front pocket. She pulled her hair back into a tight bun and put a pearl earring into each ear. She didn't wear makeup, but didn't need it. Her skin was creamy and clear, her eyes bright. JC was suddenly struck by what Davey or Colin or pretty much anyone must have seen in her. He understood Colin's reaction to someone new sniffing around. He didn't want anyone to fuck her over, either.

When the Number 34 came and carried Phee away, JC headed back to State Street, back past the Golden Lantern. They hadn't had time for breakfast and though she offered, JC didn't want to make her late. He could take his time and walk and get some breakfast at his leisure. Now, as he strolled in under the bright lights of the main room at House of Hope, he looked around to see what options lay before him.

House of Hope was his favorite shelter for breakfast. They set their food out buffet style, so he could grab a plate and serve himself so long as he didn't take too much. He didn't like the idea of being served. Being able to choose his own food and load up his own plate gave him back some dignity.

Today, the selection was the same as it was most mornings: a choice of meats—ham, sausage or bacon; fried eggs; a bagel, hash browns or toast; oatmeal if he felt like having something hot; or cold cereal like plain cheerios or corn flakes and milk. The guys that slept late and straggled in around 9 or even 10am had to pick over what was left from the early risers. Most of them made do with cereal and milk or a piece of fruit.

JC picked up a paper plate from the stack at one end of the table and made his way down the line, picking various things and trying not to be greedy. A few slices of bacon, some eggs, a piece of toast, a banana and coffee were all he needed to get through the morning. He carted his plate and cup to a table far away from the other early risers. He only paid attention to them long enough to nod and acknowledge them. Politeness went a long way but he never made much of an effort to sit and talk to people.

He ate quickly, for no reason. Just a habit, since most shelters tried to turn over participants several times an hour. He couldn't just sit there for two or three hours. Besides, he needed to get in the line for work.

As soon as he'd swallowed the last bite of egg, bacon, and toast and gulped down the last swallow of coffee, he rose from the table and dumped his garbage in the bin near the door. He lifted a hand to wave to Moe, who was in charge of food distribution. Moe had been homeless for years before he made it back on his feet again. Now he had a job helping other people. He and JC talked off and on about Moe helping him to do the same. He just wasn't sure he was ready for all of that quite yet.

The area where men gathered and waited to be picked up for work was just a few blocks away. In his new coat, hat, scarf and jeans, he felt like a new man. He walked on air, or at least it seemed he did, and had a hard time keeping a smile from his lips. The day before had been a good day. He hoped the goodness would linger and spill over into this day, too.

There weren't many men waiting for work yet, but a truck was already parked at the corner. JC rushed the block and a half to the line and approached a man shorter than he with a stocky build and a bald head. He wore a dark blue company shirt, untucked and unbuttoned with a white t-shirt under it that stretched across his chest, leaving no imagination to the detail underneath. 

JC chewed on his bottom lip, wiggling his toes inside his sneakers, hoping the fact that he didn't have boots wouldn't eliminate him from selection.

"What're you looking for, today?"

The man looked up from a list he appeared to be studying and eyed JC up and down. "Depends on who we find. You looking to work?"

"Yes, sir. Ready to go, right now."

He stepped back, taking another look and frowned at JC’s shoes. "Those won't work. Might have a pair of boots for you at the site, though. What size you wear?"

"Ten. But I'll wear whatever you give me. I'll make it work."

He studied JC some more, twisting his mouth to the side. Then he grunted and waived toward the truck with his clipboard. "Give your name to Doug when you get in the truck."

His heart leapt at the words and he wasted no time in getting to the truck with Jefferson Construction emblazoned along the side. He stopped at the front seat and gave his name to the driver, making sure he wrote it down correctly. “Chasez. That’s chase with a z.”

Once he was sure that he was on the payroll for the day, he slipped his backpack off of his back, climbed into the truck and took a seat near a window, the bag nestled between his legs. A few minutes later, two other men joined him, the burly man with the clip board climbed in and they took off.

