Favorite Passage

Jon was getting his first insight into what it was like to be a little brother. His second was when Michael led him into a hip-looking store, the kind Jon had always avoided. Michael went to the shelves with the expensive jeans, something else Jon had always avoided. Making eight bucks an hour, he didn’t buy denim that cost more than wool-blend dress slacks.

“What size?”

It had been so many years since he had bought a pair of khakis for work, he couldn’t even remember.

“I dunno.”

Michael made a noise of disgust, and shook his head. “You’re a trip.” Michael stared at his midsection a moment, long enough for Jon to feel peculiarly uncomfortable, not that he thought it possible Michael leaned east and west. But it wasn’t right for the man to—Jon didn’t want to put a word to his thoughts.

“Thirty-inch waist sound about right?”

Jon shrugged his shoulders. Michael pulled a pair of jeans off a stack and shoved them at him. Jon looked down at the price.

“Fifty-eight bucks? Are you crazy?”

“Oh hell. You don’t work for Erik anymore. You earned twenty-five thousand this morning. You can afford them.”

“Fifty-eight bucks?”

Michael grabbed another pair from the next stack, handed them to him and pointed toward the changing room, furling his eyes in an expression daring him to argue.

Jon shook his head and walked away muttering. “Fifty-eight bucks. A house payment. Work out the wazoo to do on the Mustang. No job. No health insurance. God I’ve got to get health insurance.”

“Shut up,” Michael called after him.