“This is for me?” I asked, putting down my sandwich and wiping my hands on a paper napkin so I could accept it from him.
“It’s my old phone. I had them add a second line to my service and activate it for you.” His voice was offhand, casual. He didn’t want to make a big deal about it, I could tell. I turned it over in my hands and pressed the on button.
“Wow. That’s incredibly thoughtful of you,” I said, slightly overwhelmed by the gesture in spite of his nonchalance. “Of course I’ll cover the costs… Just let me know what I owe you.”
“Sure. I won’t be charged until next month, so don’t worry about it for now.”
“Thanks so much, Peter—I really missed having a phone.”
“I didn’t like not being able to reach you today.” I watched the little Apple appear on the screen without speaking, replaying the words in my head. “I mean, it isn’t a tether, or anything,” Peter assured me quickly, as if he’d sensed the direction of my mind. “You’re under no obligation—this isn’t so I can keep tabs on you or something like that.” It was the most flustered I’d seen him. My tiny spark of unease having been quelled, I waited, smiling internally, watching him over-explain. “I just thought you’d want to be able to call people, or use your email—especially since we’re going out of town—and I knew your cousin had taken yours. You don’t ha—”
I finally couldn’t contain myself and laughed, interrupting him.
“I know, you sweet man. I get it—and I’m thrilled to have it.”
I leaned over and hugged him tightly to show my gratitude, cradling the precious new device in one careful hand. I wasn’t letting this phone out of my sight.
Chapter 8
“This is it?” Peter asked, staring up at the brick building beside us.
“I… think so,” I said uncertainly, gazing with him and trying hard to match it with the picture in my mind. “It was definitely on this street…”
The problem was, the street didn’t look anything like I expected. Gentrification had evidently overtaken this once-industrial neighborhood, which I remembered as being shabby and neglected, flyblown windows giving dim views of closed businesses, empty warehouses with broken panes in the leaded glass. On our walk here from the nearby light rail station, we’d passed two hip, sleek cafés, several trendy restaurants and a number of expensive-looking boutiques, along with large manufacturing buildings converted into high-priced urban apartments. One of these was the building we were looking at.
“I remember the door,” I said with more conviction as we approached it. “It’s the same door, except it’s been painted and cleaned, and all this is new.” I gestured at the extremely shiny modern panel that had replaced the old, tarnished buzzers. We looked at it together. It offered a keypad and speaker, nothing else.
“What apartment number was it?”
“Four. I think. There were four floors—and it took up the whole top floor.”
“Well, here goes nothing,” Peter said, and pressed the number four. We waited. Nothing happened.
“Maybe you need to hit the pound key, or something,” I suggested. Peter tried a few combinations of keys, and still nothing happened. I suddenly felt very, very tired.
It was just after eight on Monday morning, probably the worst time possible to show up at a stranger’s door. Our trip had gone smoothly so far: light traffic on the way to the airport, a parking spot on the fifth floor of the nearby BART station garage, plenty of time for check-in and security. We ate dinner at a grill in the terminal, only realizing halfway through the mediocre and expensive meal that it was our first time eating dinner out together. Of course, we only met three days ago, so there were a lot of first times to check off, it was just odd to have our first official dinner date be at an airport restaurant.
Our flight left on time, and I actually fell asleep for a few hours, soothed by the glasses of red wine I drank at dinner and on the plane. I woke up with a stiff body and a sour taste in my mouth, feeling exactly like I was awake at three o’clock in the morning, when we landed just after six. I seemed to see and hear everything through a kind of tunnel. Peter was quiet and composed, not the most entertaining traveling companion, but a restful one. He spent most of the time before and during the flight on his iPad, reading what looked like magazines or illustrated books.
He also ate a lot of the candy I’d brought, and we finished the last of the subs.
At the train terminal near the airport, we got a locker for our carry-ons and figured out the best way to get to the neighborhood where Marianne had lived. Light rail seemed like the quickest and most convenient option. I couldn’t find the address in any old emails or address books, but did remember the street name, and fortunately it wasn’t a very major or long street. After a pricey and delicious artisan breakfast sandwich and strong coffee at the first hip café we passed near the light rail stop, we started walking.
It was a muggy late spring morning, overcast and already warm. I’d taken off my jacket and slung it over my purse, and Peter had tied his sweatshirt around his waist. The clothes I’d brought—two pairs of jeans and a couple of different shirts—might not be light enough if the weather continued this way.
We stood at the door another minute or two without any response, both of us reluctant to leave now that we were here. Probably because I was exhausted, I felt flattened and let down. I’d been fully aware that our chances of success were slim. I’d even expected that we wouldn’t have any luck finding someone to talk to, if we found the building at all. But all the same, I was aware of a sinking sensation in my stomach, an impulse to burst into stormy tears.
“We’ll come back later,” Peter was saying, though I could tell he felt the same sense of disappointment. But really, what else did we think would happen?
“’Scuse me,” someone said impatiently behind me.
