In Between Days: Raising Jordan (boyxman)✅

Beat on the Brat

Pots and pans or some kind of clatter in the kitchen woke me up. Tim was usually quiet, only grabbing a cup of coffee on his way out the door every morning. I often got up when Tim got up, but today I stayed in bed.

The houseguest was the opposite of Tim, loud as anything, forcing me to get up to find out what he was doing.

Dragging myself out of bed, I wandered into the kitchen in only my boxers, what I wore to bed. In the kitchen was my brother's houseguest, his hair no longer in that stupid man bun, his hair scraggly, hanging an inch or two below his chin. His ear buds were in and he was singing and dancing to a song on his phone.

"Beat on the brat. Beat on the brat. Beat on the brat with a baseball bat. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah."

The houseguest sang the Ramones, one of my most frequently played bands on my playlist. He startled, noticing me standing there and pulled out his ear buds, his cheeks a different color, embarrassed that I caught him singing.

"Oh hi," he said. "Good morning. Want some coffee?"

Just by the brief morning greeting, I could tell he was a talker and he didn't seem to care that I wasn't. It was too early to think about talking so I didn't answer. Anyway, I could make my own cup of coffee.

As he cracked a couple of eggs in the frying pan, I made my way through the kitchen to the keurig machine.

"It's quiet here, huh?" he said.

Yeah, it was quiet in the house and the surrounding area and town, but I thought that was pretty obvious and didn't need someone to say it out loud.

"Are you alone here all day everyday?" he asked.

Most of the time, I thought.

There was the housekeeper, Yesenia, who cleaned the house weekly, but she barely spoke English. There were also the landscapers and gardeners, but they didn't really count since I didn't interact with them at all. So, yeah, I guess I was alone most of the time.

As the houseguest asked more and more questions, I watched the coffee drip into my "Jordan" mug. Only I was allowed to use this mug because my name was printed along the top in big black letters, a poo emoji in the center, a birthday gift from Tim.

"What time does Tim get home?" he asked.

I shrugged, pouring a little cream in my coffee, proceeding to scoop spoonful after spoonful of sugar into it.

"Have some coffee with your sugar?" I had a thing for sweets, but I didn't appreciate his comment.

"What's your favorite Ramones' song?" I asked after a few awkward minutes, leaning against the counter, my hands wrapped around my mug.

"The Ramones?"

"Yeah, you were singing them."

"Oh yeah," he said. "Blitzkrieg Bop."

"Typical," I said.

"What do you mean by that?" he said, slightly annoyed, but I didn't answer. "So what's yours?"

"Do You Remember Rock n' Roll Radio," I said. "I like Beat on the Brat, too. Tim used to say that song was written for me."

"And you believed him?" he said. "That song was written 20 years before you were born. Maybe even more."

"I know, but I didn't know that at the time."

Tim was always saying stuff like that to me and I was so gullible and naïve, I believed everything he told me.