A Heart of Gold

”I really like that little drawer in the corner, I think I’ll take it. Plus this pair of earrings. My daughter will surely like them, she’s moving away for college so I thought I’d get her a little something.”

Payton looks at Mrs. Reynolds and smiles at her, picking up the small, about eight inches tall drawer from the table and carrying it to the register. Mrs. Reynolds is a petite woman in her forties, with light blonde hair and a love for old fashioned things. She is one of their regulars, stopping by almost every week to see what new merchandise has come in. “So, Sarah is already going to college? Time sure does fly,” Payton comments while scanning the price from the drawer and earrings, before starting to wrap them into neat packets on the counter behind the register.

“Tell me about that. Just a minute ago she was learning to walk. But I’m happy that she got into college, you never know what future might throw at you, and I think education is the best way to prepare yourself,” Mrs. Reynolds tells enthusiastically. She has two favorite subjects to talk about; her daughter Sarah and antique. Even though she may be tiring sometimes, Payton still likes to chat with her. She’s a cheerful person with a hearty laugh.

When Payton turns around and bends down to get a bag for the presents, he can feel the necklace he’s wearing coming out from underneath the neckline of his v-neck. It’s a heart-shaped, golden locket.

Mrs. Reynolds notices it too. She laughs and looks at Payton, smiling, “Oh, so you still have that necklace of yours? Shame you won’t sell it to anyone, it’s such a beautiful piece of jewelry.” Payton just chuckles slightly, shaking his head in agreement. “It’s too precious, isn’t it?”

More than they both know, or can even guess.

Mrs. Reynolds pays for her shopping, and after the door has closed behind her, Payton leans onto the counter, sighing. Almost automatically, his fingers find the locket around his neck and lift it closer for inspection.

It’s in a noticeably better condition now than when he found it. The golden surface glistens in its earned glory, and there aren’t any stains on it. There’s one thing he hasn’t been able to fix, though; there are small hinges on the other side of the heart, but to this day Payton hasn’t been able to get it open, no matter how many times he has tried. They just won’t budge.

He hasn’t forgotten the day almost a year ago when he found the locket. It had been one of those days when everything seems to go wrong. Firstly, he had found out his now ex-boyfriend had been cheating on him almost the entire time they had been together. Secondly, as if his mood hadn’t been bad enough, he had been told that someone had thought it would be a great idea to vandalize his parents’ gravestone. And to top it all off, he had tripped over a rock, landing onto the hard pavement.

So, Payton hadn’t been in the greatest mood when he had been floundering back to his feet, trying not to just cry out on the street. Then he had noticed that the keys to his apartment weren’t in his hand anymore; they must’ve fallen out when he had thrown his hands in front of him to try to soften the fall.

He had looked all around him, but to no avail; the only option where they might have gone to was a lidless dumpster a few feet away from him. Payton had almost lost his hope while digging through the grimy container, but finally he had found the keys.Though they hadn’t been the only thing he had found; tangled with his key chain, there had been a necklace. He had felt a sudden need to keep it, so after picking all the trash up, Payton had walked back home with his keys and the necklace safely inside his pocket. Oddly enough his mood had seemed to be lightening up. The necklace had had that kind of effect, making him feel strange, but in a good way.

Kind of like the way it felt to shake hands with that Becca’s new friend, Skylar.

Although it has been a couple of weeks from that night, Payton can still remember the touch of his hand; it had been firm, like he isn’t afraid of anything. There had been small tingles running up Payton’s arm, too. Skylar had talked and acted polite and confident, but somehow it hadn’t felt real. It seemed like the real him was inside a shell, and that is what makes it interesting. Payton wants to know what’s going on behind Skylar’s green eyes that shut everything inside. Payton puts the locket back inside his shirt. He wants to know the real Skylar.

Payton’s thoughts get interrupted when the door to the store opens and Becca’s head pops from behind it. She looks around for a second, notices Payton sitting behind the counter and comes rushing towards him. She slams her hands on the counter and stares at him. Payton looks at her curiously, but before he can manage to say anything, Becca beats him to it.

“What’s this Payton? You let the rest of us go home ‘cause there’s not that many customers anymore, and say you close the shop yourself. Well, it’s quite a lot of past five already, and you haven’t even started! You are supposed to come over for dinner, if you don’t happen to remember.”

He looks to the nearest clock and notices it actually is past five, almost quarter to six. On Saturdays they close at five, so Becca’s wonder is justifiable. “Sorry Becca, Mrs. Reynolds came here and when she left I kind of lost the track of time.” Payton shrugs apologetically. To make it up to her, he quickly jumps up, going through the store shutting down all the electric devises and grabs his jacket, putting it on. When he gets back to Becca, he asks, “So, what brings you here? I thought you’d be home cooking with Joe.”

