Trading with the Boys

SERENA

“You’re not going to believe this Nate, but I forgot my wallet at home.”

I stood at the top of the oversized steps, with three other people waiting behind me. Not having the fare wasn’t just embarrassing, it was inconvenient. Luckily my favorite bus driver took pity on me.

“I got you today, pretty lady,” the old man winked. His smile was warm, his stark white mustache spreading against his dark skin as he jerked his chin over his shoulder. “Go on.”

Gratefully I squeezed his shoulder, then took my seat. I should probably buy a monthly pass to save money. Then again a monthly pass cost money up front, which I rarely had.

Which you never have, the little voice in my head corrected me.

Eventually there was the hiss of hydraulics and a jerk of movement. The thirty or so people beside me all lurched backward at once, as the bus left the curb and took off into the street. I had a fifteen-minute ride to the restaurant, followed by a ten-hour shift. I’d take an Uber home as usual, because by then the busses would no longer be running.

This is not cost effective, Serena.

No, it certainly wasn’t. Then again, at least I wasn’t buying gas or paying for car insurance. In the end it almost evened out, all things considered. But not having collision — and then subsequently getting collided — turned out to really put a damper on your freedom to run errands.

I thought back to the accident, where I’d been T-boned by some moron running a stop sign. Luckily I got off with a few weeks’ worth of a sore neck and back, but my cute little RAV4 took a fatal hit. With its frame bent beyond fixing, the car was totaled and the guy who hit me wasn’t even insured. That left me busing it for a few weeks, at least until I saved enough money for a semi-reliable junker.

Then again, that was five whole months ago.

I shook my head as we made the next stop. I really should have a car by now. Each paycheck I’d been throwing some cash into the coffee can under the sink, but I’d been taking some out, too. And by some, I mean most of it. And by taking it out, I mean paying bills with it… and even then, not paying all of them.

“Miss?”

I shifted my ass to the window seat as the man standing over me took mine. I’d seen him before. He was big enough that his elbow would be touching me the whole ride, whether I liked it or not. And in the end, there wasn’t much to like about a strange elbow in your ribs.

Skip the gas bill this month, the voice in my head murmured. Water too. Gotta pay the electric, though.

The bus turned left, jerking us collectively right as I began my weekly juggling act of which bills to eliminate, which to pay the bare minimum, and which to outright ignore. It wasn’t a fun game. It was a necessary game though, if I wanted to continue living beneath the semi-leaky roof of the house I’d owned since Eric carried me over the threshold nearly eight years ago. Or to be more accurate, the house I solely owned once the divorce papers arrived from his lawyer complete with his signature, all the way from Italy.

Piss off, Eric.

Getting married at twenty-four might’ve been a little too young, but doing it after an intense, six-month courtship turned out to be a colossal mistake. I’d inherited a fifteen-year old stepson who barely knew me, and who was more interested in his own life than in anything to do with mine. Not that I could blame him at that age. It just didn’t leave much room for common ground, or bonding over anything.

That left me alone with my newlywed husband. An older man — no, a mature man is how I put it at the time — who I was convinced would love and take care of me. Eric was thirty-five, already divorced, and more focused on his job than anything else. I didn’t realize back then, until he started spending more and more time away, that it was a job that would always come first… leaving David and I tied for a distant second.

“Do you have any gum?”

I shook out of my trance and shook my head at the man with the sharp elbows. Sighing in disappointment, he turned back to the task of scrolling through his phone.

Yeah, the bus sucks.

Getting a car, I decided, would become my new priority. I’d cut a lot of corners so far, but there were few left I could work on. For example, I could skip getting my nails done and start doing them myself again. And now that I’d let go of the landscaper, it was just a little bit more I could save each week.

The landscaper…

Man, I’d been thinking about him a lot! More than I should’ve actually. Aside from the images I’d tucked away of his perfect body all covered in glistening sweat, I kept recalling our little encounter over and over in my mind.

Was he flirting with me? He had to be. Even worse, was I flirting with him?

Ahem…

I rolled my eyes as the little voice in my head cleared its invisible throat.

He grew up with your son, remember?

Stepson. Not son. Stepson.