"You ever work for these guys?" The guy next to him leaned over and muttered his question under his breath.

"Not this company,” JC answered, keeping his voice low. “I've done some construction stuff before, though. You’ll work your ass off, but it's good pay."

The man nodded as if that was the answer he was looking for. He sat up again and stared straight ahead during the twenty minute drive. They pulled over between two other trucks with the Jefferson Construction logo on the side. Just past the line of trucks was a half-built steel structure and about a hundred men milling about, trampling through dirt and gravel. 

JC grabbed his bag and piled out, waiting for the standard orientation, safety reminders and details about the day. Doug, the driver, gave everyone the rundown.

“The work day starts at 8am, no later. Ends at 4:30, no earlier.” He handed an orange ticket to each of them. JC glanced at it. It just said LUNCH, printed in bold black letters. “Do not lose this ticket. If you lose this ticket, you get no food. Lunch is from 12:30 to 1:30. Listen for the whistle and follow everybody’s lead to the truck.” He bobbed his head toward an empty spot where, JC guessed, a food truck would later sit. He was already looking forward to it.

“You get two breaks, fifteen minutes, no longer. Let your Crew Leader know when you’re taking your break. You don’t get paid unless you work the full day. Full day pays $75. Understood?”

All three men nodded. JC shuffled from foot to foot, eager to get started. $75 was a lot of money for a man in his position.

“You,” said the shorter man, pointing at JC. “Follow me. You’ll need some steel toes. Doug, get these guys some gloves and hardhats.”

JC followed him up a dirt path to a trailer. Inside, in place of couches and chairs and tables, was a makeshift office outfitted with desks and phones, filing cabinets and office machines. There was a small kitchen, a bathroom and other rooms down a dark hallway. The man disappeared into a back room and came back with a pair of brown boots. The leather was thin and faded in places, but the laces were new and so was the sole.

He handed the pair to JC. “Some of the guys donate their old boots when they get a new pair. We’ve got a shop that rehabs them for us. Try ‘em.”

JC took a seat in one of the office chairs and pulled off his tattered Converse sneakers. He pulled on one boot and then the other, laced them up tight and then stood, walking from one end of the cramped space to the other. The insoles were cushioned, the sides sturdy. They looked old and worn but they felt like brand new shoes. 

“These will work. They feel good.”

“Great,” said the man. “Keep them. You’ll need them. Be out tomorrow morning, same time.” He raised a brow and aimed a pointed stare in JC’s direction. “You understand?”

Tomorrow was Saturday. Weekends paid extra. JC heard him loud and clear. By the end of the week, he’d have money in his pocket. Today was shaping up to be a good day, too. Maybe Phee really was an angel. Or a good luck charm, at the least.

“Leave your coat and bag up here. Come pick it up on your way off-site.” The man stuck out a hand, which JC shook fervently. “Name’s Jeff. You don’t seem like you belong in that line on the corner. I figured you for the desk job kind. How’s a guy like you end up here?”

That was a loaded question, one JC didn’t have the time or desire to answer. “Tough times, I guess,” he said instead.

“Yeah, everywhere.” He rubbed a patch of hair beneath his bottom lip and heaved a tired sigh. “We’re trying to finish this shopping center before the developer runs out of money. It’s a race against the clock lately, and we’re not winning. Time and money are running out and they wonder why the work seems shoddy? They’re rushing us through the job.”

Jeff’s blue eyes rolled toward the ceiling before he headed for the door again, grumbling to himself. JC followed him back down the path to the construction site, where men and machines were crawling around like ants in dirt.

“I didn’t catch your name, son.”

“Everybody calls me JC.”

“JC, then. You make sure to do a good job, today. And I meant what I said about tomorrow morning.”

“Yes, sir,” JC answered.

