Page 24 of A Series of Rooms
He was quiet for a long time. Jonah began to drift again, but he was pulled back to earth when Dominic said, “It might be nice to have some help.” Jonah twisted around so that he could look at him, his expression pinched. “With bills. Rent.” Jonah’s guilt must have shown on his face, because Dominic squeezed him around his middle. “You know I love having you. It would just help me out a little.”
Jonah’s stomach was splitting open. Maybe it was the pill. It had to be the pill. His body couldn’t really be pulled apart at the middle by the gnawing feeling inside of him.
“I could try,” he said quietly. Then, spurred by Dom’s easy affection, repeated it. “I could try.”
As if beckoned by his acquiescence, quiet as it was, another presence appeared at their side. His weight dipped the couch beside them, jostling Jonah’s body.
“He your boyfriend?” the man asked, little more than a shadow silhouetted in red.
Dominic’s hand came up to push away the sweat-damp hair from his forehead.
“Don’t be shy, Jonah. Say hello.”
“Hello.”
Liam was smiling when he opened the door. Jonah let out a breath. A cynical part of him had been expecting anyone else, preparing for the possibility that Liam had come to his senses and decided to leave his brief encounters with Jonah in the past. But there he was.
“Hi,” Jonah said.
Inside the room, the same stack of clothes Jonah had borrowed the week before were folded on the corner of the bed. On top of them were two paperback books, both worn and tattered at the edges. There was a takeout container on the dresser with a logo he didn’t recognize on the side. The smell made his empty stomach roll with hunger.
“I came straight from work,” Liam explained when he saw him looking. “We get a comped meal with every shift. I hope you like burgers.”
“And these?” Jonah asked, gesturing to the books.
Liam flushed, his pale skin making the color stand out. “Don’t feel obligated to read them,” he said. “I thought you might get bored of just watching TV and blaspheming our former religions all the time. I brought a couple of my favorites from home.”
Jonah picked up the thicker of the two novels, turning it over in his hands. He skimmed the synopsis on the back, thumbing over the glossy paperback. “Thank you,” he said.
“No problem.” There was a brief lapse before Liam cleared his throat. He turned, heaving a large backpack onto his designated bed. “I also wanted you to have something to do because I’m going to be pretty bogged down tonight.” He unloaded two textbooks and a notebook onto the bed. “School stuff,” he said, glancing up at him. “I have exams coming up, but I’ve been picking up so many extra shifts at the diner that I haven’t done any of the prep for them.”
A cold weight settled in Jonah’s chest. Overnight calls weren’t cheap, and the rooms couldn’t be either, even the more modest ones they found themselves in. Jonah didn’t know much about Liam’s financial situation, or about his life in general beyond the walls of these weekly hotel rooms, but it seemed like a fair assumption that the ‘extra shifts’ were going toward his visits with Jonah.
If Liam noticed his mood drop, he didn’t say anything. Instead, he settled into his bed and cracked open a textbook.
“I ate before I came, so feel free to dig in,” he said. “Or you can shower first, if you want. I’ll be here, suffering.”
Jonah looked at the box of food, then to the pile of clothes, opting for the latter. Suddenly, he didn’t have much of an appetite.
They had been working in silence for at least an hour—Jonah making headway on one of the novels and Liam scratching away at his notes—when a loudthunkstartled him. He looked over to see Liam had thrown his head back against the wooden headboard, hands over his face.
Jonah closed the book, using a finger to keep his place. From behind his hands, Liam said, “I’m dropping out of school.”
“Seems hasty,” Jonah said. “What are you working on?”
“Math. A required credit. No one would take this of their own volition.”
The ugly stab of jealousy snuck up on him before Jonah could quash it. It was easy enough, most of the time, to push away thoughts of what could have been. The image of an acceptance letter pinned to his fridge, his parents smiling.What-ifswere parasitic; they sucked your energy dry. Jonah had gotten good—better, at least—at rationing his mental energy and steering himself away from this kind of useless self-torment.
It was harder to do with Liam around.
At his age, Jonah should have been sleeping in a lofted dorm bed at whatever state school would take him, instead of bouncing between the prison of Shepard’s house and aseries of nondescript hotel rooms. He would have given anything to be drowning in homework, his largest concern an impending exam or a heavy course load. That was the way it was supposed to be. Those were the kind of stressors people his age were supposed to have.
But of the two people in the room, Liam was hardly the one at fault for that.
“What kind of math is it?” Jonah asked.
“Calculus,” Liam said. “Sorry, I won’t bore you with this. I was just complaining into the void. Don’t let me keep you from your book.”
