The Manuscript

Jonathon Delrusio fidgeted in the hard wooden chair. He glanced around the room yet again, once more taking in the proof mounted on the walls that Leon Basil did in fact qualify to publish books.

The man himself was staring with a disgusted look at Jonathon. With good reason, Jonathon supposed. The office was impeccably clean, and Jonathon was filthy.

In his defense, two years of homelessness did tend to make people dirty. Actually, Jonathon didn’t think he was all that bad looking. Granted, his brown hair needed to be trimmed up a few inches, and his clothes were at least a size too small for him, in addition to being torn in several places. And he was short for a nineteen year old, only about five feet four inches tall. And even though his figure was slightly girlish, he worked out quite a bit, when he wasn’t scrounging for his next meal, with results. And it’s not like he hadn’t tried to get cleaned up for what could be one of the most important days of his life.

Still, given the perfection of the man across the desk, Jonathon was starting to doubt that his book would even be looked at.

“Look, I’m going to be open with you,” Leon started coldly, his tone already feeling like a slap to Jonathon’s face. “We get almost eighty manuscripts a day here. Most are longer than yours. Most are presented better than yours,” he finished with a sneer.

Jonathon waited, and Leon gave him a look that clearly said, “Why the hell are you still here?”

“Sir,” Jonathon began carefully, “I have worked over a year on this-”

“Oh, by all means, let’s publish it then. No, let’s stamp it out in gold plating for you!” Leon snorted.

“Please sir, I really need the money,” Jonathon pressed.

“Fine. I’ll look at it. Now please get the hell out of here.”

Relieved, Jonathon hurried from the room, as Leon yelled, “Somers! Get your a*s in here!”

He did not see Leon sweep his book into the trash can beside the desk.

Elijah Somers darted through the long white hall, hurrying to his boss’s office. A man rushed out of the room just as he reached it, and the two collided.

“Sorry,” Elijah muttered, pushing past the man.

“Finally! What took you so long?!” Leon yelled.

Elijah resisted the urge to roll his eyes. it was less than a minute since he had been summoned.

“What do you need?” he asked.

“The trash is full, and the floor’s a mess again.”

Holding back a sigh, Elijah picked up the can for the eighth time that afternoon. He walked briskly down the hall, and hurried down the stairs. There was an elevator that could take him down the five flights of stairs, but it was really slow. And Elijah hated elevators. He had heard too many horror stories involving them, and he avoided them as much as he could.

As he headed down the stairs, the can in Elijah’s hand slipped, and paper spilled all over the steps.

“S**t!” he groaned, bending to pick up the sheets.

He scooped up the paper, and the title page caught his eye.

“The Wings of Love?” he read.

Elijah turned around, and made his way to where his bag was hanging. He slipped the story into the bag, and hurried back to Leon’s office, grabbing a vacuum as he went.

Jonathon watched the back door open, and a man walk out with three small bags. He hurried up to the man.

“Potatoes, bread, and three or four beef patties,” the man said, handing Jonathon the bags.

“Thank you,” Jonathon mumbled, before hurrying back into the dark alley.

As he sat under the stairs of an apartment, Jonathon tried to work out a description of the man. Large, almost beefy, but Jonathon couldn’t call the man beefy. It was too harsh of a term for the man. Yet honestly, if the man was the one to come out of a dark alley, Jonathon would have ran for his life.

Shaking his head at this line of thought, Jonathon’s mind brought out the image of the boy at the publisher’s office. Now there was a hot guy. Blond, with a narrow face, and  beautiful lips that just made Jonathon want to kiss them, even if the guy was a total stranger.

And the body. He certainly knew how to show off. Just thinking of that body, all those muscles sitting under a thin layer of fabric, drove Jonathon crazy.

Jonathon pulled out a piece of moldy bread. He ripped the mold off, and started eating.

“Thank God it’s Friday,” Elijah thought, making his way up the steep slope towards his house.

As he reached the door, it was opened by the butler.

“Your parents left half an hour ago. They said they’d be back Sunday.”

“Thanks. Is-”

“Your sandwiches are waiting on the counter for you.”

“Always ready. Thank you Maxwell,” Elijah laughed, walking towards the kitchen.

He tossed his bag onto the leather sofa in the living room before continuing into the kitchen.

Finally, with sandwiches in hand, Elijah sat down on the bed in his room, and pulled the book out of his bag. He was just opening the book when his phone started to ring.

Sighing with annoyance, Elijah pulled his phone out, and answered with a grunt.

“What?”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Did you finally get a life?” his friend teased.

“David, I am so not in the mood right now.”

“No problem! Just come on out to my place, and we can have an attitude adjustment together.”

Elijah rolled his eyes, imagining the grin on David’s face at those words.

“I can’t.” he denied. “I have to read a book and edit it by Monday,” he fibbed.

“Really? I thought you were just the janitor.”

“Yes. I am. But if I could hand them a well-edited manuscript on Monday-”

“-they’d arrest you for theft?”

“Not funny,” Elijah snapped. “Look David, my boss is an a*****e. I need to improve my situation as much as I can as fast as I can.”

“You also need to relieve some tension. Come on Elijah. Let’s bash some dhaeraow skulls,” David pressed.

“Maybe on Sunday night.”

“On Sunday night, you’ll need to go to bed early because of school,” David predicted. “Elijah, you need to live a little! Just quit this job! You don’t even need it!”

Elijah gritted his teeth.

“David, you know why I’m doing this,” he snapped.

“I also know that you hate it, you’d be happier without it, and you need to blow off some steam.”

Elijah looked at the stack of paper in front of him, and did a quick estimate. At least two hundred pages.

“I’m sorry David, but I have to work,” he said firmly, before hanging up.

Jonathon stepped up to the desk nervously.

“Excuse me ma’am?” he started.

“How can I help you?” the woman seated across the counter asked, her eyes not moving from the computer screen in front of her.

“My name is Jonathon Delrusio. I left a manuscript here last week, and I was wondering how far the process is-”

The woman started typing rapidly.

“There are no manuscripts here for Jonathon Delrusio,” she told him a minute later.

“Jonathon Delrusio?”

Jonathon turned at his name.

The boy from his last visit was standing in front of him.

“You’re late Elijah,” the woman said sharply.

“Bus problems,” Elijah explained. “Jonathon?”

“That’s me,” Jonathon said carefully.

Elijah studied him openly, and Jonathon wished he had worn  better clothes, not that he had any. The boy wasn’t going to be interested in a street urchin, even if he was into guys.

“Your book was in the garbage. I rescued it,” Elijah said finally, pulling the papers out of his bag.

“Uh… thank you,” Jonathon stammered, still caught up by Elijah’s body.

“It’s a good story. The presentation… well, the man up there is not a fan of dirt. You might try a picture to compensate for the personal issues.”

“W-what?”

“Sorry. That came out wrong,” Elijah smiled ruefully. “What I meant is that a good picture could make him more likely to look at it. And if you’d like, I can get my friend to hand the manuscript off. It might get a better response.”

“I can’t draw-”

“I can,” Elijah interrupted.

He pulled out a binder.

“Katherine and William,” he announced, showing Jonathon a picture of a homeless man sitting on a park bench beside a wealthy lady, possibly from the late nineteenth century England.

“Oh my God,” Jonathon breathed. “How did you get them so perfectly?”

“You’re very descriptive,” Elijah shrugged. “It’s just a sketch.”

“Elijah,” the receptionist warned.

“Come back about five this afternoon. We’ll talk more then.”

Elijah hurried towards the stairs, giving Jonathon a nice view of his butt as he ran.