Still, when I met Cohen, I was surprised at how average he was. And after last night with his brother, I can’t even connect the Fairfields I know with the ones I always thought I did.
My ride-share arrives. I ask the driver who he’s here for; he says, “Mary.” Close enough.
The entire drive, I think about last night. Levi delivered a combination I’m not sure I’ve ever had: thoroughly satisfied, yet aching unbearably for more. I know exactly what I’ll be doing when I get home.
“Uh-oh. This your building?”
I snap out of my mental sex show. “Huh?” The driver points ahead through the windshield.
A fire truck is parked in front of my loft.
“Shit.” I unbuckle and lean between the front seats, struggling to see past the police cruisers on the perimeter. “Can you get any closer?”
“Sorry, road’s blocked up there. I’m going to have to turn over at the Boulevard and circle around.” He pauses, looking at me in the rearview. “Want me to take you somewhere else?”
“No.” I gather my stuff without looking away from the building. “This is fine. Thanks.”
My feet are killing me as I wind through the roadblocks and onlookers. A policeman intercepts; I dig out my ID to prove I live here. He hesitates, then lets me through.
The building was once a factory, reincarnated through the years. In its current life, it’s a bunch of industrial lofts. Painted across the front is an old bottling plant logo. At least, it used to be.
Black streaks weep across the paint and raw brick. I follow the lines to their source.
My window. My unit.
“Sir?” I grab a firefighter’s arm as he passes. “What…. This is my—my….” My breath balls itself up and tunnels into my chest. I can’t bear to ask.
He tilts his head. My expression must have asked for me.
No one was hurt, he says, which I know is good. No matter how horrible a disaster is, you have to take solace in the fact everyone came out okay. But the more he talks, the faster I forget about silver linings and counting blessings.
Source: unknown. Damage: extensive. Units totally destroyed: mine.
“I’m sorry,” he offers, and helps me sit when it becomes obvious I’m on the verge of a breakdown. My mind spins through an inventory of everything in the loft. My clothes, my computer. Hundreds of dollars, maybe thousands, in makeup and hair dye. My jazz records. My perfume bottles.
My curling iron.
Did I turn it off? Yes. Yes, I had to. I always do.
So why can’t I remember doing it?
“Your renter’s insurance should cover it,” he says. While I struggle to explain the fact I never bothered getting insurance, he goes on. “Your landlord tried to call you....”
I think of my phone dying, chiming from my purse on the rooftop.
I think of those sirens we heard, just before we fell asleep.
“Do you have somewhere else to stay?”
My eyes lock on the firefighter’s boots as they crunch the asphalt. There’s extinguished ash all over the place. The air reeks of charred wood.
“I’ll figure it out,” I tell him, and force a smile so he’ll leave me alone. Truth is, I have no idea where to go. All I’ve got now is my purse, my fanciest outfit, and a crop of new blisters on my feet.
But when I straighten my shoulders and look back up at the building—that scarred brick, the black cavity where my home used to be—I feel weirdly okay. I will figure it out.
Once upon a time, I started with even less.
7
“Still nothing?”
I shake my head and pass Cohen another beer. Juliet’s dropping their daughter off with her sister, then they’re jetting off for their honeymoon in Orlando. We’ve spent the afternoon nursing our wedding hangovers on my deck, watching golfers on the course behind the house.
“I’ve gotten a few responses,” I tell him, “but two guys never showed for the interview, and four have been...less than ideal.”
“Not that it’s any of my business, but can you afford to wait for the ‘ideal’ roommate? Whatever that means.” He flicks his cap into the empty flowerpot by the railing.
“By ‘less than ideal,’ I mean jobless and/or carless. One suggested a schedule so we could share my truck. He was completely baffled when I didn’t jump all over that plan.”
Cohen snorts. “Okay, I’ll give you those.” He pauses. “I’m just saying…business hasn’t exactly been booming lately.”
