The Odd Couple

Summary: Accidents will happen.

Author’s Note: This will eventually get silly.

“Ya didn’t leave me any hot water,” Anna shouted over the shower. Remy caught her scowling out through the crack of the door and shrugged.

“My bad.”

“Why’d ya even get up so early?”

“Had an errand I wanted ta run.” Remy headed to the kitchen, only half listening to her complaints.

“Ah would’ve liked t’wash mah hair without endin’ up with icicles hangin’ off mah ass,” she continued. She closed the door, which muffled anything else she had to say. Remy barely made out her asking if he planned to buy milk. He rummaged through the pantry for the mostly empty box of Trix.

Despite Anna’s complaints, she still spent a long time in the shower. Remy ladled a generous amount of sugar into his cup of coffee and took apart the newspaper, bypassing the circulars that Anna’s crotchety neighbor suggested. Remy couldn’t guess how high the stick was that he had up his ass. Remy fished out the classifieds and sports pages for himself and laid the rest in front of Anna’s place at the table.

Ana marie opened the door and released the overwhelming scents of her cologne, hair spray and shampoo as they wafted out on the remaining steam. Remy gagged slightly, but Anna complained just as much about his Axe and Old Spice.

Yet somehow they got along fine. Remy lived with Anna Marie for six months and counting, and they had yet to disagree on anything more relevant than where to buy toilet paper.

Anna made faces at herself in the mirror as she put on her eye makeup. “Ya gonna try for that job I showed ya? It pays thirteen-fifty an hour.”

“T’ought about it.”

“Whaddya mean, ‘thought about it?’” She frowned at him, setting her mascara wand down even though she only had one eye done. “Why don’t ya go for it? Don’t just let it slip by.”

“It ain’t de kinda t’ing I’m lookin’ for, petit.”

“What ya should be lookin’ for is somethin’ that pays the phone bill. It was ridiculous this month. Why didja need ta make all those calls ta Boston?”

“I wuz followin’ a lead,” he shrugged. He took another bite of his cereal.

“So thirteen bucks isn’t a lead?” she said hollowly Anna threw up her hands. “I give up.”

“Whatsamatter, petit?”

“Why do ya keep doin’ this Remy, don’t ya think it’s time ya found something more steady than sittin’ in a booth?”

“Ya didn’t have a problem wit’ it when Remy moved in.” Remy set down the sports pages before he was finished with the jump page from the Lamar Odom headline. His brows drew together in classic, miffed fashion. Anna rolled her eyes.

“Course Ah didn’t have a problem, Rem, when ya were getting’ enough hours and ya had other side gigs. But ya’ve been scrapin’ the bottom of the barrel. We can’t live like this. The recession sucks. What if something happened ta my job, huh? We’d be up shit creek!”

“Ain’t the first time I’ve heard that,” Remy muttered. “Sheesh…”

“Ah’m serious. What, Ah ain’t allowed ta say anything when Ah’m worried about how we’ll get by?” Remy sighed.

“Finish puttin’ yer makeup on, chere. I’ll make ya some breakfast.”

“That doesn’t let ya off the hook.”

“Want mushrooms an’ cheddar?”

“Eggs? Why? I was thinkin’ ‘bout a protein shake.”

“Might be kinda hard, seein’ how we’re outta milk…”

“Remy!” she carped. “Jerk!” Remy hissed in mock fear as he hopped out of his chair when Anna Marie charged him, shoe at the ready to smack him.

He loved getting a rise out of her.

*


“LOGAN! LOGAN!” Several shrill voices chanted his name at him as soon as his feet hit the blacktop. He sighed and offered his best long-suffering look, complete with a roll of his eyes.

The rug rats loved hounding him; it was their job as much as it was his to unplug the toilets or mop the teacher’s lounge.

The Maximoff kid threw a football straight at his head without any reservations. “Think fast, Logan!” he shouted.

His beefy hand reached up and snatched the ball out of the air seconds shy of knocking in his nose. He winged it back just as easily.

“C’mon, Logan, come an’ play,” Lorna whined. She was the school’s resident tomboy and loved playing with her half-brother, Pietro.

“Ain’t got time, guys. Some of us hafta work for a livin’.” He eyed Pietro, giving him his best “scary adult in authority” stone face. “Betcha ain’t even finished yer homework. Have ya?”

