Building My Life

Chapter 9 - Going Downtown

Teodoro smiled when he saw Josias enchanted by a resident girl of Happiness Slum. “My boy, take it easy with that heart. Do I know her by any chance?”

“Her name is Melissa,” Josias responded in a singsong voice. “And she lives further down.” Josias, however, shook his head. “Well, what am I doing? Okay, the girl is beautiful and nice, and she was admiring my chest, even though I am not that muscular. I need to find something to do. She must think I’m a weirdo for walking around without a shirt.”

“There is nothing wrong with a man walking around without a shirt, especially in this heat,” Teodoro remarked. “But, as I warned you, you’d better start buying your things.”

Josias smiled as he remembered. “Her father is very strict; he doesn’t want his dear daughter to marry a poor man. So I better get moving.”

Josias started walking out of the reception. Teodoro asked him, “Hey, where are you going?”

“To buy the towel,” Josias answered, without stopping or looking back.

Back on the main street, Josias realized that a group of people was standing on the sidewalk as if they were waiting for the bus. Josias remembered that no buses traveled in that locality, it was a van that did the job. He approached the group. “Excuse me; are you by chance waiting for the van?”

“Yes, and it’s coming,” a lady in formal wear answered.

Josias looked back and decided to wait for the van. It stopped.

The guy in the passenger seat got out and opened the rear door for the others to enter. He served as the driver’s assistant, collecting the fare, which was cheaper than the conventional bus.

There was still space, and Josias entered, sitting between another teenager — probably going to some vocational course — and the lady who had given him the information. Inside, Michael Jackson’s “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough” was blaring on the radio. The guy next to Josias started to move; he thought he was dancing just like Michael.

The van reached Downtown. Lagoon City was a medium-sized city with approximately 200,000 inhabitants, located near the coast. Downtown had numerous commercial and residential buildings, the tallest having an average of twenty floors.

Traffic was busier; pedestrians needed to use the crosswalk and respect the traffic lights, and people crowded the sidewalks.

Among so many people, Josias ended up drawing attention for being shirtless and in sweatpants. But he was already getting used to it.

Upon entering a linen store, he was promptly attended to by a saleswoman who wanted to sell him a whole wardrobe, even though Josias had repeatedly said that he just wanted to buy a bath towel.

When he left the store, relieved, Josias wondered if he was really that attractive to get such female attention. The fact was, he was modest. And yes, he could have spent his time dating girls at school, but precisely because of the lack of financial support from his father, Josias had spent his adolescence doing odd jobs. Consequently, he hadn’t had the mindset for picking up girls and dating like his other friends.

Walking through the downtown streets, Josias remembered that right there he had already worked selling popsicles or delivering pamphlets — any job that helped him buy jeans or new sneakers.

Josias stopped walking as he passed through the main square, the heart of the city, having the slight impression of seeing Everaldo. A young man was standing at the bus stop, dressed formally like his friend from the night before. Josias didn’t want to shout his name, as it could be another man. But he tried to get closer.

When he was almost there, a bus pulled up at the stop, and the young man, head down, promptly boarded through the back door. If only he had lifted his head...

Josias regretted not having arrived on time. He had wanted to meet with Everaldo again to say that everything was fine and that he was taking steps to build a better life. The religious boy’s whereabouts remained a mystery to Josias.

Meanwhile, the same van appeared around the corner of the square. Josias signaled to it. Immediately, the other passengers looked unfavorably at Josias, looking him up and down, thinking that the boy’s scant clothing and dark skin indicated that he was a slum dweller.

Josias ignored the prejudiced glances and got in the van, now with Captain and Tennille’s “Do That to Me One More Time” playing on the radio and bothering the others waiting for the ride.