*Sarge*
The alarm shrills to life, blasting its klaxon call through the dark, silent apartment, and Galliard jolts awake. He slams his hand down on his alarm clock, temporarily stilling its insistent blare, and then waits, poised and tense on his futon.
A few taunt seconds pass, and then he hears shuffling from the floor beside him, followed by a heavy sigh, and he relaxes. Galliard drops his hand over the side of the futon and finds the rough, wiry fur he knows is down there, and gently strokes it. More shuffling, and then the slow, steady beat of a tail wagging and hitting against the futon legs.
“Good boy,” he mutters, and closes his eyes to snatch a few more moments of sleep.
The alarm goes off again, and Galliard slaps it off before sitting up with a groan. He fumbles for the lamp, and floods the room with light.
Sarge looks up at him from the floor, his tail still wagging slowly and his ears perked forward. Once, he’d been a yellow lab, but now he’s mostly grizzled and gray, his fur gone wiry and stiff, and missing in patches, his eyes clouded by cataracts. But his nose still works as well as ever, and he twitches it, snuffling as he turns his head to sniff Galliard’s ankle and then lick it.
“Hey, buddy.” Galliard leans over and pets the dog for another moment, but he doesn’t have time to give Sarge the love he deserves. He hauls himself to his feet, wincing a little as his ass twinges. He’ll have to wash his toys today, if he’s going to cam again tonight. He could take a night off, if he wanted to; iamayam and titan23 got into another bidding war last night, and even with the thirty percent cut the cam website takes, he’s making much better money than normal. But there are always more bills, more things demanding his attention, and it would be nice to have some kind of nest egg put away.
Galliard’s first stop of the day is the refrigerator, where he takes out a cube of bright yellow cheese. From the living room, he can hear Sarge’s tail pick up its beat; the dog knows what’s coming. Galliard unscrews a bottle of baby aspirin on the counter and tucks two into the cheese. Then it’s back to the futon, where he crouches near Sarge’s head and offers him the cheese. The dog slurps it up, swallowing his treat whole, and then licks the palm of Galliard’s hand with a slobbery pink tongue.
“Yeah, yeah, you’re my buddy too.” Galliard pets him again, then rises to his feet and pads to the bathroom.
The shower creaks and groans, but he’s up early enough that the building still has some hot water, and Galliard stands under the spray, letting it cascade around him. It beats at his chest and shoulders, and he holds his breath before ducking his face down and letting it wash over his head and down his back. It’s the only time of the day where he’ll be alone, and he lets his thoughts wander as the heat slowly unkinks his muscles and relaxes his aches and pain.
His thought turn, as they frequently have lately, to the big blond fuck, his stalker from the club. Reiner Braun. A very Germanic name, one he’d looked up at the gym; it had taken some serious flirting to get Hannah to let him see the membership records, but then Franz had come over and distracted her, and Galliard had taken his shot.
Reiner Braun: twenty nine years old but looks and acts a lot older; been a member at the gym for three years; has his membership dues on automatic payment; lives in the fancy part of downtown, where all the rich people live. Nothing really surprising, except for his age, and Galliard had closed the program in a hurry, afraid that Hannah would eventually get tired of flirting and come back to chase him away. He’s already taken enough risks regarding Reiner Braun; he doesn’t need to make it worse.
The blowjob in the sauna had been stupid. Galliard knows this, and can admit it to himself. It had been fucking stupid, stupid and dangerous, and he could have gotten himself fired from his one real job over it. It was the stupid stunt of a self-destructive kid, and Galliard isn’t that kid anymore. He’s better than that. He has to be better than that.
Thank god Braun was into it.
He hadn’t given a bad blowjob either.
Galliard shakes his head, sending water droplets flying everywhere, and grabs his bottle of shampoo. Now isn’t the time to start remembering the warmth of Reiner Braun’s mouth, or how willing he’d been to crawl across the floor and position himself between Galliard’s legs. It had been a one-time thing. It happened, it’s over, it’s never happening again.
Rich pricks like Braun don’t slum with people with Galliard.
Not unless they want something, and Galliard isn’t going to whore himself out to whatever it is Reiner Braun is sniffing after.
The hot water starts to die away, and Galliard rinses off the rest of the way and turns off the shower before it can blast him with frigid water. He towels himself dry, frowning at the bruises peppering his chest. He needs to be more careful with the clamps; they’re always a big hit with the perverts, but if anyone at the gym saw these, it’d lead to questions Galliard doesn’t want to answer.
He wishes he didn’t bruise so easily.