Without thinking I stepped out of the way, and a twenty-something blonde woman in bright workout gear walking a beautiful Dalmatian passed between us and reached for the keypad, quickly punching in numbers, which opened the door with a discreet buzz.
“Excuse us,” Peter said quickly, “could we ask you about a previous tenant?”
She paused in the doorway, visibly torn between annoyance at being stopped and curiosity at his question. It was clever of him to say that immediately—if he’d asked to speak to her without saying why, we’d be staring at a closed door by now. She looked at us for the first time, relaxing noticeably as she took in our ordinary clothes and lack of clipboards or fliers.
“I guess—I’m in kind of a hurry, though.”
“We’re looking for information about some people who lived here five or six years ago, before it was remodeled,” he explained fluidly, “they would have been on the top floor—a large group of people.”
We could see we’d caught her interest. She stepped a little further outside, pulling the well-mannered and obedient dog with her, and allowed the door to shut.
“I moved in after that, but I heard about them,” she said. “It’s the same owner—the same family, anyway. There were, like, ten or twelve of them all in some kind of cult, right?”
“Something like that. Our friend might have lived with them for a while, we’re trying to find her,” he said.
“Huh. I heard they were really sketchy—drugs and orgies. I mean, it could just be gossip, but I heard about it from the son—he took over managing the place—and he said he’d been inside and seen some weird stuff. I think they were evicted.”
“Sounds like the right people,” I said, speaking for the first time.
“Could you tell us how to contact the owner?” Peter asked.
“Sure—Napoletti Properties. You should be able to look them up, they’re in Jersey City.”
“That really helps—thanks so much,” I said.
She nodded and typed in her code again. When she’d gone inside, we moved back down the street, my spirits suddenly soaring as high as they had plummeted a few minute
s ago. It was irrational, but I couldn’t help it. We paused by a bus stop and Peter pulled out his phone.
“Here they are—their address is on West Side Avenue. What do you think—should we call, or try to see someone in person?”
“I feel like they’ll be more likely to talk to us if we go in person,” I said. “What do you think?”
“I think you’re right. Well, next stop: Jersey City.”
We walked back the way we’d come.
■ ■ ■
After getting our bags from the terminal, we made our way to Newark Penn Station and caught a train that dropped us off half an hour later at Journal Square. From there it was an easy mile or so walk to the address of Napoletti Properties. We stopped and got coffees to go at Starbucks at the square, sipping them as we walked. I started to feel more awake now that the caffeine was kicking in and my breakfast had digested. I’d felt chatty on the train ride, so Peter had obligingly set aside his tablet and talked with me.
“How old were you when you got married?” I asked.
“Twenty-four. I was too young to know if was the right choice,” he said easily. “Kathe is a few years older than I am. I wouldn’t say she pushed me into it, but it was definitely something she wanted more than I did.”
“How long had you been together?”
“Not long—about a year. We met at the University of Arizona and moved in together as soon as I graduated.”
“And it lasted three years?”
“More like two and a half. She finished her Master’s degree and started at the Police Academy while I drifted around trying to figure myself out. Eventually she got tired of running our lives and her career at the same time and I got tired of being mothered. We just weren’t a good match.”
I liked it when people could be philosophical about past relationships, no matter how they ended. More often than not, the guys I dated were bitter, rude or dismissive (or, worse, a combination of all three) about past girlfriends, and that kind of negativity had become a definite turnoff. Peter’s version of events sounded reasonably fair to both sides; plus I already knew they were still on good terms, to the point that he called her for advice and she willingly gave it. I’d tried to remain cordial with my exes, too—though most of my relationships weren’t long enough for us to really establish the same social circles, so we generally didn’t make it past the “taking some time apart” phase and just stopped communicating altogether.
“What about you? Any ex-husbands I should know about?” Peter was asking.
“Oh, sure—far too many to remember,” I said breezily. “Fortunately they all died in their sleep. So convenient.”
“Leaving you a rich widow several times over? Outstanding. I knew my luck was in when I saw you sitting by that bicycle on the beach. Seriously, though… Any live-ins or long-term significant others I can feel hostile and jealous over?”
“Not really. My longest relationship was about two years, in and out of college, but we never lived together. I was finishing up at San Francisco State and he was working on launching a startup, which took most of his time. Eventually we just sort of got too busy to see each other.”
“Were you living in the city?”
“In the South Bay—that’s where I grew up. I lived with my parents in San Mateo, and then on my own in South San Francisco. After graduation I worked at Cisco for a while in an entry-level position.”
“That’s a good gig,” he commented, impressed. “You didn’t want to stay and move up the ranks?”
“When my mom was diagnosed, I moved back home to take care of her,” I said. “Everything sort of got… put on hold for a few years. Once she was gone…”
“You moved to LA,” he finished.
“Yeah. My dad decided he was going to sell their townhouse and move into senior living apartments, and I just couldn’t seem to face staying and seeing everything go at once.”