“Don’t remind me.” Fairfield Party Suppliers, once my pride and joy, lumbers along from month to month now like a reanimated corpse. It’s entirely my fault; ever since the divorce finalized, I haven’t given the business one tenth of the attention I used to.
“If you need to cut my hours or something, I understand.” He scratches his head and studies a guy’s backswing in the distance. “Until you get things rolling again.”
“No way. When a business succeeds, the owner gets most of the profits—so why would it be any different for losses? It should be me who feels the hit, not you guys.” I swig my beer. “And it’s my fault, anyway. I’ve slacked off so much since that shit with Lindsay started.”
“Maybe this is a good thing, though.” Cohen props his feet on an overturned bucket. “Scaling the business back down. You were working twenty-four seven for years. Isn’t it kind of nice, having days off again?”
“Not if I lose my house,” I quip, but it falls flat. I’m not even sure why I fought Lindsay in court for this place. It’s too big, more her style than mine, and too expensive, even when money was pouring in. The only thing I like about it, in fact, is this: sitting on my deck and watching golf, the smell of grass in the air and the taste of beer on my tongue.
“I’d better get going,” he says, standing as he drains his beer. We slap hands, then pull each other in for a quick hug. “Glad I found you, man.”
I nod, but don’t say anything. No one has any idea where I was last night, or with whom. Cohen assumes I got too drunk and stumbled upstairs after the cake-cutting. When he knocked on my door this morning so we could pack up our supplies from the reception, he stepped back and pulled his shirt over his face, bitching that I smelled like booze and B.O. I wondered if that was why Mara took off without saying goodbye—then quickly realized that was just her style. After all, she’d told me from the start it was only for one night.
I walk Cohen to his truck and watch him back out with painstaking care. Used to be he’d whip out of driveways and parking lots like a bat out of hell. A lot’s changed in two years.
“Hope the honeymoon’s fun,” I call. “Try not to knock her up again.”
He laughs and gives me the finger through his open window. “No promises.”
My house is even quieter than before he arrived. I fall onto the couch and turn up the television. The cat wanders past; I call him to me, but he decides the square of sunlight in front of the window is more appealing. Either that, or my twenty-minute shower this morning wasn’t adequate.
I’m not sure when I fall asleep, but it’s dusk when I wake. A migraine commercial blasts through the speakers, which seems eerily targeted to me. Not to mention ironically cruel.
Then I notice the sound that actually woke me: my doorbell.
“Hang on a sec.” I pause in the front hall. My reflection’s a sorry sight: circles under my eyes, hair flattened on one side, and shirt wrinkled from four days in the dryer.
Fuck it. Nothing I can do to improve the image in less than two seconds. And I doubt whoever’s on my porch would mind seeing me like this, if they’re rolling in at dinnertime. I open the door.
It’s Mara. Like another missile-targeted ad campaign, delivered right to my doorstep.
“Hi.” I look behind her. She’s alone, not even a car in sight. “Um....”
“What am I doing here?” she asks, giving this laugh I somehow know isn’t real. She’s in stiff-looking jeans, spotless white sneakers, and a T-shirt that sti
ll has the size sticker running down the side. In her hands are her pocketbook from last night, a shopping bag stuffed with clothes, and a piece of paper. It’s this she gives me, instead of an answer.
It’s a copy of my roommate ad, printed in streaked blue ink.
8
“It’s not like you’re my first choice.” I slide the soda he offers me closer and pick at the tab. “Which isn’t against you or whatever—I’m just saying, I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t my only option.” The listing crinkles under my elbow on his kitchen table. “Even if it’s just a few weeks, you’d be helping me out a lot.”
Levi sighs and takes a long blink. “I’ve only got one extra room. Two if I give up my office, which I’d rather not do. And if you’re in it, but somebody long-term applies—”
“A month.” I crack the soda and sip. “That’s all I need. And it’s the amount of time it takes to find, interview, and approve someone else, right? Assuming they apply, like...tomorrow.” Now I unveil my first nuclear attack. “Which seems kind of unlikely, since I heard from Cohen you’re not getting many offers.”
