Broke-Ish [Completed]

Chapter 2

"Where are my straighteners?" she asks and I point to the chest of draws/dressing table/ storage station lovingly placed next to my everything chair – not that anybody can see the chair. I believe the last time I laid eyes on it before my coats and jeans and once worn pjs took over was more than two years ago. She rummages through the hair brushes, solo eye lash strips, empty deodorant cans and half bottles of perfume until she finds them.

I have known Jasmine since I was four. Our parents lived next door to each other for about ten years or so and at some point it wasn't clear who lived where as we were barely separated. Either she was at mine or I was at hers. Truth be told I often leaned towards going over to her place more than she came to mine, other people's houses are always more interesting than your own – at least they are when you're a child. Once we hit our teens her mom left her dad. Something about him not being the man she once knew and that Jasmine and her brother were not even his kids . It was all very soap-opera like and like a soap it was not the most original storyline. Then there was a big hoopla about whether it was true or not and Jasmine ran away from home for two nights and to this day, I don't know where she went. When she came back she never saw her dad again and we never spoke about it. Not once. Her mom had a string of relationships with hopeless, useless, penniless men and each relationship started and ended the same way. She'd fall in 'love' with a guy, said guy would move in, Jasmines brother would move out, the guy would contribute nothing to the house but problems and unpaid parking tickets, the relationship would end then she'd meet another hopeless, useless, penniless guy. Presumably at the same place she found the first one which I am starting to think may have been homeless shelter as where else would you meet so many men with no home.

Her brother joined the army then moved to France which I found very random but everybody else seemed to think it was nothing out of the ordinary. Where we lived, people used to move to another area sometimes and maybe even the next town or city across but never another country, never France. It wasn't even Paris either it was some random town two hours north of Paris. That's how it was described to us, as a cardinal direction like we were going to head over to Paris with our trusty compass and march there or something. But I have to say for all the ups and downs in her life she turned out pretty stable. Steady job, long term on/off partner and while we were partying and buying a new outfit every other day thinking she was a boring bitch, she was actually saving the money she earnt to buy a house. Which is all good and well for her but who would want to be tied down by a mortgage? Not me.

My upbringing was less eventful but only by an inch, well at least the first half of my life was. Nobody moved for France, no bailiffs ever turned up at the door, there were no paternity queries, nobody died (that I know off) and unless you can count that time my cousin played on his game console for 2 weeks straight there were no addiction sufferers. Yet look at my life. I haven't achieved a single thing I'm proud of, I hate my jobs, I'm drowning in debt and if my round bellied, round headed, duck bottomed manager Rob appears in my dream one more time I will be forced to spend my entire wages on therapy.

"How was work?" Jasmine asks,

"Someone did a shit by one of the fire exits on the first floor,"

"Nice,"

"Yeah." Unfortunately this occurrence can be described as mundane. The people who stay at The Norton 'hotel', as they insist on calling it although it's more like a hostel if you ask me, hold certain qualities. There are those with limited vocabulary outside of 'naa' and 'yeah' and "you get me'. Those with a dependence on alcohol or drugs, usually both. Those who rent a room for the night to then rent their bodies by the hour, although from what I have gathered rent is also available in 15-30 minute intervals. And for the pleasure of dealing with these guests, checking them in, translating their slurred words, providing toilet roll, dodging the phone and in last nights case risking typhoid, I am paid the standard minimum wage with no night shift allowance and constantly referred to as Abby. Abby is the middle aged black women about two sizes bigger and a foot smaller than me. She works as the night receptionist during the week.