Jamie’s teeth returned to his bottom lip as he shook his head. “I haven’t got a job yet. I’ve been looking, but...”
He shrugged. Marc dumped heaping spoons of instant espresso powder into the mugs and opened the empty fridge in search of milk. Thankfully Mrs. Valentino from next door had popped in overnight to feed Natalie and saved the day with a pint of semi-skimmed.
Marc retrieved it and searched for sugar, but was unlucky this time. “No sugar, mate. Sorry.”
“That’s okay. And don’t worry about the milk. I drink it black anyway.”
Brilliant.Marc chucked the milk back in the fridge and poured water into the mugs, stirring up until he had coffee that was barely looser than sludge. “Hope you like it strong.”
Jamie accepted the coffee with a half smile that melted into a wince he clearly tried to hide. “At least it will stop me sleeping all day.”
“Is that what you’ve been doing since you got back? Still stuck on American time?”
“Maybe. I don’t think it’s that, though. I guess I just... I don’t know. I don’t sleep well.”
Marc understood that. It was only pain, fatigue, and working himself to his knees that ever earned him a full night’s kip, but that was the military way. Injuries aside, he hadn’t slept more than four hours at a time in years, and couldn’t see it changing anytime soon. Which was fine for him, he was used to it, but the exhaustion in Jamie was obvious. “Is something bothering you?”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know—like being unemployed or unsettled in a new town? Are you missing your friends back in America?”
“I didn’t really have many friends over there.” Jamie took another cautious sip. “Apart from my roommate, who was actually my boss. I do miss him, but not enough to want to go back.”
“Maybe it’s the job thing, then. Are you bored?”
“God, yeah. And that’s a dangerous place for me to be. I don’t, uh, cope well when I’m unoccupied. Bad habits, you know?”
Marc nodded, hoping that Jamie would elaborate, but Natalie’s noisy arrival cut the conversation short, which was far less annoying than it might’ve been if Jamie’s face hadn’t lit up like the sun.
Natalie, apparently, was equally enamoured, and bypassed Marc to jump onto the counter by Jamie and rub herself all over him like white on rice.
“Traitor,” Marc muttered. “She took a piss in my shoe the other day.”
“Why?”
“She didn’t say,” Marc said dryly. “Should I have asked?”
“You should’veknown,” Jamie retorted. “Cats are clean. They only do stuff like that if they’re cross. What did you do to upset her?”
“Are you serious? You think it was a revenge piss?”
“I’d imagine so. Maybe she was miffed that you went to America. How long were you gone?”
“Ten days, but the neighbour looked after her.”
“Not the point, is it?”
Marc opened his mouth to respond, but quickly shut it as he realised that Jamie was talking to the cat.Revenge pissing? Sounds about right.“You mentioned the other day that you worked in a kitchen in America. Is that something you could do here?”
Jamie’s eyes flashed, and Marc wondered if he was thinking of the kisses they’d shared in the car before Jamie had run off. But the heat in his tired stare was brief, his shrug defeated, and Marc’s heart ached for him. “I looked around for some kitchen work, but it’s only the pubs hiring, and I can’t work in a bar.”
He didn’t say why, but Marc knew, and found comfort in the fact that Jamie was apparently educated enough about addiction to keep himself safe. “None of the cafés or chippies got anything?”
“Not at this time of year. It’s summer all year round in Cali, so I didn’t think of the tourist season when I decided to come here.”
“You must have other skills.”
“Not unless you count giving fuck-hot blowjobs, but I’m retired from that.”