Ch. 3: Part 4

"Hey, Leo!"
It was Abel. Again. I mean, I couldn't quite bring myself to hate him. I didn't think anybody could hate Abel. He was so nice.
"Hey." I gave a little half smile in spite of myself. I couldn't help it.
"You wanna get a drink after work?" He asked with enthusiasm. It had caught my attention that Jonah had must of not mentioned my age to anyone, because this was about the third time in a week Abel had asked me to hang out at Larry's after work. And I wasn't about to leak the information if he hadn't.
"Uh, no thanks."
Abel cocked his head and raised an eyebrow. "You know what, Leo? You work to much."
I just shrugged. He let out a good chuckle. "In a small town like this, I try to get in all the fun I can."
I just shrugged again and he shook his head at me, but went back to his saw with a whistle.
After a couple days of Hank's instruction, I had started my labor, cutting the log to specifications. I got paid by the cut, which was fine by me because I never stopped working.
Maybe Abel was right. Maybe I worked to much. But, what else was I supposed to do? Not only had this job served it's purpose by providing me with income, it also kept me busy. That had been an added bonus I hadn't asked for. Logging gave me something to do and I was grateful to it.
I just tried to keep my mind off the fact that I was working to live and living to work. Without doing much of the living. I kept telling myself that I just needed to get my feet underneath me and then I could work on sorting everything out.
Breathing first, then the living part.
But, if I stopped kidding myself for a couple seconds, I would realize that I was scared shitless of figuring anything out. I wasn't ready to face what my life would actually become once I stopped to look at it. A cruel, strange something had thrown me off my course and I had lost my direction. And I was terrified of finding a new one.