Elijah woke up in an empty house. He checked his phone. No new messages from mom. One from Valerie. Took him a moment to register that Travis was still the name saved onto his phone. Once that was changed, he read the message.
'Ivan is dead.'
'shit, really?' he typed back.
'Yeah, I heard he was stabbed in the neck. You think we should have let him join with us?'
'IDK' Was all he could say. Guy had a few screws loose and could be incredibly annoying, but didn't deserve that.
'I mean, the guy got us beer whenever we wanted it.' Valerie continued. 'I think he just wanted somewhere to hang out.'
'yeah. but leon kept saying no and we stuck with it after he left'
'Sure. This was Leon's fault.' Valerie replied. That one took a little longer than the other ones. Whatever. He got out of bed, made breakfast, and drove to work. He inspected himself in the car's mirror before he went inside. Flat top hair was the same as usual. Freshly shaved. His blue uniform and jeans were in good condition. They say you're never truly dressed without a smile, but the boss didn't give him a raise when he asked for that, so he wasn't coming in fully dressed.
The car dealership was the same as it ever was. A sterile place with white walls and the latest cars lining the building, with a few more in the front. When he signed up for the job, he had hoped to either get the Spades discounts, or get a look at cool muscle cars. Maybe drive some old guys cool sports car, even just for a little bit. None of which had happened in the eight months he worked there.
It was the weekend, so slightly busy. And by that, there were two families walking around, quietly discussing all the cars around them. One of them had kids behind them eating ice cream, ignoring the no food policy. He'd bring it up with management, but he'd get on his ass for being overly pedantic. So he glanced at the family occasionally, while pretending to inspect the cars in the showroom. It was either this or getting something even more tedious to do.
But one of the kids had his ice cream fall on the floor, because that's what happens when you bring food into a place that clearly isn't meant to have food. He sighed quietly to himself, and mopped it up. And that was the first half of his day. Pretty uneventful. But it probably seemed better than dealing with the whackjobs Leon had rolling in to the car wash. So he ate his lunch in the slightly less sterile break room. Less sterile only because the old coat from an ex-employee who never took it laying on a chair in the corner proved some human life was there at some point. There was some commotion going on downstairs, but it didn't sound violent, so Elijah ignored it. But the commotion continued upstairs, until the manager burst through the door, with two new guys next to him. The new guy looked important. Slicked back hair, decked out in a blue striped button up shirt and slacks. The guy behind him was filming him on a smartphone. He looked a little younger than Elijah, and dressed much more casually.
"So, Dale." The man asked, throwing a casual hand around the manager. "This the staff?"
"Well, I predicted it was a slower day, so I just had Elijah here come in."
"Well, you must be pretty good at keeping the place running." He said with a finger snap and wiggle of the hips.
"I guess?" Elijah asked.
"Do you not know who I am?" He asked, keeping his pose.
"No." Elijah replied.
"Well, you gotta get more interested in politics, sir!" He continued, casually throwing a business card in his direction.
"Names Eustace Durward, but the peeps call me Eddy. Running for mayor. Look me up when your shifts over."
"Uh…sure." Elijah nodded.
"You really should. Look kid, I represent the working people, okay? People like you. And I respect you. Lot of your kind will just lay around, but you go ahead and work your way up. This city needs more people like you, and I assure you, I've got your interests at heart."
"Thanks?" Elijah replied.
"Well Dale, I'd love to stay and chat, but I've got to look into some other people in the community. Keep me in mind when you vote, because every vote matters!"
Eustace and the other guy left the room, leaving just him and the manager, beaming with satisfaction.
"He's got a good head on his shoulders." Dale nodded.
"What's he planning on doing, anyway?" Elijah asked. "His card doesn't seem to mention that."
"General clean up." The manager nodded. "Get rid of the gangs on the edge of the city, fix up the centre, that kind of thing."
"The centre?" Elijah asked.
"Yeah, the centre. You hear about all the fighting and the drug deals going on there, it's crazy."
"How you think he's doing that?"
"Honestly? I say we just bulldoze it. Don't know what I'd replace it with, but anything's better than what's there."
"You know there are people living there, right?"
"Yeah." He scoffed. "Probably just immigrants mooching off the government. You see, if they were like you, they'd probably have a better reputation."
"Maybe." Elijah nodded slowly. He was born in the city. He didn't even know what the manager was talking about. Was it his accent? Did he have an accent? Nobody ever mentioned it to him.
Work finally ended, and Elijah walked out. Maybe it was time for him to talk to Leon. Try see how he's living since his old house burned down. Well, he didn't check in when his dad died, so maybe he shouldn't bring it up. What was Natalie up to? He texted her to see.
'Eh, just trying on new clothes.' She said. 'Wanna see?'
'yeah'
She sent him an outfit, and she was decked out in a green cardigan and long brown dress. She didn't look much like a spade. To be perfectly honest, she resembled a librarian more than anything else.
'What you think?'
'Gonna be honest you look like you read nothing but books about sexy werewolves.'
'What were you expecting lol?'
Elijah was expecting something on the level of a heavy metal album cover girl. The type decked out in leather jackets and tight jeans. He wasn't entirely sure why that was what he was expecting. The Spades never had any girls in it, and he just expected any girls interested in joining would look like that. But that would sound pretty perverted to say out loud.
'IDK' was what he typed.
He put his phone in his pocket and took out a cigarette. He thought about how the two of them were gonna navigate the games going forward.
Eh. It'd be fine. After all, it was nothing he couldn't handle.