Peter looked out the train window for a minute, holding my hand.
“I lost my mom to cancer, too,” he said. “My dad wasn’t around much—they split up when I was seven and Delia and I stayed with our mom. Our dad moved to Boise and eventually remarried and had three more kids. They’re a nice family. We didn’t see a lot of them—it just wasn’t convenient. We spent a couple of summer vacations with them, but it’s been a while since we all got together.”
“How old were you—when your mom passed?”
“Seventeen. Delia was twenty. She became my temporary guardian, just until I turned eighteen. I moved in with her and her boyfriend, and then they moved to Texas and got married and I went to Arizona and worked my way through school. I wanted to study architecture, but that didn’t really work out.”
“So many things we want don’t seem to work out,” I said soberly.
“And then other things really surprise you when they do,” he said, and we looked at each other and smiled.
For the rest of the trip, I thought about our stories. It seemed interesting—strange… even fateful, somehow—that they met and intersected in so many different and similar ways. Losing our mothers to cancer, losing our fathers to divorce or grief, finishing school but not starting a real career, getting derailed in early adulthood from the things we’d hoped for.
Of course they weren’t uncommon themes: death, divorce, disappointment, loss. But then add in that our only real family was an older sister, in his case, an older cousin raised like a sister in mine. Add that our homes had dissolved and we hadn’t really been able to create new ones as adults. That our families weren’t the kind that had reunions and holiday gatherings.
And that someone close to use—or closely connected to us—had made choices that put us in danger, affected our lives and livelihoods, created problems that we weren’t responsible for but now had to face, and attempt to fix.
To that end, coffee cups in hand, we approached the commercial building where Napoletti Properties had their office. It was on the first floor, filling up a light, attractive space with windows looking into the street and the building’s central hallway and sleek, pale wood furnishings. Just inside the glass door was a front desk with a good-looking receptionist, who greeted us politely and heard Peter’s request without showing any more surprise than a slight raising of the eyebrows.
“Mr. Napoletti currently manages that property. I believe they’ve owned it for some time,” he said. “Let me see if he has a moment to assist you.”
He stood and walked toward the back of the office, through a grouping of desks that looked like the account manager area of a bank. Two of the workspaces were occupied by professional young women, one of whom had a couple seated across from her with papers scattered in front of them.
At the very back of the room was a large, walled-in office with more windows. We watched as the receptionist approached the office door and knocked, able to see the man who sat behind the large desk but not hear what was exchanged. After a moment, the receptionist returned and asked us if we would follow him. We soon found ourselves in the back office, shaking hands with Mr. Richard Napoletti—“Junior,” he added—and being offered coffee or water before the receptionist slid out and shut the door. We introduced ourselves and sat down in two beautiful Danish modern leather chairs.
“James said you were interested in finding out about some previous tenants at our warehouse building on Commerce.”
Richard Napoletti looked to be in his mid-to-late forties, short and broad-chested with a slight paunch and head bald but for the last ring of short dark hair around the base. He wore a well-fitted navy suit, white shirt and tastefully-patterned tie in shades of blue.
“That’s right,” Peter said. “We talked to a resident this morning who said you’d managed the building for a while, and might be able to tell us something about a group of people who lived there five or six years ago. We’re trying to track down a friend who may have stayed with them.”
Richard eyed us briefly, but was apparently reassured that we weren’t after any
thing he wasn’t willing to give us.
“You’re talking about that group of potheads who rented the loft space for a few years,” he said. “You know somebody involved with them?”
“Maybe. We think our friend was involved with the group for a short time, though we don’t know why.”
This safe answer—Peter, I was learning, was good at safe answers—seemed to please our host.
“I don’t mind telling you about it,” Richard said. “It’s a weird story. I’d just taken over from my parents and was looking for investors to rebuild the place—this was five years ago. We were losing money on it every time property values went up. Have you heard Newark referred to as ‘the next Brooklyn?’” he inquired. We indicated that we hadn’t. “Well, it’s got a lot of potential for development. You saw what’s happening to that street alone, and there’s more like that all over the place. That building is already paying itself off—twenty brand-new units, brand-new facilities and a waiting list. As soon as I took over, I started moving forward with the renovation and had no trouble getting the other renter out—there were only two at that point. A ground floor space was being used as a studio by a kind of artists’ collective, the other was this group. My dad had a soft spot for the whole sixties collective thing. That loft, though.” He shook his head.
“What a complete nightmare. At first they refused to let me in, I had to start eviction proceedings before they’d even open the door. When I finally got one of them to allow me inside, I couldn’t believe it. They’d… well, all I can say is I was glad the whole place was being gutted, because the damage was worse than anything I’ve seen. They were breaking so many laws and codes, it was all I could do to keep my shit together. Pardon me,” he said suddenly, with a glance at me.
“That’s OK,” I said, realizing that he was apologizing for swearing. “I hear it all the time.”
He grinned, looking much more likeable.
Spiders in a Dark Web Page 10