Jeff veered off to the right, where a group of men had gathered. The giant claw of a yellow crane dangled above them. Around the site, everyone wore jeans, t-shirts, boots and a hardhat. Everyone looked the same. No one could tell, looking at JC, that he was any different from any of the other men on the crew. As soon as the whistle sounded to indicate the start of the work day, the men from the corner were officially on the clock. Working men, just like anyone else.

Normal never felt so good.

His assignment for the first half of the day was cleanup. He followed several crews around picking up scraps of wood, metal and drywall, dumping them into a wheelbarrow until it was full. Then he’d wheel his pile to another larger pile offsite and dump it there and repeat all morning. Later, a large crane would scoop up the debris from the larger pile and cart it away. It was JC’s job to feed the crane.

By noon, his muscles ached. JC took off his hardhat and ran his fingers through the sweaty mop of curls, then wiped his forehead on the sleeve of his t-shirt. He’d long since removed his sweatshirt. It was tied around his waist. Breakfast had burned off by 10am. He was starving, so hungry his stomach rumbled and growled and twisted like there was a tiny being inside him. The lunch whistle finally brought relief.

He stepped in line at the food truck, which had pulled up about an hour before and teased the crew with the scent of hot dogs, hamburgers and barbeque pork. By chance, he just happened to get behind Jeff, who nodded at him while wiping his forehead with the bottom of his t-shirt. Once stark white, it was now caked with dust and dirt.

“Good day, so far?”

“Real good,” JC said. “Ready to eat, though. Then I’m back at it.”

“Good to hear. Eat up, and then come find me up at the office. You’ll work with me the rest of today.”

JC wondered what that meant. Since Jeff was the one who’d told him to show up the next day to volunteer, he hoped it meant something good.

Lunch was a hearty pulled pork sandwich on a generous bun, potato salad and baked beans on the side and two chocolate chip cookies. He balanced his plate on the palm of one hand while the other poked through a cooler of ice to pull out a can of Pepsi, something he never got to have anymore.  He picked up a plastic knife, fork, spoon and napkin, conveniently packed in a wrapper and walked past the food truck in search of a place to sit and eat.

There were no tables, no chairs, no benches, only dirt and concrete. The crew didn’t seem to mind—they were already dirty. JC followed suit, settling on a patch of pavement with his plate and digging in with two-fisted vigor, attacking the potato salad and beans with his fork while holding his sandwich in the other hand. Every few bites, he dropped the fork to suck down a few gulps of Pepsi.

He could get used to this.

His plate was empty, practically licked clean. He honestly could have gone for another helping but he only had one lunch ticket, so he took his empty plate and nearly empty can of soda to the trash bin near the food truck. The bin was overflowing with paper plates and plastic forks. JC tossed his plate onto the stack, tipped the can of Pepsi into his mouth until it was empty, and tossed that into the bin as well. He stepped back, rubbed his belly and let out a belch. Satisfied.

As instructed, he followed the dirt path back to the trailer, where he found Jeff sitting at a desk. Rather, lounging at a desk. His chair was tipped back, his booted feet resting on the desktop next to his empty plate and bright yellow hardhat. He held a can of Coke aloft as he laughed loudly. At a desk across the room, a man sat in a collared shirt, a tie and slacks as if he’d accidentally ended up at a construction site and decided to stay.

“So, the construction worker leans over the table and the doc whacks him on the ass with a baseball bat, then sends him into the bathroom. He comes out a few minutes later and says, Doc, I feel great. What did you do?  Doc says, Stop wiping with cement bags.”  He launched into a high pitched hyena laugh, pounding the faux wood desk top with his fist. Jeff was close to falling out of his chair.

JC closed the door behind him and halfway laughed along, just to not feel uncomfortable. The end of the joke was pretty funny, anyway. Jeff sat up, righting his chair and kicking his feet to the floor and set his can of Coke back down onto the desk.

“You finished your lunch already? You must be a hungry sonofabitch.”

JC nodded, not sure if he should laugh. Was Jeff was referring to his hard work that morning or his situation? “Worked up an appetite,” he said. “You said to come find you…”

“Right, right.” He checked his watch and frowned at it. “We’ve got about fifteen minutes before we need to head out. Pull up a chair, have a seat.” JC looked around for an empty chair. He pulled one out from behind an empty desk and sank into it, relaxing a little.

