REALITY STRIKES

Xander made stupid noises as he rummaged through the bottles on the table for the one that still had alcohol in it. He caught one that still had a little bit of alcohol in it, but it was at the bottom. He stuck out his tongue, shaking the bottle in his mouth, but only a drop touched his dried tongue. "Argghh!!" he screamed in frustration and pushed all the bottles on the table to the floor, some of them breaking in the process. He felt dizzy and wasted; his eyes were extremely red, and his head went out of his control and landed on the table with a great thud. He groaned in pain, closing his eyes as he sat there, drifting to sleep.

Melody was in a taxi with her boyfriend; the taxi was driving through the streets of one of the major cities in Canada, Toronto. Melody was looking out the window of the taxi. The beautiful but windy atmosphere around her added to the uncanny mood. Melody was extremely happy that she was finally living a dream; she was out of Florida, where she had lived her whole life. She couldn’t wait to settle down and enjoy the place. It was an early November afternoon there in Toronto, and she could see snowflakes like crystals slowly descending from the sky, which made her place her hand on the window.

"You like what you see? I told you it was a good thing to get out of the US entirely; you wanted to go to Las Vegas." Her boyfriend said behind her. "If we had gone there, it would have been easy for the queen you stole from to find you; that’s why you have to use your brain sometimes." He added.

"Do you mean I don’t use my brain?" she asked.

"No, no, no, that’s not what I meant; just forget I even said that and just enjoy the view." He said.

"I would love to see how Christmas is celebrated here." She said with a smile. "First, let's get settled in our new apartment." He remarked as he moved closer to her, wrapping his hand around her waist and hugging her from behind, closing his eyes as he inhaled her fragrance.

******

The morning sun took its place in the sky, waking a lot of people from their sleep to get ready for work. Xander was still fast asleep with his head on the table. It was a bad sleeping posture, but he couldn’t feel it because of how drunk he was.

The loud sound of his doorbell got into his head as he forced his eyes open and realized he had been sleeping like that all night. He grunted in pain and slowly got up on his feet, stretching his muscles that were starting to hurt. The person at the door kept ringing the doorbell; the noise was quite annoying for Xander, who was having a splitting headache because of the alcohol. "I am coming." He said slowly ambling to the door with heavy feet.

He rested his hand on the wall close to his door and peered through the spy hole. His heart skipped a beat as he saw that it was the owner of his apartment. He wasn’t expecting to see him because his rent was due in two weeks. He opened the door after getting another ring from the angry landlord. His landlord glared at him and forced his way into his house. He stared at Xander from top to bottom; his body reeked of alcohol, and he smelled awful. Seeing him in his shorts made him look at Xander in a disgusted manner.

"Greetings, sir, what brings you here?" Xander asked, massaging his head with his hand.

"I am here because I won’t be available when you want to make your next payment, so I want you to pay it now." He said.

"Huh? Why?" Xander asked, blinking his eyes.

"Because I am going out of town for a while, and I want you to pay your rent early now that I am still here so I can give you a receipt before I go." He said. Xander snorted; he felt like the whole world was against him—first he lost his job, and now his landlord was asking for an early payment.

"I am sorry, I can’t pay now... I’m going through a lot lately, and I don’t have enough money to pay in advance." Xander explained to the landlord, who frowned immediately. "You will have to look for a way to pay me or else you will lose your apartment after your rent expires." He threatened Xander. Xander felt miserable. He covered his eyes with one hand, not sure what to do. "I have lost…" Xander couldn’t bring himself to tell him that he had lost his job because it would give him more reason to kick him out of his house. "Don’t worry, I will try my best to send you the money one of these days." Xander assured the landlord.

A smile curled on the once-angry face of the landlord as he tapped Xander on the shoulder. "I will be waiting for the money, kiddo. Have a nice day." He said and showed himself out of the house. Xander clutched his hair to the point of yanking it off his head. He got a grip on himself and headed to the kitchen after drinking a hangover pill, he went to his room, opened his laptop, sat on his bed with it, and started searching for job opportunities that were available for him online. He spent hours looking for a job, but no one was ready to accept him, not even online jobs. They would act as if they wanted to give him a job, but when they saw his portfolio, they changed their minds.

He was a graduate and had only worked in the police department. His phone beeped, and he saw that it was a message from an unknown number. He opened the message and was shocked at what he saw. "You won’t find a job just give up and come to the queen she is waiting for you." That was the content of the message. "Ugh! Who is this fucking queen?!? Why is she set on ruining my life? What have I done to deserve this?" he shouted, jumping down from the bed.