AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yeah. And no. Spent more time free than locked up. Shit had changed, but not enough that I felt too lost. Still can’t get behind all this shit, though,” he said, producing his cell phone, and casually tossing it onto the counter. Without a case on it.
My frugal heart clutched itself in my chest.
I only ever got a new phone every five or six years, when they refused to hold a charge anymore. And I kept them in the toughest cases available until the day I got a new one, so I was sure nothing ever happened to them.
“What about the phone can you not get behind?” I asked. “Aside from putting it in a proper case,” I added.
“Case, huh?” he asked looking down at it. “Probably why I shattered six of these so far this year.”
“Six?” I croaked.
Six?
Six phones in one year?
That had to be, what, upwards of six-thousand dollars.
God.
“But, yeah, all the shit. The apps and the fake bullshit everyone posts about their life. Once sat next to this kid at a restaurant doing some fucking five-second video or something about being out to lunch with their significant other and how they were loving life. They were alone. And sad the entire time. Fucking fake-ass shit. I’m too old for that shit.”
I mean, he wasn’t wrong. I’d seen it countless times with my own students. Hell, even with fellow teachers. They post the highlight reels of their lives, not what it was really like. And that, in turn, creates a false narrative about what their life is like and what other people think their own lives should be like.
It was a vicious cycle.
I was kind of glad I didn’t have social media of my own. I mean I used to. But it always got weird when a student found you. Or even a previous student. It always felt strange to me for them to see my personal life.
Then, well, I had other reasons for shutting it down.
I never looked back.
Though I did still have my book site that was social-media-lite. How else was I supposed to rate and shelve my books? And I did have a couple of book-world associates on there. But it was all about literature, so in my mind, it was different.
“Yeah, I can’t see you on social media, posting pictures of your food.”
“This would be picture-worthy, though,” he said, scraping his fork along the plate to get the last of the cheese and sauce and a tiny wedge of noodle.
“Thanks. I don’t get to cook often. Especially now with serving tables at night. I end up eating my shift meal for the next day’s lunch instead of making something decent.”
“You planning to serve when you start up the school year again?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I’d like to quit. But it might not be… feasible right now.”
“Feasible,” he repeated. “Why not?”
“Money,” I said, shrugging.
I hated talking about money.
It had been drilled into me as a kid that it just wasn’t an appropriate topic. But it was the only answer to his question.
It all came down to money for me right now.
“Even with the money we’re kicking you?” he asked, watching me with thoughtful eyes.
“Even with,” I agreed. Especially because I didn’t know how long the hush money went for. Could they decide at any point to just stop paying me?
I couldn’t take that risk.