Jeff turned his attention back to the man at the desk across from him with the clean, fancy clothes and thumbed toward JC. “Philip over here is sharing his best construction worker jokes. Shoot us another one.”

JC joined in on the laughter and when it died down, sat through two more jokes before he started to get antsy. He was here to work. He should have felt privileged to have some down time while he waited for Jeff to show him where he’d be working that afternoon, but he was impatient. And bored. Philip wasn’t his friend and, frankly, neither was Jeff. He’d rather be working.

He leaned forward, staring at his hands clasped together in front of him. Little more than a year ago, he’d never imagined that those hands would do anything near what they were doing now. He was never mechanically inclined. He did not build things, not even when he was little. If his car needed work, he took it to a shop. If he needed something, say a dresser or a table, or a photo frame, it would never occur to him to put his hands to work and build it.

Jeff was right. He was an office job, desk job type of guy. He was Philip, in the white shirt and navy slacks and the tie with the clip and the snappy, preppy hair cut. Now he took whatever came to him. He did manual labor—washed dishes, swept floors, worked construction. He had to admit, now that it wasn’t beneath him, he really liked it.

“You ready for some more work, kid?”

Jeff was standing, clapping his hardhat onto his head. JC stood so quickly that the chair shot back and rolled into the metal desk behind him. He grabbed his hat and put it back on, raised a hand in greeting to Philip as they filed out of the trailer and followed Jeff back down the path to the line of trucks. They climbed into the same one JC had ridden in that morning.

The truck crawled over the uneven surface of the site at a snail’s pace, passing different phases of construction—pouring cement, pounding steel bars into the ground, measuring and cutting wood for walls and window openings, carting slabs of sheetrock across the site. It was like watching the evolution of a project from beginning to end.

“You ever paint?” Jeff was asking as he pulled over in front of a building on the other end of the site that looked nearly complete. It just needed windows.

“Not really. Not that I can’t. I just never have.”

“It’s not hard.”

They got out of the truck and walked into the building. There were large, empty squares where doors and windows should be. The sun beat into every square, shining patches of light into the space. The floor was covered with drop cloths, but JC could see patches of light brown stone tile underneath the cloths.

Jeff led the way through the building, past enormous rooms where crews of men were building, painting, constructing. They were loud, talking and laughing over the sound of machines and a radio that blared a familiar tune.  They stopped at a room with a crew of three men. The floor was still cement and the walls were bare.

“You’ll work with these guys today. We need sheetrock hung in here and in the four stores next to this one. Once they get it hung, we paint it. One coat of construction white.” He pointed to the painting supplies in the middle of the room—a bucket, a long handled paint roller, and an aluminum pan. “Doesn’t have to be DaVinci. Just give it a coat and move on. You’ll be doing this tomorrow, too.”

JC nodded, pulling on his gloves, removing his hardhat.

“I’ll be a few stores over, if you have any questions. This building has working restrooms and water fountains if you need them.”

JC jumped in to help carry a few pieces of sheetrock into the room and held them while they were nailed into place. Once a few walls were complete, he opened the five gallon bucket of paint and poured some into the pan. Then, starting at one end of the room and working his way around, he applied a coat of white paint to the plain grey surface.

4:30 came while he was in the middle of painting a wall in the second store. His crew dropped their tools, picked up their hardhats, jackets, and lunch pails and filed out of the room. JC opted to finish the wall he was painting, enjoying the silence. He was alone for the first time, that day. He missed silence and solitude.

“You work hard. I like that.” Jeff was standing outside the store, where the doors would be if they had been installed. “Dedicated to the finished product. Good work, but time to call it quits. You’ll miss your ride back to town.”