Galliard throws on his threadbare robe and pads back into the living room area. Sarge watches from his position on the dog bed as Galliard gets dressed—khaki pants today, long-sleeved undershirt and then his black polo over the top, green apron and visor stuffed into his backpack to put on when he’s at work. Once he’s dressed, Galliard shrugs into his worn leather jacket that’s too big in the shoulders, originally purchased for someone bigger and heavier than himself, and squats next to Sarge’s dog bed. He reaches on top of the cardboard box that serves as an end table and takes down Sarge’s leash.
“You ready to go pee? You ready?”
Sarge hauls himself onto his front legs, and then sits there for a moment, panting. Galliard watches him, his jaw clenching, his brow drawn down. Sometimes Sarge has weakness in his back half, and can’t get up on his own. Those days used to be few and far between, but they’ve been coming more and more often; the last few times it’s happened, Galliard had had to hoist Sarge’s back half up himself, and then hold him up when they went outside so the dog could relieve himself.
It takes the dog a few moments, but he stands up under his own power today, and Galliard relaxes. Giving him his aspirin first is helping. That’s what he’ll have to keep doing: give the dog his medicine and then give it time to work. If the aspirin is working, Sarge can still stand up and move around on his own.
It’ll be fine.
“Okay, let’s go.” Galliard clips the leash to Sarge’s collar, and the dog pads heavily beside him as they leave the apartment and go out to the elevator. Galliard has to pay more for an apartment with an elevator, but he can’t expect Sarge to walk up and down stairs everyday, and pee pads inside the house are both disgusting and too expensive.
Sarge moves slowly and ponderously down the street, sniffing at all the trees along the way with interest, and Galliard trails after him, letting the dog do his thing. He tries very hard not to notice how Sarge can’t lift his leg to pee anymore and instead crouches like a girl dog, or how he dribbles urine even after he’s done doing his business. He’ll google this when he gets home; maybe Sarge just needs more aspirin, or something else with his daily cheese.
This early in the morning, when the sky is still a ghostly gray and the street lamps haven’t turned off yet, the street is mostly deserted. But it’s never completely silent in Trost, and Galliard scowls at a jogger who runs past them, moving to put himself between Sarge and the stranger. The person probably wouldn’t hurt his dog—probably—but Sarge is old and unsteady on his feet, and Galliard would kill anyone who knocked him over. Sarge doesn’t even notice, too intent on sniffing an interesting pile of trash.
“Don’t let him eat that, there might be bones in there.”
Galliard turns around, just in time to hear the quiet roar of a city bus and have the heat from its passing wash over him. His eyes are narrowed and he has his shoulders squared up, ready for whatever’s coming, but relaxes when he sees who it is.
“It’s a fast-food wrapper. That shit doesn’t come from real animals, it won’t have bones.”
Pieck laughs softly, making her slow way towards them, her forearm crutches making soft sounds of impact on the sidewalk. Sarge lifts his head and wags his tail, recognizing one of his friends, and walks towards her. Galliard gives his leash a gentle tug. “Don’t knock her over, buddy.”
“He won’t knock me over, it’s okay.” Once she’s close enough, Pieck stoops a little and pets Sarge’s broad head. “Hey, good boy. Who’s a good boy? Who’s my good Sarge?”
Sarge wags his tail harder, hitting it against Galliard’s legs, and Galliard sighs, stepping aside. “He’s going to get hair all over my work uniform.”
“No one can see your legs at work.”
“Doesn’t mean I want dog hair on them!”
Pieck smiles and shakes her head, giving Sarge one last scratch behind his ears before straightening up. “Do you want me to check in on him during the afternoon?”
Galliard glances away; he does, he has another long day today, but he also doesn’t want to ask. “If you have time…”
“I’ve always got time for this handsome old man.”
Galliard scoffs quietly, relieved, and changes the subject. “You’re up early.”
“Or out late.” She smiles at him from beneath her waves of dark hair, and Galliard suddenly realizes that no, she’s not going somewhere, she’s coming back, and he makes a face.
“Not that guy again!”
Pieck shrugs. “I like him. He treats me right.”
“He’s old and has a pervert beard.”
“Just because you’re mad you can’t grow one is no reason to take it out on Zeke.”
“I could grow a beard!” A very sad, gingery carrot one, which is why he doesn’t, but Pieck doesn’t need to know that. It would also interfere with his job, but Pieck doesn’t know about his other job, and why he needs to stay clean-shaven for it. He’s not big or broad enough to pull off the lumberjack look, and the clean-shaven baby face thing makes him look younger and more desirable, and it hurts Galliard’s heart that he knows all this.
“I’m sure you could.” Sarge has stretched his head up to lick Pieck’s hand, and she pets him again. “So another late night tonight?”