Becca laughs. “Oh, he can cook himself just fine. I was showing this part of the town to Skylar, ‘cause he hasn’t really had the time to look around, with his new job and all. And I just happened to see the lights still on.” It’s only now that Payton notices Skylar, who’s walking quietly between the shelves, looking interestedly at the different items, occasionally stopping to take a closer look at something that has caught his attention.

Becca turns to look at him too, speaking more lowly, “I think he has adjusted here well. He got a job from a gardening business, and me and Joe decided that it’s best for him to stay with us, you know, so that he doesn’t have to worry about finding a place to live. He’s made himself comfortable on our pull out couch.” Payton nods, commenting how nice it was of them.

“Well, it wasn’t that much of a difficult decision. And besides, he is a nice fellow, even though we’ve known him only for a few weeks. There’s just something about him that makes you want to help and trust him.” Payton agrees, in his head though, for Skylar walks back to them, looking mildly admiring.

Payton decides to start a conversation. “What do you think?” Skylar looks at him oddly. “I mean, about the shop. You seemed to like wandering around and looking at the stuff,” Payton explains his question.

Skylar nods in understanding and answers, a small smile adorning his lips, “It’s… I don’t really know how to say it otherwise, but I think it’s beautiful. It looks well taken care of, and loved. That must make the atmosphere in here so peaceful.” He looks like he’s reminiscing something that happened a long time ago.

Payton looks at him baffled. No one has ever called Antiquarius beautiful. Cute or lovely, sure, but not beautiful. He shakes off his confusion while saying, “Thanks, I take it you like it.” He smiles at Skylar, which in turn makes him smile back.

They head out of the shop, and when Payton has locked the door firmly, he turns to look at both Becca and Skylar, asking what they’d do next. According to Becca, the food won’t be ready for at least forty-five minutes, so they decide to go to the library, one of the places Skylar hasn’t seen yet. Well, actually it’s Becca who makes the decision, but neither of the men has any complains. They climb inside Becca’s van and head out. Skylar seems to want to see every place possible, and Payton always likes to pay a visit to the library; it was his parents’ working place, and they were very enthusiastic about their job, so Payton spent a lot of time in there as a young child. He doesn’t actually remember it that clearly, but the smell of the books is what stuck in his memories through all these years.



As Becca parks the van in the parking lot outside the apartment building, Payton can hear someone’s stomach growl. Because he’s sitting in the back, behind the front seats, he sticks his head between the two seats and comments on it nonchalantly, but there’s a noticeable tease in his voice, “I think someone’s hungry.”

He quickly finds out it was Skylar’s stomach, for the boy looks slightly embarrassed and his cheeks are turning pink. He tries not to let it show though, and answers while Becca chuckles, “W-well, I haven’t really eaten anything since noon, so I think it’s only natural I’m hungry.”

“You know I would’ve bought something to eat while we were at the coffee shop, but you were too stubborn,” Becca points out to Skylar, before turning towards Payton and lowering her voice to a whisper, although not to a quiet enough for Skylar not to hear, “He muttered something about not wanting to waste my money anymore as he does already.”

Skylar looks like he’s about to argue back, so before they’d be caught in an argument that would last too long, Payton grabs both of their attention by planting a hand on their shoulders and saying, “Look, I think we should head inside. You can argue later, Joe must be waiting for us already. And my stomach is too impatient for me to sit all evening listening to you two bickering in the car. So let’s go!”

Ignoring the familiar tingling feeling going through his arm after touching Skylar, Payton smiles at them before climbing out of the van and heading towards the doors. He can hear Becca and Skylar following him, while still debating about whether or not Skylar should’ve ordered something at the café. Clearly they’ve become good friends over the past few weeks.

When they get inside Joe and Becca’s apartment, a delicious smell hits their nostrils. Joe must’ve heard them coming in, because as they are taking off their jackets and wiping their shoes, he comes from the kitchen. He’s wearing a black apron that has a skull and crossbones in the chest of it. Payton can’t help but to laugh out loud and exclaim, “Dude! I can’t believe you still have that apron! And you’re actually wearing it!”

Joe just shrugs and smiles slightly, looking down on himself and says, “Well, why wouldn’t I wear it? You gave it to me as a Christmas present, and I needed something to cover my clothes. Besides, I like this, I think it’s cool.”

He turns around accompanied by Payton’s laughter and the others’ chuckles and makes his way back to the kitchen. He shouts that the food will be done in a few minutes and orders them to go wash their hands before disappearing through the doorway. After doing what they were told, Skylar, Becca and Payton go into the kitchen and see that Joe has already set the table for four and is carrying a steaming pot of corn casserole. He lowers it on the table and they take their seats, Payton sitting next to Skylar.