Reluctantly, he put down the long-handled paint roller, leaning it against the wall. He grabbed his hardhat and discarded sweatshirt, noting his hands. They were covered in drops of paint. Underneath the paint were splotches of dirt. He was dusty and pain splattered, head to toe, including his boots. He felt great about that.

Jeff drove him back to the main site where men were milling around, talking and laughing, striding toward cars and trucks parked at a lot across the street. JC found Doug, who was walking around the site with a stack of envelopes.

“Chasez. Been calling your name for ten minutes.” He shoved the envelope into JC’s hand and walked away. It was sealed, with his name printed in block letters on the front, the date beneath it. It was thick. He clutched the envelope in his hand and inwardly sighed with relief.

It was time to go back to the corner. Back to reality. He trudged the path back to the truck, dirty and sweaty but deliciously tired. If only he was heading home to take a shower, sit down to a nice meal and crack open a beer with some football in the background. He sighed at the thought and suddenly missed a lot about his old life. At least the day was good.

The drop-off was unceremonious. The truck slowed to a stop at the same corner where they’d been picked up earlier that day. All three men piled out and walked away, each man going in a different direction.  JC didn’t put his coat back on, but heaved the heavy bag onto his back and headed towards the gas station he always used to clean up. The owner was nice and didn’t have to let him use it, but didn’t give him a hard time about it when he did. Maybe he’d actually buy something today, to pay the guy back a little.

The envelope burned in his pocket. He pulled it out, opened it and counted eight bills—7 $10’s and a $5. He slipped most of the cash into a zippered pocket inside the bag, saving $5 to spend that night. He wanted to run the streets, flashing his money, spending it on random things he always thought he needed when he didn’t have any money to buy them. He couldn’t, though. He had to save it, because he never knew when he might need it. Life had to go on as normal, as if he didn’t have any money. Besides, the first hint he gave that he had cash would immediately invite an opportunity to have it taken from him.

He washed up in the restroom, doing his best to scrub the paint spatters from his skin and shampoo the sheetrock dust and dirt from his hair. He changed his clothes, cringing at the jeans. They were one of the newer pairs that he’d taken from the stash of Davey’s old clothes. He hadn’t meant to get them so dirty. These would have to become his work jeans, then. He’d wear them again the next day and then try to find a Laundromat and wash them, along with his socks caked with dirt and his shirt with a film of dust embedded into the fibers.

It was well past 5:00 by the time he got clean. He could probably find dinner somewhere, but he was too tired to deal with the lines and the lukewarm food. He walked into the gas station and picked out a hot dog, a bag of chips and a bottle of water.

“You’re paying for that.”

He didn’t realize the clerk was talking to him until he looked up and saw the line of people at the register, all turned around and staring at him. The clerk glared from his platform behind the register. His face was stone cold.

Slowly and deliberately, JC dug into his pocket and pulled out the crisp $5 bill, holding it up for everyone to see. All eyes went back to the clerk, to see what he would do or say next. “Whatever,” he mumbled, going back to ringing up items. “Probably stole that money from someone.”

“You don’t know that he stole it,” a lady said.

“And you don’t know he didn’t,” the clerk snapped. “Are you checking out, or not?”

She opened her mouth, JC hoped to say something unseemly, but was quieted when a door from the back room opened and a man JC recognized as the owner came out and climbed the two steps to the platform.

“What’s going on, out here? Who’re you yelling at?”

The clerk turned around and muttered something to the owner. He listened, his eyes flicking up toward JC and then to the woman who was standing in line fuming. He said something to the clerk, to which the clerk began to argue, forcing him to say it louder. “I said I don’t care! Do your job.”

Flustered, the clerk returned to his register. Slowly, robotically he began ringing up customers again. When it was JC’s turn, the clerk wouldn’t look at him or speak to him, except to tell him his total and announce his change. JC picked up his bag and walked out of the store.

He remembered now why he never went to stores anymore. Despite trying so hard to not look homeless, it must have been some kind of invisible overcoat he wore, that he couldn’t take off. He wondered if he’d ever be able to take it off.