Galliard goes over his schedule in his head. Starbucks this morning, then class, then another couple of hours at the university Starbucks, and then a few hours at the gym, both for his own workout and to try and drum up some clients. “Not too late. I should be home around eight.”
“I’ll come see this guy around noon and six, then.”
“Thanks, Pieck.” Knowing that she’ll be around to check on his dog is a weight off Galliard’s shoulders, and he almost feels bad for hassling her about her boyfriend.
“Of course.” She straightens up, and offers him her arm. “Walk a lady to the building?”
Galliard takes her arm, and they make their way back to the building they share.
They say goodbye in the elevator, and Galliard takes Sarge back to their apartment. Inside, the dog waits patiently for his breakfast, which he devours noisily while Galliard packs his bag for the day. When the dog is done eating, he plods to a corner of the living area, where his second dog bed is, the one near the radiator, and flops down on it with a heavy sigh.
“You’re a good boy.” Galliard goes over to pet the dog one last time, running his fingers over ears where the fur has worn down on the tips, over a muzzle that’s gone completely grizzled and grey. Sarge licks his fingers, and Galliard smoothes them over the top of his head. Sarge is getting stinky again; Galliard is going to have to find time to give him a bath this weekend.
The dog rolls onto his side, exposing his belly for some scratches, and his back bumps up against the little end-table that sits beside his bed. The items on top of the table chatter together at the impact, and Galliard reaches out to steady it. He doesn’t look at what the table has on it; it’s too early in the morning for that. Maybe he can look at it tonight, maybe even dust it off. It’s probably dusty.
It’s almost certainly dusty.
“Bye, buddy.” After a few scratches to Sarge’s belly, Galliard rises, satisfied that the dog will be fine until Pieck comes to check on him, and then leaves the apartment, locking the door behind him.
~*~
It’s a long bus ride to Starbucks, and Galliard sits in the back, leaning his head against the window and watching the city slowly wake up around him. He lets his mind drift a little, slowly ticking off a mental list of everything he has to do today: work, his class—Economics, the most hated of all the classes he’s had to take since starting university—work again, and then the gym. And when he starts thinking about the gym, the image of him rises up again, like a dead fish floating to the surface of a lake.
Reiner Braun. Reiner fucking Braun: known strip club patron and possible stalker; rich boy who lives in the fancy part of town; dumbass who doesn’t know how to do squats properly and is going to blow his knees out in a few years, Galliard can practically guarantee it, because guys like him never listen to advice and don’t change their form; guy who probably went to some expensive private school and broke his nose in high school playing soccer or water polo or polo with the damn horses (never football, never anything as gauche and unsophisticated as American football) and then never got it fixed because he probably thinks it ‘adds character’ or some dumb thing; obviously thinks a lot of himself, with the perfectly trimmed beard and tight body and flawless skin, little bitch probably goes to a spa once a week to get treatments, whatever those are; very solid cocksucker, A+ on enthusiasm, B on technique, but maybe that would be better if they weren’t getting their rocks off quick in a sauna, and why is Galliard thinking about this? This is such a waste of time. He made it perfectly clear that Reiner fucking Braun is notto come to the gym in the afternoons anymore, that Galliard doesn’t want to run into him again, and who cares that he was actually the ideal personal training client, quiet and attentive and willing to take directions, or that he was so willing and eager to get on his knees in the sauna? Who cares that he’d saved Galliard’s ass in front of Franz—if he’d just had another minute, he would have thought of something, something good, to throw Franz off the trail, but Reiner. Fucking. BRAUN had beaten him to it—or that he’d looked at Galliard like he was really seeing him for a couple of seconds there? Who cares?! It’s all irrelevant!
Galliard knows guys like Reiner; he knows what they want, and what they think they can do. He’s a user, just like iamayam and all the other sick fucks in Galliard’s life; he doesn’t see Galliard.
He sees Jaws.
And Galliard doesn’t want to turn into Jaws. God, he doesn’t want to be Jaws forever.
The bus pulls up to the curb, the light from the Starbucks sign shining green and white, and Galliard stands up. He hefts his backpack onto his shoulder, wipes the condensation from the bus window off his cheek, and makes his way to the bus door. He doesn’t have time to think about this. He needs to forget about Reiner fucking Braun and his sad goddamn eyes and just… he needs to get through this. He needs to keep his head down, his mouth shut, and just brute force his way through all this.
He’ll forget about Reiner, and Reiner will forget about him, given enough time.
They always do.
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Hi every one👋
God I almost delete this chapter because of this hangover 🤢
Anyway vote and comment 😘