“Have too,” he argued uneasily, but he ducked his platinum head sheepishly.

“G’wan. Behave. Unless ya wanna be like me and push a mop with me, guys, ya better do yer work. Homework is s’posed ta be done at home.”

“Throw us one more,” crowed Lucas Bishop, the tall Black kid that Logan caught scrawling grafitti in the boys’ wash room a week prior. His punishment had been to follow Logan through each classroom with a bottle of disinfectant, cleaning all the pencil and ink scribbles from each desk. It was tedious and boring, and he grumbled into Logan’s purposely deaf ears how unfair it was. Despite that, he liked the surly janitor and the corny jokes he cracked all the time. Once in a while, when he came out to help with yard duty, he’d pitch them the softball for an inning or two.

But he complained about it like they were killing him. He had to; he couldn’t make it too easy for them or let them mistake him for a soft touch.

Pietro threw him the ball again, or rather threw it at him. Logan caught it reluctantly. “I ain’t got time for this, guys!” He winged it back.

“Aw!” Lucas protested. “Whatsamatter? Think a bunch of us can’t take you on?”

“In yer dreams, kid. G’wan, keep talkin’ smack. Think yer bad? Huh?”

“I know I’m bad!” he bragged, straightening his jacket collar and profiling. Logan rolled his eyes.

“Oyyy… yer too much fer me, kid.”

The bell rang throughout the schoolyard, and the kids began to line up outside the main entrance. Logan waded through them with little to no greeting as he made his way inside.

He stopped when he smelled something artificial and suspiciously strawberry. He paused and tapped the shoulder of a slender, dark-haired girl running her mouth a mile a minute with two of her friends. She turned and looked up at him sheepishly.

“Hi, Logan!” she chirped.

“Out with it,” he grunted, holding up his hand.

“Aw, c’mon, that’s gross,” she complained, wrinkling her nose. She had paused in chewing the incriminating Bubble Yum as soon as she’d turned around. He gestured more emphatically with his raised palm, and she sighed.

“Ya know the rules, Wanda. No gum in school.”

“Awwww!” She took the damp pink wad from her mouth and deposited it in his hand, cringing at how unsavory it looked sitting there.

“Thank you,” he muttered as he continued his trek inside. He heard a chorus of “eeeeewww!” behind him and smirked. Better that they give up the goods to him outside, rather than end up with detention if they were caught with it inside.

Logan reached the teacher’s lounge and wadded it up in a paper towel. Once he rid himself of it, he washed his hands with the drying, antiseptic soap in the pump by the sink, glad it lacked the floral scent of the stuff in the women’s wash room.

“Logan? Did you drop off your project sheet in my inbox yet?” It was on the tip of Logan’s tongue to tell him “Check yer inbox and find out,” but he decided to go easy on Scott this morning. He nodded affably without facing him, drying his hands with another rough brown paper towel.

“Yep.”

“Thanks. Appreciate it. I meant to ask you, too, if you could buff that hallway outside the nurse’s office this morning.”

“Got a full plate, if I clean the carpet in the lounge like ya asked.”

“Could you fit it in? Even if you just lay down two coats of wax today, just to get part of it done.”

“We got big company comin’?” That was the easy assumption.

“Superintendent. Quarterly budget meeting.” That opened Logan’s eyes.

“Right. Wax. Got it.” Scott sighed.

“I think the coffee’s fresh. Want some?”

“If yer headin’ that way fer some, sure. Sounds good.” Logan followed him to his office and waded through the foot traffic of kids salvaging text books and gym clothes from their junk-stuffed lockers, grimacing at the odor from a ripe, forgotten bagged lunch. He paused by Fred Duke’s locker and made a motion with his thumb over his shoulder. “Chuck that thing before it stinks up the hall, kid.”

“Sorry, Logan.”

“Ehhhhh…” Logan made his Sunday best grimace and bulldog pose; Fred put up his dukes and pretended to go a few rounds with him before he complied, discarding the bag in the hall rubbish container. Scott chuckled from behind him before they headed inside his office. Logan silently noticed that the door pane needed Windexing when he had an opportunity.

“There’s still time for you to make it to home room,” Scott offered.

“I was never on time for home room when I was their age, either,” Logan admitted.

“They won’t listen to you if you give them too much leeway and act too much like their buddy.”

