Oh stuffy nose from weather change. Or possibly too much time outside yesterday. I didn’t actually mean to go outside, but I got caught up in what i was doing and didn’t realize how chilled I was. I hate it when things like this are clearly my own fault. But such is life. I think this morning may be a lemon and ginger tea instead of coffee. I’m sure I’ll get around to coffee later, but right now, tea just seems like a good idea. Timers set? Excellent. Let’s go.
I find this interesting. I didn’t realize what i was going to write until near the end and then I had a light bulb moment. I like the idea of a character with a big secret accidentally finding out about someone else’s secret. watching them both unfold could be interesting. I’d have to write up more of the group dynamic as I go. Could be fun to look into.
Friday, January 21st: It sat heavily in his mind.
It sat heavily in his mind. This secret. It wasn’t even his secret. He didn’t want it, didn’t want to think about what it meant. ‘I could be wrong,’ he told himself. ‘Maybe I didn’t see what I thought I saw. Or there is an explanation I am missing.’
What he thought he saw was Carl leaving a motel room in the middle of the day in the middle of the week. He and Carl were friends, or had at least been on friendly terms since grade school. They weren’t close enough to share secrets, but there was a bond formed from years of simply moving in the same circle. He and Carl were part of the same group of guys that went to school together, graduated together and got jobs in the same factory together. It was just what they did. He doubted any of them really wanted to work in the factory, but no one’s family had money for college and none of them were smart enough or athletic enough to get scholarships.
So they went to work at the factory right out of high school.
Most of the others were married now including Carl. He and JB were both still single. JB was always going to be single, while he still had hope that someday he might actually find someone. The dating pool was pretty thin on the ground. Carl was married to the girl he started dating in junior high. He and Charlene dated all through high school, got married after graduation and now had three kids together.
About twenty minutes before seeing Carl step out of the motel room door, he saw Charlene pull their family car into the supermarket as he drove past. Whoever Carl was with, it wasn’t Charlene.
‘It’s not really my business,’ He tried telling himself. He didn’t feel the burning desire to know who else might have been in the motel room with Carl. In fact he wanted to know less than what he knew now.
‘Maybe I can just forget about it,’ he decided.
‘Besides it isn’t like I don’t have my own secrets.’ He was much more comfortable with his own secrets than with anyone else’s, but even those were growing. While there was not the money for college when he graduated high school, he found as a working adult he was able to put some by. He lived in an inexpensive apartment and since he had no family to support he was able to put money by each month. While his friends teased him about going into the city to look for a wife, thinking he was frequenting the clubs, he was in fact attending night classes at the local university. He had been doing so long enough that he was about to graduate again.
He wasn’t entirely sure what his next step might be. He took the classes because he enjoyed them, but now he had an entirely new set of skills. And he needed to decide if he was going to put them to use or not and if so, where that use might be. He didn’t really want to think about Carl and what he might be doing behind Charlene’s back. Yet somehow, the thought kept wiggling in.
Ten til Midnight 