His jaw sets, but the way he rubs his forehead tells me I haven’t angered him. He just hates that I’m right.
“And,” I add, opening my pocketbook, “I’ve got the rent, right now.” He stares at the money I hold out to him. “Cash.”
Slowly, he flips the edges of the bills with his thumb.
“Count it, if you want. It’s exactly what the ad said.”
He nods, but sets the money back on the table between us.
“I guess,” he says, after a minute, “I’m just confused. Why would you want to stay with somebody you barely know? Wouldn’t you be more comfortable in a...a motel, or something?”
If I could stop myself from bristling, I would. “I don’t do motels. Ever.”
Levi holds up his hands with a tired expression, like I’m high-maintenance. Fine. I’ve never been one to beg.
“Forget it.” I put the money back into my purse and stand. “You needed roommates, I needed a place until my tips at work pick up...just thought it was a win-win, that’s all.” On my way to the door, I look at him over my shoulder. “Hope you find someone soon.”
His chair scrapes the tiles as he follows me. “Well, hang on. I didn’t say no.”
“You couldn’t be more unenthusiastic about this,” I laugh, turning to face him in the foyer. “Look, really...it’s okay. You don’t want a temporary roommate. I get it.”
“You’re right, though. Temporary is better than nothing. And...and I need the money.” A faint blush paints his cheeks, and he puts his hands in his pockets. “Business always, uh...slows down, in the fall.”
I feel kind of bad, ragging on him about how much he needs my money, even if it’s true. “Don’t forget,” I add, “you’d be helping out a displaced fire victim.”
His smile flashes. “That, too.”
I look around. The place is nice: newish construction, contemporary, lots of space. Not my style, but definitely doable for a few weeks.
It wasn’t a lie when I told him he wasn’t my first choice; I’ve spent the last twelve hours combing rental guides and online listings, but no one’s answering their phones on a Sunday. Juliet and Cohen are on their honeymoon, and who’d want to crowd a couple newlyweds, anyway? A nice hotel could work for a few days, but I’d be broke long before I saved first and last months’ rents.
Besides—I like the idea of helping Levi as much as he’s helping me. Tit for tat. In addition to motels, I don’t do charity. It’s why I refused the free hotel room the Red Cross offered me. Would it have made this day a hell of a lot easier? Yes. Would it have also made me feel two inches tall and absolutely pathetic? Hell, yes.
“In that case,” I say, setting down my bag of hastily-purchased clothes with a flourish, “say hello to your new roommate.”
“And this is yours.” I stop in the doorway of the guest bedroom while Mara paces around it. “Bathroom’s across the hall, there are clean towels in your closet…I already showed you the laundry room....” My voice trails. “I guess that’s it.”
She sits on the edge of the bed and bounces. “It’s nice. Thanks.”
“Thank you.” I pat the pocket with my wallet, where her money now resides. First thing tomorrow, I can catch up on my mortgage. This whole idea still has me wary, but the cash-upfront thing helps, for sure.
We’re quiet a few seconds, Mara running her hand over the bedspread, me pretending to check the paint on her doorframe.
“You’re probably exhausted. With the fire, and everything.” I back into the hall and wave, about to wish her goodnight, when she laughs and flops back on the bed.
“Yeah, right. I’ve got about a gallon of adrenaline, after this morning.” Her eyes slide shut. For the first time since she arrived, even when she told me about her apartment, her face takes on a tinge of sadness.
“Did you lose anything irreplaceable?” I hover in the doorway, one foot in her room. “Sentimental things?”
“Just about everything I owned was sentimental.” The sadness ebbs away as she snorts. “The messed-up thing is, I just did a huge purge last month, culling shit down to only what I really cared about. The whole minimalist deal. Now I’m as minimalist as they come.” One of her eyes cracks open, finds me, and closes again as she scoots closer to the foot of the bed. She pats the mattress.
I hesitate, then sit.