“Are ya kiddin’? Half the time they’re running scared in the other direction.” Scott chuckled and shook his head. “And that’s the assistant principal’s job.”

“Speaking of which, Emma’s out sick. Could you clean her office in the meantime?”

“Will do.” Frost was notorious for shooing him away and closing her door when Logan was vacuuming the main office, so he had a hard time getting in there.

“While I have you here,” Scott added as he booted up his computer,” I need to pencil you in for your performance eval.” Logan mentally groaned. “They’re weighting it differently this year.”


“They weight it differently every year.”

“I know. We’ll see. How about Wednesday the fifth?”

“Okay.” Logan poured himself a cup of the school’s cheap brew and blew on it, glad that it was at least hot.

That was the last moment of his day that he could actually relax.


By four o’clock that evening, Logan was frazzled, tired and starving. His Dickies pants were covered in spatters of white floor wax and his hair was disheveled; he caught his reflection in one of the door windows and grimaced. He looked like hell.

But the school looked good. The locker rooms and rest rooms smelled fresh, the hall floors sparkled and everything was in its place. The last late bus was gone from the campus, signaling that the kids playing intramurals were finally headed home.

Mac had given him his fifty back, plus an extra sandwich he’d picked up, saving Logan the trip to Moe’s. More than anything, though, Logan longed to head home and put his feet up to watch the game.

He caught the red line and read the sports page of the paper he finally picked up. That reminded him of Anna’s smart mouthed roommate’s comment from that morning. Logan tsked to himself. Commando…sheesh.

Kid struck him as a real himbo, anyway. That type was always a chick magnet. Irresponsible, carefree and way too pretty, the kind that could talk a woman out of her clothes and then talk her into a ride home the next day. Logan wondered how Anna stayed so secure knowing her roommate – Logan had no doubt in his mind that the kid was more than that – was such a night owl.

Not that it mattered to him. Logan minded his own business.

But still…kid was way too much of a flirt.


*

Logan wrinkled his nose at the familiar, slightly stale smell of the front corridor of his apartment building. But he didn’t take his work home; his landlords could take care of their own place without any interference or suggestions from him. It was ironic that Logan was such a stickler at work for keeping things neat as a pin, but once he was off the clock, he was an absolute slob. His mother would have fainted dead away if she was still alive.

He climbed the stairs, flipping through a handful of envelopes as he went, not holding onto the banister.

Upstairs, Remy stepped out into the hallway and found two of teenaged kids from the third floor, Roberto and Sam, playing with a small remote control car. Its buzzing and grinding gears made a loud racket that had been plaguing Remy all afternoon.

“C’mon, now,” he beckoned, making cutting motions across his neck, “can it. m’ tryin’ ta practice a song I’m writin’, and I can’t t’ink wit’ all dis racket.”

“It’s a free country,” Sam shrugged.

“Remy’s free ta kick yer sorry butts into next week if he don’ get no peace an’ quiet. Landlady might not appreciate it if Remy raises a noise complaint, neit’er, eh?”

“It’s no big deal,” Roberto retorted. “Go ahead.”

“Naw, forget about it, Bobby. Look, mister, howzabout this: Wanna take a turn?”

Remy wasn’t expecting a lack of resistance.

The remote control in Sam’s hands looked tempting.

Moments later, he was guiding the small car in hairpin turns around the corridor while both boys cheered him on. “Can dis t’ing do donuts?”

“You don’t know how to drive, here, lemme show ya!” Sam teased.

“Non, ya let it go, don’ ‘spect Remy ta give it back, now!” They continued to smack talk and the car continued its wild path until Remy gave a left turn too much “oomph.”

The car careened down the stairs.

“Ooooh!” Roberto and Sam winced in unison.

The car bounced down the stairs. A wise person would’ve wanted to watch their step and hold onto the banister, or even keep their eyes open for someone – or something – coming from the opposite direction.

Remy dashed over to the rail when he heard a familiar low, scratchy voice humming what sounded like a Fabulous Thunderbirds song. The boys flanked his sides, suddenly wearing identical “oh, shit!” expressions.

“Mec, be careful, watch-“

“GAH! SHI-“

CRASH! THUMP, THUMP, WHUMP!

“…out,” Remy finished helplessly.

That answered his question. The car didn’t do donuts.