Vacant

by Alex Hughes

  Her thoughts settled, from chaos to a single thought. I hadn’t been there. And if I wasn’t showing up for her in some ways—though the thought of sex that meant something terrified her—she felt like I should be there for her otherwise.

  “It’s nothing,” she said.

  “Don’t be a liar,” I said, my voice too hard. I was frustrated myself, it looked like. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here—I really am—but I’m here now and there’s a kid still alive because I was gone. You have to work with me here. I work with you plenty.” She hadn’t fallen apart, had she? I’d made the right choice!

  “Don’t call me a liar,” she said, and I felt the anger rise in her again. But the anger scared her—I got a picture of the trial, and people calling her all sorts of names, calling her anger the enemy. She breathed, feeling trapped, angry, and ashamed of being angry all at once.

  “I’m here now,” I said, feeling very, very guilty all on my own.

  “Take the couch,” she said finally, words bitter and broken. “You drove all this way. I’m not sending you back out. But you’re not sleeping in my bed.”

  I flinched. “Does this mean we’re over?” I asked, knowing it was the wrong thing to say, unable to keep myself from saying it. I was exhausted, and I’d been afraid of this the whole drive up. Eager to see her and worried she’d be destroyed and afraid she’d turn me away. Again.

  She breathed, stared at me, swallowed an agreement to the question. She finally settled on “I need space, okay? I don’t know what else. I don’t know. I just don’t.” Her world was falling apart.

  I closed my eyes. That wasn’t a yes, but it wasn’t any certainty either. “If you’re just trying to drop me politely . . . ,” I said. I was disappointed, horribly, horribly disappointed, but I’d known this might happen for months.

  “You want me to do that?” she yelled, stepping closer to me. “You want me to end this and walk away? Would that make you happy?”

  “No.” I shook my head, too much emphasis, but I didn’t care. “No, that’s not it at all.”

  The tension sat between us for one long moment, and then she broke.

  “Then give me my damn space,” she said. “Let me figure out my whole damn life before you go screwing with me, okay?”

  “You can have the space, but—”

  She cut me off. “I mean, you can’t just not show up, not be here, and still expect me to totally trust you when it comes to the PI business. You have to earn this shit.”

  I just looked at her. “Wait. We’re opening a PI business?” I’d thought that was off the table. I’d thought everything was off the table, and it had hurt. To hear different now . . .

  “Yeah,” she said. “And I need some space to figure this out. It’s my whole life, Adam. My whole life . . . my whole life was that police force, and you weren’t there. It doesn’t matter why. It doesn’t. That’s what’s the truth right now. And I’m not sure I can do business and personal both right now.”

  I took a breath. I’d have her in my life however she’d let me. I had no pride when it came to Cherabino, no damn pride at all. “So the personal . . . ?” I needed to hear her say it. I needed the hope to be gone if it was going to be. I needed the hope to be completely gone, if I had any chance of getting past this.

  “Not now,” she said, and laughed, a dark, angry sound. “Give me until we figure out this PI thing, okay?”

  “I don’t know what that means,” I said, hating the sound of my own voice then. I was so tired, but even this tired, even this guilty, I wouldn’t beg.

  She frowned at me. “You’re being an idiot. I’m not breaking up with you. I just need space, okay?”

  A sense of relief washed over me, a tangible thing, relief and disappointment mixed. “Sure,” I said. “Sure, take all the space you need.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Two weeks later

  “It’s too small,” Isabella said, looking around.

  “It’s what we can afford. This could really work,” I insisted.

  We stood in a vacant office space about the size of my tiny apartment, a single room with a dividing half wall, ancient stained carpet, and concrete walls. But the ceilings were high, the exposed pipes industrial in an interesting way—even if they were old and clearly functional—and there were huge windows behind us pooling sunlight into the space. The overwhelming smell was sunlight, with a hint of old stains. It was just right for what we needed.

  Isabella turned. “What, are we supposed to entertain clients in the main room where everybody can hear?”

  “What everybody?” I said. “It’s you and me. Maybe a receptionist on a good day to take phone calls, you know, once we get enough cases. But it’s not like we’ll be fighting for space. We can actually afford this one.”

  She made a hmrph sound. “What’s the bathroom like anyway?”

  The building manager, a plain woman with a very tall hairdo with a flower in it, pointed out the small door on the far wall. There were two doors, and the bathroom was the one on the right, apparently.

  “I thought that was a closet,” Isabella said. But she followed the Realtor to the bathroom. After a moment, she came out. “It’s disgusting. But at least it has a shower.” A necessity for the workaholic Isabella, who had been known to sleep at the department more than once during heavy workloads. And she could clean the dirt.

  “How much is it?” she demanded of the building manager.

  I took a breath of relief. She’d made up her mind. Finally.

  The manager named a price just barely within the budget we’d talked about. Isabella objected loudly. They started negotiating, Isabella’s mind quietly happy in the process.

  I took a deep breath, feeling the open sky above the office, the quiet minds of the accountants below us, an artist’s studio on the right with blobby emotions like splotches of paint. I could work here, and work well. The sunlight hit my back, warming my bones. This would do well for the PI office. And she was happy. I’d cut off my hand to make her happy, even if it didn’t get me what I wanted in return.

  I adjusted my stance, settling the left arm in the sling better, the right hand in my pocket. Then I felt it. The paper that Fiske had given me, crumpled within the pocket. His death threat was still outstanding, still out there, and I hadn’t told Isabella.

  I hadn’t even told Swartz.

  Isabella and the manager reached an agreement, and Isabella turned to me with a smile. “We’ll take it,” she said.

  I forced a smile to echo hers. “We’ll take it.”

  We took care of the paperwork together, her shoulder brushing mine, her happy mind warming me like a fire in some clever cabin, almost enough. But when we got the keys and walked into the empty space, I felt it.

  An overwhelming sense of loss, from her.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  “I’m fine.” Her voice cut me off. She’d cut me off all too much these past weeks.

  I turned to her and put my right hand on her shoulder. She let it stay, let it stay for the first time since that day, that day I’d shown up at her door after she’d been fired.

  I half hugged her then, hope blooming like an insidious flower, a thing of heartbreak and possibility. Maybe she’d let me in again, eventually. Maybe. “This’ll work out,” I told her. “Even Swartz says this will work out.”

  I’d have her in my life however she’d let me, I told myself.

  “It had better,” she said. And she didn’t pull away, even though she didn’t move closer either.

  With the sunlight falling on the empty space, I thought, it had to work out. Even with that crumpled piece of paper in my pocket, and all that she’d lost. All that I’d lost.

  This was a brand-new, empty space, and we could fill it with what we wanted.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Alex Hughes has written since ea
rly childhood, and loves great stories in any form, including sci-fi, fantasy, and mystery. Over the years, Alex has lived in many neighborhoods of the sprawling metro Atlanta area. Alex Huges grew up in Savannah, where Vacant takes place.