“Know what I miss the most, though?” She looks at me. “It was these shitty, dried-out markers I hadn’t touched in years. In a Crown Royal bag. Top shelf of my wardrobe.”
“They didn’t work?”
“Not even a little.”
“Then why’d you keep them?”
“Because it was easier than letting them go.” Mara rolls off the foot of the bed and stands, groaning as she stretches. “I’m guessing you wouldn’t remember those old Pageant Girl dolls?”
I shake my head. She sighs and bites her thumbnail.
“Okay, well—they were these dolls. Kind of expensive, had about ten thousand accessories you of course had to buy separately...but my mom and I loved them. They were our thing, you know? And...and the markers, they went with my favorite doll, Kiki. You could draw on her little denim overalls, then take them off and wash them, and just start over.” Her mouth twitches with a smile, then seems to right itself. “Anyway...that’s what I miss the most. Those stupid old markers. Which tells you a lot about what a packrat I am. Was. And a senseless one, at that.”
“If it helps, I’m not so great at minimalism, myself.”
“This place does still look like a woman lives here,” she adds, cringing, like telling me the truth hurts her more than me.
Thing is, it doesn’t hurt me at all. I know my house looks almost no different than when Lindsay lived here. A little more room, sure, but the furniture, décor, paint colors: it’s still what Lindsay chose, the year we moved in.
A forgotten urge to turn this into a joke, the way my brother does—the way I used to—takes over.
“Are you saying my tastes are feminine? That bedspread is a genuine Kate Spade, I’ll have you know.”
Mara laughs with her head thrown back, unbound, teeth shining in the recessed lights like that night at the hospital. It makes me laugh too, happy just to hear it.
“This is gonna be fun,” she winks, falling back onto the bed when I rise. “I’ve actually really missed living with other people.”
“Same,” I tell her, and then marvel at how easily this answer came about. You never notice how little space you need until you have to fill it by yourself.
“About last night,” she calls, after I’ve waved again and turned into the hall, “I want you to know...to me, that and this are totally separate.” I hear her take a breath as I face her again. “Like, what happened between us, that was its own thing. One night. And what’s happening now, that’s its own thing.”
“Oh.” For whatever reason, my neck and face grow warm.
“You look confused.”
“No, I get what you’re saying. I just don’t get why you said it. We already agreed last night was it.”
“Right, no. I mean, I know you know that. I wanted to make sure we…still agreed, that’s all.”
It’s a little insulting she felt the need to remind me of our parameters. As though she expects me to get crazy and clingy, simply because I’m divorced. Like marriage was a drug and I’m in withdrawal, looking anywhere for the fix.
“Yep. Well, we do.” Before she can say something else, I put my hands in my pockets and start for my room. “Goodnight.”
She doesn’t say it back until I’m at the end of the hall. It’s the quietest response I’ve ever heard her give.
9
My first night in Levi’s house, I dream about him.
It’s not a sex dream. I wish it was. For all my talk of keeping things separate before he gets needy, a dirty dream or two would serve me well, right about now.
Instead, I’m in the middle of my loft with a curling iron in one hand, the Crown Royal bag with Kiki’s old markers in the other. The exposed brick and polished concrete around me are a clean, crackling white. My brain doesn’t even question it.
Slowly, I touch the curling iron to the corner of the bag. It ignites.
Like a Molotov cocktail, I send the whole thing spiraling into the center of the loft. Black creases and scars weep outward from where it lands, a choking ivy across the floor, the walls, the ceiling. Over my feet. Up my legs. The flames dancing on the surface are see-through blue.
A hand clasps mine, still poised in the air from the pitch.
“You’ve got to get out of here,” Levi says. Over the tunneling wind of the fire, his voice holds steady. I don’t trust mine to do the same.
He starts away from me, still holding my hand, but I don’t move.
My last thought is whether I should follow, or stay and watch it all burn. On my bureau, one by one, the perfume bottles burst.
Honey, When It Ends: The Fairfields | Book Two Page 5