The Start of the Fall
This month...had not been his best month.
Mainly 'cause he'd gotten canned again.
For one, he'd been dragging his feet and having trouble not looking utterly miserable on the job, but what'd gotten him fired was what'd happened when he found out one of the other strippers was dealing drugs backstage.
Some of the guys at this place were hardly more than kids--eighteen, nineteen, trying to work their way through college. Insecure, and made even more insecure by the day by the job itself. Some of them were gay, just only recently come out. And he saw how the creep worked, pressuring them, working on their self esteem until they got into the shit.
Rich'd told the boss, the boss didn't care and told him to forget it. If he didn't let it go, he was on thin ice already, close to losing the job. He'd confronted the guy anyway...and in the end, the jerk'd ended up with a bloody nose, head first in a trash can.
Rich, on the other hand, had ended up jobless again for messing up the face of one of the club's highest-grossing acts. But that was the old Rich Rider luck right? Doing the wrong thing even when he did the right thing.
A month with hardly any money was a long time when you were in debt and had little money to spread around. Now he was walking around doing the application slog again. Trying to find someplace--any place that'd give him a job.
Part of him wanted to go to his friends, wanted to go and ask for help. But the prospect of telling Nita that when she-- the things she'd said--
Maybe she was less mad now? Maybe it was time to apologize for being a heel. That job had been a horrible job and he shouldn't have kept it a secret. He needed to talk to her and work it out, now that she'd had time to calm down--
He caught sight of a tabloid rag at a news stand.
...Now that she apparently had calmed down and decided they were through, without telling him.
He leaned against the newstand with one arm, eyebrows furrowing, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose, breathing deep for a few seconds.
"Listen buddy, this ain't a library. Either buy somethin' or geddout of the way so other people can buy something," said the older man running the newstand. When Rich didn't answer at first, he snapped, "Hey, are you deaf or somethin'?"
"Yeah yeah, pops, I heard ya'. I'm movin'," Rich said, leaving the stand and walking away, pulling up the collar of his jacket to fend off the city breeze, starting to grow cooler as the summer ended and Autumn crept in.
Johnny $%@#ing Storm.
So that was what she wanted, huh? Some rich, famous pretty boy who--
Who was part of one of the most beloved superhero teams in the world, and been an actor and--
Who--
Who, let's face it, was way more impressive than him any day of the week.
"Face it, Rider," he said to himself. "You're nobody."
Amidst all the anger, no matter how much he tried to forget it, that bitter thought roiled in the pit of his stomach like poison.
The city seemed dim. The breeze was cold. And it was only getting colder.
Mainly 'cause he'd gotten canned again.
For one, he'd been dragging his feet and having trouble not looking utterly miserable on the job, but what'd gotten him fired was what'd happened when he found out one of the other strippers was dealing drugs backstage.
Some of the guys at this place were hardly more than kids--eighteen, nineteen, trying to work their way through college. Insecure, and made even more insecure by the day by the job itself. Some of them were gay, just only recently come out. And he saw how the creep worked, pressuring them, working on their self esteem until they got into the shit.
Rich'd told the boss, the boss didn't care and told him to forget it. If he didn't let it go, he was on thin ice already, close to losing the job. He'd confronted the guy anyway...and in the end, the jerk'd ended up with a bloody nose, head first in a trash can.
Rich, on the other hand, had ended up jobless again for messing up the face of one of the club's highest-grossing acts. But that was the old Rich Rider luck right? Doing the wrong thing even when he did the right thing.
A month with hardly any money was a long time when you were in debt and had little money to spread around. Now he was walking around doing the application slog again. Trying to find someplace--any place that'd give him a job.
Part of him wanted to go to his friends, wanted to go and ask for help. But the prospect of telling Nita that when she-- the things she'd said--
Maybe she was less mad now? Maybe it was time to apologize for being a heel. That job had been a horrible job and he shouldn't have kept it a secret. He needed to talk to her and work it out, now that she'd had time to calm down--
He caught sight of a tabloid rag at a news stand.
...Now that she apparently had calmed down and decided they were through, without telling him.
He leaned against the newstand with one arm, eyebrows furrowing, closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose, breathing deep for a few seconds.
"Listen buddy, this ain't a library. Either buy somethin' or geddout of the way so other people can buy something," said the older man running the newstand. When Rich didn't answer at first, he snapped, "Hey, are you deaf or somethin'?"
"Yeah yeah, pops, I heard ya'. I'm movin'," Rich said, leaving the stand and walking away, pulling up the collar of his jacket to fend off the city breeze, starting to grow cooler as the summer ended and Autumn crept in.
Johnny $%@#ing Storm.
So that was what she wanted, huh? Some rich, famous pretty boy who--
Who was part of one of the most beloved superhero teams in the world, and been an actor and--
Who--
Who, let's face it, was way more impressive than him any day of the week.
"Face it, Rider," he said to himself. "You're nobody."
Amidst all the anger, no matter how much he tried to forget it, that bitter thought roiled in the pit of his stomach like poison.
The city seemed dim. The breeze was cold. And it was only getting colder.