As they are eating, they talk about their day, and Payton is sure to mention how good the food is. The others agree. Joe smiles and thanks them, saying how it isn’t that good, but Payton has to disagree with that, for he has always liked the food Joe makes. It tastes like it’s made by a mom, with love and care, and actually Joe uses a lot of his own mom’s recipes, so the outcome isn’t that surprising.

When they’ve almost finished eating, Joe breaks the comfortable silence that had fallen over them as he clears his throat, looking a bit concerned.

“So, I’m not if you’ve heard about this, but there has been an arrest in Everett. They arrested some kind of a gang, or at least part of it, they were involved in selling drugs and forcing underage teens into prostitution. I heard it on the six o’clock news.”

They all look at him surprised, for that area is usually quite peaceful. Becca is the first one to comment. “Everett’s not that far from here, I sure hope they’re not spread this far. Did they say anything else about it?” Joe shakes his head, “Nothing, just that the police are hunting down the rest of the members, and it seems to be proving efficient. And that the victims are all getting out of that horrible situation, some after years of misery.”

Payton is silent, deep in thought. This kind of news is actually pretty unusual, around here at least. There have been reports of robberies and occasional assaults, but nothing of this scale. And he can’t possibly imagine how it must’ve felt for those poor children! Just thinking about it makes chills run down his spine, and they’re not the good ones. Well, hopefully the police will get everyone guilty arrested and locked away.

Payton voices his thoughts aloud, making Becca and Joe agree with him. “Yeah, it’s good that they got those kids out of that situation, I mean I’ve heard stories from the kids at the youth center about people who have tried to sell them drugs or entice them having sex by offering money. It’s just disguisting,” Joe says and frowns slightly. He works as a youth worker, so naturally when something bad happens he gets worried for the local teenagers.

It’s only now when they notice that Skylar isn’t participating in the conversation; he’s completely silent, looking distant, like he isn’t in the room anymore. Mentally, at least. He sits frozen on his chair, not moving an inch, even his eyes don’t blink. The color from his face has drained, leaving him looking sickly white. They try to call his name to get his attention, but it doesn’t work.

Payton lifts his hand to put it on Skylar’s shoulder to try to shake him out of his odd daze, but when his finger tips touch Skylar ever so slightly, he quickly draws his hand back. It felt like Skylar was radiating coldness; he wasn’t warm at all.

Like he is a cold, dead body.

Suddenly Skylar starts to shake uncontrollably, and he looks like he’s about to cry or scream from the bottom of his lungs. He does neither; instead his eyes that only a moment ago were hazy roll to the back of his skull, and he collapses towards the floor. But before he can hit it, Payton stands up from his chair and takes a hold of him, making his unconscious body lean on him. Payton sighs in relief; Skylar’s warm again.

Joe and Becca rush to them and after a quick examination, they come to the conclusion that Skylar is okay; he has just fainted but he doesn’t seem to have any symptoms of deceases that could cause him to do so. Payton and Joe carry Skylar into the living room where Becca has already pulled the bed out from the couch, and lower him on the mattress. Becca goes upstairs to get Skylar’s pillow and duvet, leaving Joe and Payton to look after him. The two of them consider changing Skylar’s clothes to make him more comfortable, but opt to just taking his jeans off.

When they are doing just that, Payton can’t help noticing how good Skylar’s legs look. They are slender, with a hint of muscle in them; just perfect. Payton knows that now isn’t the right moment to think about anything sexual, but he can’t not stare at Skylar’s legs. He shakes his head to get rid of his improper thoughts. Hoping that Joe didn’t notice his moment of lack of self control, he moves his eyes to Skylar’s face. He looks peaceful, nothing like what he did a few minutes ago.

A small smile makes its way on Payton’s face. He’s glad that Skylar is okay now.

Becca comes to the room with the bedding and they put the pillow behind Skylar’s head and cover him with the duvet. Before leaving the living room, Joe turns the lights off, and they all go back into the kitchen, still a bit shaken from the shock that Skylar caused with his odd behavior.

Later, when Payton is about to leave and go to his own apartment, he decides to look at Skylar for the last time. Leaning onto the doorframe of the living room, he observes the pull out couch in the back of the room. The figure on the bed isn’t moving; Skylar is fast asleep, hopefully dreaming about something sweet. As he finally leaves the doorway and the apartment altogether, not forgetting to say good night to Becca and Joe, he is sure of one thing:

Skylar is full of mysteries that hide behind layers of polite and happy masks, while the true Skylar shies away from the eyes of anyone who looks at him. And Payton wants to dig through all that, to meet the one who really is living inside that body.

He wants to know the real Skylar.