The Way We Talk

She's fresh to death,
She'll be the death of you,
Seduction leads to destruction.

John sighed to himself as he made his way home from work in his run-down car, which was pretty much a mirrored, mechanical version of him right now: worn down and battered. He was happy his shift was over; all he wanted to do was go home, have a shower, eat and go to bed. He was physically drained. His job was too demanding, and didn’t pay half the amount he needed or wanted. In just over 12 hours he would be awake and out of the door for yet another hard, 11 hour shift. He turned the final corner of the street, his house in perfect view. He turned his car into the drive way of his house, parking up, grabbing his bag out of the car, locking up and heading into the house. He entered the house, closing the door behind him, placing his keys down in the key tray in the hall way. He hung his jacket up on the end of the banister rail, dragging his feet as he walked into the kitchen. He opened the fridge door, looking through the contents of his fridge: a half eaten block of cheese; some eggs, which had been there for some time; a packet of ham, surprisingly unopened; butter; tomatoes; a carton of milk and a half empty bottle of orange. He sighed, picking out the packet of ham, butter and cheese. He opted for making himself a cheese and ham sandwich, as he didn’t have a variety of much else. He made a mental note to himself to go shopping sometime that week. He took the bread out of the bread bin, taking out two pieces, buttering them and putting on the cheese and ham. He took himself off into the living room, flicking on the TV as he passed it, then sitting himself down on the couch, making himself comfortable and then tucking into his sorry excuse of a meal.

After finishing his ‘meal’, taking a shower and watching a few more hours of TV, he decided it was time he went for a nap. He decided he couldn’t really call it a sleep, because he’d only be getting five or six hours of sleep at the most. Undressing himself, he climbed into bed, setting his alarm before drifting off into a deep sleep.

He awoke the next morning, finding it rather odd how he’d woken before his alarm had gone off. He never did that, not since he’d been getting such little amounts of sleep. He turned himself around in bed, looking at the clock and freezing. The clock read 10:38am.
“Shit.” John cursed out loud, jumping out of bed, practically running around his room as he picking up pieces of clothing that were scattered around the room, not caring whether they were clean or dirty. He had to get to work soon and explain to his boss how he’d over slept. He checked himself over in the mirror quickly before he ran out of the door, messing his hair about a bit. He was into the whole ‘messy look’ so it didn’t bother John that his hair wasn’t perfectly preened and in place. After putting the key in the ignition, John waited for the car to start up. The car spluttered, then fired up after a few seconds. John rammed the car into gear, speeding his way out of his drive and he kept his foot to the floor almost all of the way to work. He arrived at his work place, jumping out of his car and running into the run-down restaurant that he called his place of employment. Stood behind the counter was his boss. He gave him a weak smile before walking over to him, putting up his hands in his own defence. His boss shook his head,

“John, I told you one more late and we’d have to let you go. I’m sorry, you’ve been late too many times in the past few weeks.” his boss said in an apologetic tone. John let his face fall,

“No, please! You don’t understand, it wasn’t my fault! My alarm didn’t go off again and-” he tried to explain, before his boss raised his hand, silencing John. He shrugged,

“Yes, I know, ‘your alarm didn’t go off’. We’ve heard it all before, John. I’m sorry. I’ll pay you your wages until the end of this month and then that’s it.” he replied, final. John bowed his head, nodding.

“Fine. Thank you, Mr. Jennings.” he said, before turning around and walking out of the restaurant and back over to his car. He got in slowly, starting up his car and driving off. He made a detour to the club that was down the road from his work, pardon, his ex-work place.

He parked up in the parking lot, getting out of his car and going in. He sat down on a stool at the bar, ordering his drink, paying the bar tender and remaining sat on the barstool. After a few minutes, he felt the presence of someone next to him. He looked up from his drink. There was a tall, skim blonde girl stood next to him. He carried on looking at her until she turned her head to face him. John smiled weakly. The girl smiled back, sitting down on the seat next to him.

“Hey, I’m Carla.” she said. John smiled,

“John O’Callaghan.”