Coffee and Sugar by C. Sean McGee (ready player one ebook .txt) 📕

The silence was uncomfortable. Joao was not very good at lying.

“And how is the church?” she asked.

“It’s great” said Joao.

“So there are a lot of people then?” she asked.

“Oh lots” said Joao, staring at a vile empty room.

“Is he back yet?” asked Mother, uncomfortably.

“The Bishop? No. Do you want me to get him to call you when he gets in?” said Joao, picking up on Mother’s reason.

“No. I’ll call back in one hour. Are you behaving Joao?” she asked.

“Yes mam” he said.

If she had of called a week before, he might have told her about his job and the good he was doing and how good that made him feel. He would have told her about all of the interesting people he met and about the interesting things he had learned from his friends and how he had friends and had found a way to be useful; like he always wanted, like she said he would be. If only she had called a week before; but not today.

“And your father?” she said in obvious dubiosity.

Joao was silent for a second but that second spelled out an eternity. He thought of so many things he had not seen; hints of things that could have been and that shouldn’t have been.

“He’s good too mam. He’s very busy with the church and helping a lot of people around the city. He’s really important here, just like we said he would be” said Joao.

Mother hummed loud and unapproving over the phone.

“One hour Joao. I want to speak to The Bishop” she said before hanging up.

Joao hanged up the phone and plucked his fingers nervously against the corners of his eyes, wondering if he could just tear them out and stick his ears with stinging barbs. He thought of Charity again, standing before him with her hair tied back and her hands inviting him to her concern and the sound of her voice almost brought him to tear.

“Hey you” she said.

Joao turned and saw her standing by the doorway, looking so pretty. Charity smiled and Joao smiled back. His heart beat tremendously. He was so nervous. He was always so nervous around her, though he couldn’t tell her that though; not like he needed to anyway.

“Whatchya doin?” she asked.

“I have to find The Bishop?” said Joao.

“Can I help?” asked Eve.

Joao smiled.

He looked stupid when he smiled, like a lost tourist.

“Yay” he said, realising immediately how that must have sounded and hating himself just a little more.

“I don’t know where to start” said Joao.

“I do” said Charity. “Let’s go” she said, taking Joao by the hand and leading him out of the church and into a whore house called Misty’s.

When Charity smiled it seemed that the world about her did just the same; plants would rustle, dried leaves would flicker about and dance under light drifts of air and the clouds would part just so the sun would be able to catch the slightest glimpse long enough to etch her shadow on the concreted pallet below.

Joao thought about this as they walked through the entry to the whore house as around them, faces lit up like new year’s eve, all smiling and fanning about her as they walked past the cashier; Charity offering a faint wave before they walked down the darkening hallway where the music built into a deafening roar when it was that they opened into a large bar with small tables spread about a large room with a rickety stage at one end which rocked to and fro and naked women crawled like heated felines along the stage towards the drunken men who sat silent and pervasive in their seats, fondling themselves in the darkness, preferring to save the last of their pennies for one more drink than to shuttle them into this girl’s pants for her to do what could be done themselves.

Joao was shocked. He didn’t like this place. He didn’t like seeing women doing these kinds of things. It made him feel like he was doing them wrong just by being there. He felt excited, but like with The Seductress, it felt sinful.

“We should go” said Joao.

Charity smiled.

She knew he was nervous so she held his hand. This is no way made Joao’s plight any less formidable; feeling her warm soft hand squeezing his, feeling the light touch of her thigh brushing against his, feeling the tips of her shoulder scratch against his, while watching four women kissing and masturbating each other on a stage while in the background; bleeding in his ears, Johnny Cash was singing about the coming apocalypse.

“He won’t be here, not in a place like this” said Joao.

“There he is” said Charity, pointing and smiling with her free hand.

Joao covered his eyes, lowering his stare to the floor while they crossed the floor passing the front of the stage. He felt hands sweeping down on him but he kept his focus trained on his feet and bid his thoughts of his gargantuan mother to avail prohibit his curious distraction from settling on those strange naked women.

At the corner of the bar, drunken and slouched over the table with his face buried in warm ale was The Bishop. His pants were undone and either falling down or having been caught after trying to be pulled up. His face was buried in a pool of alcohol but he was still breathing. They could see by the little bubbles that built in the warm ale every time his fat belly heaved inwards and spilled back out onto his legs, past the point where his belt would normally be.

“Sir” said Joao.

He didn’t respond.

Charity lifted up one of his hands and let it go. It slapped hard against the table and still, he didn’t move or respond. Not even a groan.

“We’ll have to carry him” said Charity.

Joao nodded and kneeled down with Charity to prop his father on his shoulder and drag him out of the club. He kept his head tied to his feet so as not to disrespect the naked women on the stage. Just because they were there, it didn’t mean he had to look and it didn’t mean they wanted him to look; it was just their bitter struggle.

Still, Joao snuck one quick glimpse as they hobbled past the stage, shuffling his eyes upwards and quickly putting them back to the floor.

“I saw that” said Charity smiling.

Joao felt embarrassed.

They got The Bishop out of the club and back onto the street where the cold air coming from the late afternoon breeze and the sounds of buses’ horns and racing cars and shouting pedestrians and coughing and pointing old women, roused The Bishop into a semi-conscious slur, saying something that neither Joao nor Charity could understand before venturing back into unconsciousness and eventually, being dragged back up the hill and inside the church where he was laid like a sick animal, in a ball on his bed.

“What do we do?” asked Joao.

“He’s home. Just let him rest it off. He should be fine. I’ve seen worse” said Charity.

“But Mother is going to call. She wants to speak to him. If she doesn’t, she’ll be real angry. If she knows he is like this and at those kinds of places with those kinds of women….”

“Do you think I’m a bad person Joao?” Charity asked.

Joao forgot about his mother for a second.

“No, of course not. You are very kind, really kind and you do lots of good things like what you do with the lottery tickets, that’s really kind. Bad people don’t do things like that. Imagine if those people win” he said, wishing he could say that she was beautiful, so beautiful that when he saw her, all of the things he thought he could imagine himself saying abandoned him and all he knew of the words were that they were kind and adoring.

He wanted to tell her that he loved her.

“He’s not waking up any time soon. Here, this will do” she said, taking the phone cable and tearing it from the wall.

Joao said nothing. She could do anything and he would play the ever agreeing participant.

“You’re lucky Joao” she said. “You have a family.”

Joao thought about all the times he was teased and hit by his siblings and the emotional disparagement of his mother and that ignorant, slapping heel of his father and he felt lucky as she had said, though he thought luck to be something that no man would ever wish upon, the picking of the wrong hand.

“Where’s your family?” Joao asked.

“I never really had one, not a mum and dad like you have. I mean, yours may not be perfect, but at least you know who they are. You can find em in a bar and drag em home. You got someone to be angry at. Someone to yell at. Someone to apologise to. That’s something, even if it’s all you have” she said.

“I guess. But I don’t really hate them. I mean, they are mean, you know? I guess all families are like that. I don’t really have any friends to ask” he said.

“And what am I?” she asked angry.

Joao wanted to say I love you; so very much.

It seemed so appropriate, so right but he couldn’t. Her face was so pretty and her heart and care was so enlightening and though she gave him the will to accomplish anything, she took from him the courage to say the words that he wanted and that he needed to say.

“You’re my friend. I mean like…”

Joao couldn’t finish his words. His face turned redder than a tomato, painted with frustration and abashment.

“I’m just teasing” said Charity pulling on his hand.

“But do you really have no family?” asked Joao.

Charity looked sullen. She looked rare and unnamed.

“I don’t really like to talk about something that is not. Know what I mean? It’s like, if I don’t remember who they are, maybe that’s a good thing. If I forgot, like maybe I knew them when I was real young, but if I forgot, I think maybe I forgot for a reason. There’s a lot of bad people out there. I guess it’s good not knowing if I was made by one of them or not” she said.

“Well who do you have?” asked Joao.

“Well, I got you now, don’t I?” she said squeezing herself against his arm.

Maybe now would be appropriate although Joao said nothing and missed another moment, so maybe not.

“I went by the café and you weren’t there. Fatts said he saw you run like the devil was on your tail. What’s wrong?” she asked.

“I don’t think I wanna work there anymore” he said.

“That’s a shame. You’re real popular” she said.

“I think I just wanna help The Bishop. You know, help him here with the church. Maybe if I wasn’t making coffee for all those people, I could have been here helping The Bishop, bringing people to the church” he said.

“Joao, you’re helping those people. You don’t just make coffee, you make… I don’t know… reflections. God, your coffee is like a drug” she said.

“I know. And that’s what I mean. What if the good I think I’m doing is actually hurting these people? They come back, at first smiling but then real desperate, real angry. I don’t think they’re meant to see their soul, or god would have given em a mirror. Know what I mean?”

“Yeah, I do” she said, looking down at the extent of her body.

“What’s the worst thing you ever did?”

“I don’t think I’ve done it yet” she said.

The two were quiet for a while, for a series of awkward moments.

“I like you Joao. But I’ve done some stuff and I think if I told you, you wouldn’t like me no more” she said.

Now is more than appropriate. Just say it you idiot. Tell her you love her. Don’t say nothing. Damnit just say you love her you fucking imbecile. Say it.

“I don’t think that’s true” he said, flighting over the proper words.

(Idiot)

“You’re a good friend Joao, thank you” she said, wrapping her arms around him and